AT THE FORT

In September 1934, David arrived in London — capital city of United Kingdom and fort of the British Empire. He had spent the last four years preparing for his assault on the citadels of domination and power and he was going to succeed, come what may. The London into which he stepped in 1934 was not the glittering, glistening, modern metropolis one would have expected. Certainly, all the trappings of power were there in their full glory — the Palace of Westminster and the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Whitehall, and the Old Bailey — but everything was just a lot greyer, grimier, and grimmer than depicted in history books and travel guides.

The tail-end effects of the Great Depression were still being felt in many quarters and life for the average English family was tough. The city itself was experiencing unprecedented growth, surpassing the eight million mark when David arrived. Indeed, London's population would reach an all-time high in 1939 at 8.9 million. This was fuelled in part by traditional migration from the English countryside and in part by the many Jews who were fleeing Germany and other European cities in the wake of growing anti-Semitism and the rise of Hitler's Third Reich. The trappings of modernity — trams, the London underground, railways — were much in evidence, but there was massive unemployment in the capital. Even women had to go out to find work to supplement the family income; something previously unheard of. London's East End became a ghetto and a hotbed of extreme political ideas, epitomized by the Communist Party of Great Britain at one end of the spectrum and the British Union of Fascists at the other.

The city centre was very congested and lodgings were in short supply. These shortages, coupled with Londoners' preference for a more “rural” lifestyle, led to the city sprawling beyond the County of London into the neighbouring counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, Middlesex, and Surrey. Urban dwellings were typically terraced houses or low-rise, walk-up flats built in and around a large grid. Working-class dwellings were affordable, costing between eight and twelve shillings a week, depending on the location and what floor the lodging was on. Running water was available but there was no hot water or electricity.