History of Kilburn and West Hampstead

This was the Coroner’s opinion of David Miller, who had failed to help his lodger rescue two of her young children from a fierce fire that gutted 90 Willesden Lane. The blaze was discovered shortly before 2pm on Friday 19 June 1908. No. 90 still stands, in a parade of three-storey shops with flats above, between Torbay Road and Callcott Road. In 1908 it was occupied by David who ran his tailoring business on the ground floor. He occupied the basement and first floor, while Annie and Alfred Reid paid Miller a weekly rent of 6 shillings and 6d for the rooms on the second floor. 90 Willesden Lane today (Dick Weindling, 2020) David Miller’s father Abraham was born in Poland and came to England in the 1870s. He was a tailor living in Mile End in 1881 with his wife and five children; David was the youngest, just four months old, born in or near Spitalfields. Abraham Miller had moved to 90 Willesden Lane by 1899, when he advertised his business in the local paper, offering a var...