History
It had its origins in the more rural and financially supportive Labourer’s Friend Society, founded in 1830 by Benjamin Wills
This was refounded under royal patronage in 1844 as the Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes, by Lord Shaftesbury and Robert Benton Seeley, to provide sanitary accommodation for deserving poor workers
It became the 1830 Housing Society in 1959, and was taken over by the Peabody Trust in 1965
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What was reforming about it?
Unlike many similar societies, it concerned itself “not only to erect model buildings, but to renovate old and ill-arranged houses in the worst localities, and to clean and ventilate courts and alleys” (Arthur Scratchley, A Practical Treatise on Savings Banks, 1860)
Where in Bloomsbury
It built model housing in Streatham Street, and, according to Scratchley, also ran a lodging-house in George Street, and renovated eleven houses in Clark’s Buildings in about the 1850s (Arthur Scratchley, A Practical Treatise on Savings Banks, 1860)
In the twentieth century, it was based in Bloomsbury, at 45 Doughty Street
Website of current institution
It was absorbed into the Peabody Trust, www.peabody.org.uk (opens in new window)
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Books about it
It published its own journal, the Labourers’ Friend Magazine, which continued even after the Society had become the Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes in 1844
Archives
Most of the records of the Society are held as part of the Peabody Trust records in London Metropolitan Archives, ref. ACC/3445; details are available via Access to Archives (opens in new window)
Some building plans, apparently not including Bloomsbury buildings, are held by Lambeth Archives; details are available via Access to Archives (opens in new window)
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