Walk around London today, and for a major city, the air is generally good to breath. Much of this improvement has been down to the move away from coal as a fuel for heating homes. The change has also been due to the loss of industry from the city, much of which used coal as a fuel source, and some of the worst were electricity generators, which, in the days before any form of national grid, were located across the city, close to where electricity was needed.
My grandfather was the superintendent of two of these electricity power stations, both of which were in the area under the authority of the St. Pancras Vestry.
I have already written about the first of these in my post on the Regent’s Park Power Station and the First Electric Lighting in Tottenham Court Road, and for today’s post I am exploring the second of these, the much larger King’s Road Power Station, which my father photographed in 1951:
The photo was taken in Camden, at the junction of Royal College Street and Georgiana Street, just by where Lyme Street meets Georgiana Street.
The following photo shows the same view, 73 years later in 2024:
There is a new building in the final stages of construction on the site of the power station, although the view is now obscured by trees which were not there in 1951. The road layout is the same, although the streetlamp in the middle of the road, surrounded by bollards, has gone. The alignment of the footpath and kerb on the right, where Royal College Street meets Georgiana Street is exactly the same.
The 1951 photos shows something you could not do today, as a mother is pushing a pram with a child along what appears to be the middle of the street:
Given that the photo was taken 73 years ago, the child in the pram must now be around 75 years of age. I wonder if they still live in Camden?
I have marked the location from where my father’s 1951 photo and my 2024 photo were taken, with the red circle in the following map of the area today, with the red dotted rectangle showing the block of land occupied by the King’s Road power station (© OpenStreetMap contributors):
The new building which occupies the site of the power station:
Before the construction of the building shown in the above photo, the site was occupied by small industrial units.
The St. Pancras Vestry was at the cutting edge in the generation and use of electricity in London, and wanted to provide electricity across St. Pancras, and show residents what could be done with this new form of power.
In March 1891, there was an “Electrical Exhibition” held in the Vestry Hall of St. Pancras, which was open to the public, and ran for several days. The London Daily News reported that:
“The display of electrical appliances was as beautiful as it was complete; it must have astonished more than nine-tenths of the people present, for the simple reason that comparatively few are aware of the rapid progress made since 1885 in electric lighting, decorative as well as merely utilitarian, and in the use of electricity as a mechanical force.”
The article mentioned that the 260,000 inhabitants of St. Pancras are not the only persons interested in electrical enterprises, but that every municipality will sooner or later be taking the same approach.
The Vestry had a plan to build four power stations to serve St. Pancras. The first power station was the Regent’s Park power station, explored in my earlier post, close to the Euston Road and bounded by Longford Street and Stanhope Street.
The King’s Road Power Station was the next to be built, and in an interesting take on the costs of electricity provided by private or municipal organisations, it was reported at the time that with electricity generated by the St. Pancras Vestry, “the price is to be one-sixth lower than that charged by the private companies, of which there are now twelve or thirteen in London; but it is believed that the price many be considerably lowered by the time the four central stations which it is proposed to build in St. Pancras are in full working order”.
The Electrical Exhibition at the Vestry Hall was full of the household and industrial wonders that could be powered by electricity, including what was described as a new word, the “electrolier”, a new light that would hang from the ceiling and take the place of the gas chandelier.
The Vestry started to build the power station on a large site, which had been occupied by industrial buildings, in 1893, and the first electricity was generated two years later in 1895. It was designed to burn both coal along with commercial and industrial rubbish.
If you know the area, you may well be wondering why the power station was called the King’s Road Power Station?
The following map from 1895 should help explain. Firstly I have outlined the site of the power station using red dotted lines, and you will see that only part of the overall site was occupied by the power station, with terrace houses still running along Royal College Street. This was the first phase of the power station, and over the coming decades it would grow to take over the whole block as electricity demand increased.
Regarding the name, the red arrows point to what was King’s Road. This street was renamed in the early 20th century (I suspect to avoid a clash with King’s Road in Chelsea), and today is St Pancras Way (Map ‘Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland“):
You will see that the first phase of the power station faced the Regents Canal and the large area of railway coal depots, and this was one of the reasons why the power station was located here – the easy access to supplies of coal, whether delivered to the power station via train to the depot opposite, or along the canal from Regents Canal Dock (now Limehouse Dock), brought in from the north east of the country using colliers.
St. Pancras were a large consumer of coal, and frequently invited tenders for the supply of coal. For example, a 1937 advert in the St. Pancras Gazette, the Metropolitan Borough of St. Pancras (as the old Vestry had evolved to through local government changes) invited “Tenders for the supply of Coal for the Electricity Generating Station, the Public Baths and other Departments”.
In the first decades of the 20th century, the use of electricity was growing rapidly, and in February 1914, at a meeting of St. Pancras Borough Council “The Electricity Committee recommended ‘That the proposals for extensions at the King’s-road electricity generating station be approved and adopted, and that authority be given for the preparation of the necessary specifications, and for the invitation by advertisement of tenders for the boilers and steel work.”
The recommendation was approved, and the power station was extended, now including the area once occupied by the terrace houses along Royal College Street.
The King’s Road power station eventually took on the final form as shown in the following extract from the 1951 OS map (the red circle shows the position from where the 1951 and 2024 photos were taken, the power station is now labeled St. Pancras Generating Station, as by 1951, King’s Road had been renamed St. Pancras Way (Map ‘Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland“):
Having a power station in the heart of the borough of St. Pancras was a wonderful innovation for residents in that they now had a regular supply of electricity to power all the innovative new appliances for use in the home, and to power the industry of the area, however there was one major problem – grit.
Before burning, coal was pulverised to turn it into a black dust that was blown into a combustion chamber where it rapidly burnt, thereby creating the heat for the boilers, where water was turned into steam to power the electricity generators.
Some of the pulverised coal, and the end results of burning coal were expelled via the chimneys of the power station, and being heavier than much of the gasses produced as a result of combustion, this fell as grit in the local area.
Newspapers were full of letters to the editor, campaigns, and reports of the problems that this grit caused to those living in the area. For example, in July, 1928:
“A LONDON GRIT COMPLAINT – The latest revolt against the dirt and discomfort arising from the use of pulverised fuel for the generation of electricity is at Camden Town, where residents near the St. Pancras Council’s generating station have decided to call a meeting of protest”.
This was following a letter written to the St. Pancras Gazette from Mr. H.R. Williams who was the Councilor for Ward 3. He wrote:
“Dear sir, For a long time past the residents of Ward 3 have suffered a great annoyance from the pollution of the air by the chimneys of the King’s-road generating station. Appeals and petitions have been in vain, and the nuisance from the smoke, grit, soot and ash continues.
A large number of my friends and neighbours – including many shopkeepers – have asked me to form a committee in order to enforce a consideration of their complaint. Will any of your readers who wish to associate themselves with this committee please communicate with me.”
This was a London wide problem, with complaints against nearly all the coal fired power station in the city (for example, see my post on Stepney Power Station, Limehouse, and on Bankside Power Station).
All these power stations were initially built with multiple, smaller chimneys (see the photo of King’s Road power station at the start of the post). The technology of the early 20th century required a chimney per boiler, and as these were relatively low in height, the pollution did not escape high enough into the atmosphere.
When Bankside was rebuilt, it was changed from coal to oil, with a single, much taller chimney. Stepney power station had a new, much taller chimney installed, which at the time was the tallest chimney in London, and the same approach was used with the King’s Road power station, where a much taller chimney was built, which my father photographed when in use:
As well as a single, tall chimney, other measures were introduced to try and restrict the amount of grit that would descend on the residents of St. Pancras.
One such measure was reported in the Holloway press in July 1932: “Grit arrestors and collectors, at a cost of £3,825, are to be fitted at the St. Pancras Generating Station in King’s Road”.
Whilst the tall chimney and the grit arrestors and collectors helped, it was impossible to get rid of all the pollution from a coal fired power station that would fall on the residents of the area.
When my father took these photos, he was working as a Draughtsman for the St. Pancras Borough Council Electricity and Public Lighting Department in nearby offices in Pratt Street. I wrote about these offices, and the work that took place in the building, along with photos from the roof of the building, in my post on the View from Pratt Street, Camden.
A photo I did not feature in the previous post was the following photo showing part of the power station and some of the original chimneys, along with the gantries at the corner of the power station, which were also marked on the OS map. The map also shows a “hopper” adjacent to the gantries so it may have been here that coal was fed into the power station:
The photo shows just how close this major generator of electricity was to the dense terrace houses of the surrounding area.
One of the buildings in the above photo has a set of adverts on the side, for National Savings and Oxo. I cannot identify the advert at top right:
Despite all the complaints about the pollution generated by the power stations, there were concerns that it might be forced to close down.
In 1928 Parliament had sanctioned electricity proposals which would split the country into electricity areas, and London was in the South-East England area, from the English Channel to the Wash.
Within this area, electricity undertakings were to be divided into three classes, generating stations, distribution centres only, and places to be closed down at once.
The St. Pancras, King’s Road Power Station was defined as a class two station, therefore to become a distribution centre, meaning that the power station would close, and the site used for distributing electricity generated from outside London.
These proposals would not come into effect for a further forty years, but they do define the way a nearby site is used today.
The King’s Road / St. Pancras Power Station was still working into the early 1960s and there seemed no immediate risk of closure, as on the 24th of April, 1963, the power station, which was now part of the Central Electricity Generating Board, was advertising for Boiler Operators.
The Power Station closed in 1968. By the late 1960s there was no need for power stations operating within cities. The national grid had been built to transport electricity across the country. Technology was such that large scale generation was possible within a single site, although city locations did not offer enough space, and power stations were now built out of towns to avoid local pollution.
By 1968, the first nuclear power stations were operating and in the year of the St. Pancras closure, the Ratcliffe-on-Soar Power Station opened in Nottinghamshire. Close to local coal fields and with many times the generating capacity of a small station in St. Pancras.
Coincidently, the power station at Ratcliffe-on-Soar which opened in the same year as the King’s Road / St. Pancras Power Station closed, is due to close in four weeks time, by the end of September, almost at the end of the use of coal for electricity generation.
I suspect those working in the power station, would have left a shift rather thirsty, especially after working in what must have been a polluted atmosphere, and they would probably have frequented the three pubs that surrounded the power stations.
I covered the Golden Lion, on the corner of Pratt Street and Royal College Street in my previous post on the view from Pratt Street, and facing the north-west corner of the power station is the Prince Albert, hiding behind one of the trees that also now obscure the view from where my father took the 1951 photo:
Walking along Georgiana Street, along what was the northern edge of the power station, there is another pub and a bridge:
The pub is the Constitution:
The pub is alongside the bridge, which takes what was King’s Road, now St. Pancras Way, over the Regent’s Canal:
In the above photo, the coal depot shown in the two OS maps was to the left of the canal. Being so close to the coal depot, and the Regent’s Canal provided the King’s Road power station with access to large quantities of coal which could be delivered from coal mines via train or ship / barge.
As shown with an earlier advert, the power station owners would regularly go out to tender for supplies of coal, which could then be delivered by rail, or along the coal.
There was no direct rail line into the power station, if arriving in St. Pancras by train, coal would have been unloaded and transported the short distance by road to the power station.
I wonder if the bridge that carried King’s Road over the Regent’s Canal needed to be strengthened to support these deliveries of coal, as the bridge that now spans the canal was opened a couple of years after the power station started generating:
I did find an account of the opening of the bridge, and there is no mention of the power station, only that the old bridge needed to be replaced due to “increasing vehicular traffic”. The impact of the railways can also be seen on the area, as the Midland Railway Company contributed £6,000 to the construction of the bridge, and that money from the extension of the railway in the area would also contribute to the bridge, so there was no need for any financial contribution from the ratepayers of St. Pancras.
The account of the opening of the bridge is fascinating, as it brings to life the names written on the plaque that is still fixed to the bridge.
There was a marque erected in the bridge, lots of speeches, ceremonial trips over and under the bridge, and then a trip to Reggiori’s Restaurant in King’s Cross “to further commemorate the event”.
The King’s Road power station has left its mark on the area, despite closing in 1968.
Power stations were hubs for the cabling network that distributed electricity to the local area, so when the power station closed, the network was still in place, and the area around the power station became a hub for the distribution of electricity generated from across the country, and that continues to this day with this large brick building:
Which dates from 1936, and has the date on a stone plaque on the wall, as well as the initials of St. Pancras Borough Council:
St. Pancras Vestry, then St. Pancras Borough Council seem to have been one of the more innovative of the local London authorities in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, certainly in the generation and use of electricity they clearly wanted the benefits this would bring to the borough.
The downside was the dirt and general pollution to the local area. My grandfather died relatively young, well before I was born, and I do wonder whether working in such an environment contributed to an early death.
