Bermondsey heroine Ada Salter has been awarded a blue plaque, after years of deliberation about where it could go – given all but one of the buildings that had a connection to her have either been bombed or pulled down.
Social reformer, politician and environmentalist, Ada Salter was the first female councillor to be elected in Bermondsey. She was later elected mayor of the area, 100 years ago last year, making her the first female mayor in London.
English Heritage has now put up a blue plaque in her honour – an action which has gained the support of actor Dame Judi Dench, who, like Ada, was a quaker.
She said: “As a champion of environmentalism and the welfare of others, Ada was a force to be reckoned with. We have so much to thank her for and so much that we can still learn from her. I’m delighted to help bring this heroic woman into the public eye.”
Dench is also a patron of the 2022 Salter Centenary – which celebrates 100 years since Ada became Bermondsey mayor and her husband, Alfred Salter, became an MP.
The coordinator of the Salter Centenary, Sheila Taylor, met up with Dench in her garden in Surrey, as she was unable to travel to the official unveiling due to unforeseen circumstances.
“As we chatted over tea at her house,” Sheila said. “we discussed Ada’s view that contact with nature was essential for mental health and Judi commented that: ‘Ada was so far ahead of her time.’ Ada is best known for planting hundreds of trees in the old Borough of Bermondsey.
Sheila and her husband Graham, who is writing a book about Ada, said they were both overjoyed: “Following our year of Salter Centenary celebrations, I think it’s brilliant that we now have this permanent tribute to Ada. Being unveiled on International Women’s Day, Graham feels it also celebrates all the Sisters of the People, who came from across the country to help the poor of London.”
But Sheila told the News that the decision had been delayed. “To receive an English Heritage blue plaque there must be an existing building that has a provable connection to the person – but this hasn’t been easy in Ada’s case,” she explained.
“When she first came to Bermondsey, before she could get a flat of her own amongst the people, she was housed in one of the Bermondsey Settlement houses – but these were sadly pulled down in the 1960s.”
Other locations for the plaque could have been the Labour Institute – which was bombed during the war – or the Salter family home at 5 Storks Road.
“The home on Storks Road was where Ada had her lovely garden – that became quite famous. But it was damaged during the war and then pulled down afterwards.”
So where is the plaque? It is in Rotherhithe:
“It’s on 149 Lower Road on one of the remaining houses which belonged to the Bermondsey Settlement. The actual Settlement building, where the men were accommodated, was demolished in the 1960s, but the women lived here.,” Sheila said. “Ada lived at this address for a while when she first came to work at the Settlement.”
English Heritage’s Rebecca Preston said: “Ada Salter’s accomplishments were many, and each one highly significant: from her early proposal for a green belt around London, which with her help went on to become law in 1938 whilst she was vice-chair of the London County Council Parks Committee, to the ambitious housing programme which aimed to make Bermondsey a garden city, and the maternity and child-welfare services which were the foundation of the borough’s municipal health service formed under her watch.
“She believed that gardens and playgrounds were integral to a total public welfare programme. Her open spaces were not just green but ablaze with colour: not least from new strains of hardy dahlia – the ‘Bermondsey Gem’ and the ‘Rotherhithe Gem’ – grown by the borough gardeners in their hundreds.”
The blue plaque can be found on 149 Lower Road, Rotherhithe, SE16 2XL.
Celebrating the life of Ada Salter, a pioneer and social reformer
It seems a shame when the memorials and references to the Salters have gone over to Rotherhithe when much of their good works and home was based solidly in old Bermondsey. As Ada seemed to be a passionate gardener, I’d be interested to know where and how her ‘famous’ garden may have looked.