3. The 1923 Market Stampede

On 7 October 1923, when Club Row Market was at its peak of business, an alarm sounded. According to contemporary press accounts, an irrational panic suddenly affected the three or four thousand people crowded into Sclater Street. Pandemonium broke out, with shouts of “Earthquake”, “Runaway horse,” and “Man with revolver.” “They came round the corner like horses coming round Tattenham Corner” declared one eyewitness, referring to the famous Epsom Racecourse. The upheaval caused a stall selling petrol to be knocked over, resulting in an explosion that maimed and killed scores of birds, with hundreds more cats and dogs being trampled by the crowd. It is estimated that between 700 and 2,000 birds were released or killed, either as a result of the stampede or in the aftermath when many injured birds were put to death by their sellers.

The following day, the Dundee Evening Telegraph reported that in addition to the injuries to animals, eleven people had been “seriously hurt” and more than a hundred slightly injured. One of the victims was a twelve-year-old girl named Millie Silverman who was tending to a box of tortoises at one of the stalls. When the mob advanced, the Telegraph noted, she threw herself over the box to protect them “at the cost of her own life.” Despite lasting perhaps only two minutes, the stampede had a severe financial cost for the market traders. In the chaos, over £200 (equivalent to about £20,000 today) was lost, being either looted or pickpocketed in the confusion.

The stallholders at Club Row were understandably devastated as they contemplated their stalls, many of which had been completely crushed. Although the police blamed the stampede on “a rough game of crown-and-anchor” (a gambling game) between rival gangs and regulars at the bird fair, the market sellers took a different view. A canary importer and market trader named Arthur Howard, reported the Daily Mail, had suffered the worst losses. “We all know that there are gangs in these parts,” stated Howard, “but I know them and I know that injury to animals and children genuinely upsets them.” The prevailing view was that the stampede had in fact been triggered by a brawl between honest and dishonest canary sellers.

At around this time, Club Row Market began to attract international interest, with many newspapers and books describing Club Row as, in the words of the Halifax Evening Courier, “the most famous bird market in the world.” The 1923 Market Stampede was covered extensively in a number of foreign newspapers, including France’s Le Populaire, as well as regional newspapers such as the Belfast Newsletter. With a rise of investigative journalism in the UK at the turn of the century, scores of writers ventured into the miserable slums of the East End to document the lives of the poorest in England and write fanciful accounts of their experiences. Partly in response to the spotlight that these investigations shone upon the East End, national organizations such as the RSPCA and the RSPB began to investigate the dealings at Club Row, which led in turn to pressure for a bill in support of animal rights that would put an end to the market.