Kmflett's Blog

Lenin, the Islington Socialist Church meeting 1907 and the Hackney Bus Garage

Its 100 years since the death of Lenin. The Marx Memorial Library (where Lenin edited Iskra in 1903) held a special event to mark the occasion.

One speaker was Bob Henderson an expert on Lenin’s six visits to London and where he lived and worked.

Some interesting new information has come to light on the occasion in May-June 1907 when Lenin was in London for a conference of the Russian Social Democratic Party. The conference had been hastily re-arranged from Copenhagen and up to 400 delegates attended. It was held at the Brotherhood socialist church, Southgate Rd N1 an area which borders Islington and Hackney.

What was not known until now was where the delegates stayed.

Henderson had discovered that it was a former barracks in Shrubland Rd, Dalston. It had been the HQ of the 7^th Battalion of the Rifle Brigade but they had moved out to Mill Hill in 1904.

The former barracks were opened as a bus garage in 1906 and ended up with London Transport who closed it in 1981 and replaced it with Ash Grove bus depot in the same area which still operates.

While the dates don’t quite match it would appear  that the barracks didn’t become a fully fledged bus depot until 1908 so in 1907 its quite possible that the no doubt rather uncomfortable army accommodation still existed. How the Russian Social Democrats got use of it remains to be discovered

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/lenin-london

Update

thanks to @derekjohnbryant on X who notes what the site is now:

The barracks were in the area of new housing known as Grand Union Crescent to the South of the East end of Shrublands Road