Devil's Acre

The Devil's Acre was a notorious slum near Westminster Abbey in Victorian London. The Devil's Acre was on and behind Old Pye Street, Great St Anne's Lane (now St Ann's Street) and Duck Lane (now St Matthew Street) in the parish of Westminster St Margaret and St John.

In the 19th century it was considered one of the worst areas of London — in 1850 Charles Dickens called it The Devil's Acre in Household Words. In the same year the term slum was popularised by England and Wales's Cardinal Wiseman based at Westminster Cathedral adjoining the area, when his description of it was widely quoted in the national press.

Westminster has its origins in medieval times. The monks of the Westminster Abbey would offer safe haven to suspected criminals and debtors, leading to the area next to the western gate of the Abbey being called "the Sanctuary". This acquired a reputation for narrow streets and run-down dwellings, as did certain other parts of Westminster in the 18th century.

The area around Old Pye Street, Great St Anne's Lane (now St Ann's Street) and Duck Lane (now St Matthew Street), including most of the properties on those streets, was considered the worst. Prior to the 18th century the area was considered a desirable place to live, but in the middle of the 18th century gardens and courtyards were built over and the streets became "notoriously ill-paved and ill-maintained". Dwellings were built with the cheapest material, lacked ventilation, had poor lighting, and no drainage or sanitation facilities. In particular, poorer parts of the City of London had a lack of night soil affordability which resulted, as in other major cities in the culverting (covering over) of all of its small streams, such as the Tyburn. This created stench in remnant low flood plains of their lowest course which is a particular feature of Westminster, Lambeth Marsh and the lowest areas of the docklands - all of this is visible from a simple contour map which often correlates with Booth's poverty map.

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