John Murray: Hodder Headline PLC, 2004. For centuries the East End has been synonymous with poverty and sweated labour, with Cockney solidarity and popular protest. The poverty is still there but now, once again, East London is beginning to reshape itself. Alan Palmer takes us back over 400 years in this great melting pot which was once the very centre of Empire trade. People as well as goods have flowed in and out of it, from the Huguenot weavers of the 17th century to the Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis of today.<p>. Paperback. New.