The Pearly Kings and Queens of London are part of the very fabric of the city since Victorian times. Representing working class history and tradition, these flamboyant characters have been raising money for charity, as well as people’s spirits, for 150 years.

Firmly embedded into popular culture, whether it’s doing The Lambeth Walk in the musical Me and My Girl, or baffling the watching world at the London Olympics opening ceremony, the Pearlies are as much a part of London as Big Ben or the Changing of the Guard. However, who really knows much about them? What motivates them to dress up in Mother of Pearl outfits and ‘Roll Out the Barrel’ at the drop of a hat?

Well, London City Mice were determined to find out, and who better to help us navigate the subject of London’s other ‘royal family’ than Clive Bennett, the Pearly King of Woolwich.

It was Clive, on behalf of the Pearly Society, who actually organised this year’s annual Harvest Festival knees-up in Guildhall Yard in September to raise money for charity. If you didn’t get to see it you missed out on maypole dancing, Morris dancing, military bands, rock choirs, Can-Can dancers and of course, a right royal Cockney knees-up where Maybe It’s Because I’m a Londoner was sung with great pride by the Pearlies themselves.

If ever someone was a template for a ’cheeky chappie’ Cockney, it was Clive. Always wearing a smile, with a quip and story for every occasion, and a pair of spoons on standby for an emergency rendition of It’s a Long Way to Tipperary, he was the real Pearly deal.

Clive, tell us how the Pearlies came about?

1875, in the Somers Town area, a young lad, Henry Croft was his name, brought up in a workhouse, and at about 14 years old he got a job in the markets. He was employed as a street sweeper, ratcatcher, so they say. He made friends with the costermongers, the market traders at the time.

Now the market traders all looked after one another, there was no welfare state, and he quite liked that. He also saw they wore a flash of buttons down the sides of their trousers and across the pockets, and he saw how that attracted attention. So, he just started sewing buttons on his rag tag work clothes.

They had collecting days, carnival days, going out collecting for charity, dressed up. So, he joined in with that. He started collecting money for where he was brought up in the workhouse. Then other charities wanted him to start collecting for them. So, he started asking his friends off the markets (for help) and eventually they got one for every London borough.

So how did you become a Pearly King?

The Pearly Queen of Royal Greenwich was looking for a consort, so she asked me. The old tradition was Pearly Pride. So, like a pride of lions, you’re a member of a family, but you’re not a king or queen. I had to do an apprenticeship for a year and a half. Turning up, watching and learning. You don’t have to do a test or anything. Luckily enough, the Woolwich title was vacant, so it got offered to me.

Does every London borough have a Pearly family?

Unfortunately, not. The sad thing is families who have had Pearlies for a borough, and they pass away and gradually it filters out. We’ve got the Fulham title and the Barnet title again from hunting them down, but we always need more. I’d say [there are] 50 or 60 working Pearlies. Dr Vanessa Vallely, she’s quite big in the City, is the Queen [of the City of London].

It sounds like real Royalty where it’s passed down?

Yeah, it’s like the Seven Kingdoms, isn’t it? There’s probably a couple of families. I was invited in, so I was the first of my line. My daughter’s in it. She’s a princess and my wife’s my queen. There’s a couple of two generational and three generational families in our group. You usually die a Pearly. Very few people give it up.

What kind of charities do you support?

Last year, we gave £29,000 away to something like 40 different charities. Usually to smaller ones but some give to the RNLI, Air Ambulance, hospices, care homes, children’s homes. Every Pearly King and Queen gives to different charities. We collect through the year, and I give to: the Greenwich & Bexley Community Hospice; a charity in Woolwich that helps you out with a shower, clothes and legal advice; and a prostate cancer charity, and every now and again you’ll give to someone else who pops up. We go into a lot of care homes. We do a lot of talks with the Women’s Institute and the active retirement groups and do regular collecting days.

What’s the best thing about being a Pearly King?

I love it. Me and the wife go into a lot of care homes and we usually get on the dementia ward and it’s wonderful. You walk in there and we tend not to do too much in the way of talking about history or anything else, they want singing. So, then the feet go, and the legs are going, and they’ll start mouthing the words. The memories are coming back, and we’ve had them up and dancing. Sometimes families are with them, and they come up to us and say, "Oh I don’t know what happened to George. You’ve brought him back to life for half an hour there". It’s wonderful.

What does the future hold for the Pearlies?

Well, the future’s looking very, very bright, I’ve got to say. We did advertise for a little while; do you want to become a Pearly? This is what we’re looking for, and we got in some lovely people. The Queen of Fulham and her two daughters, who are 24 and 19 and they’re very, very keen. We’ve got a youngish fella who took over as the King of Bromley, who’s also the Town Crier of Sevenoaks. He doesn’t sing too much but is very personable.

We’ve got another young lady who’s just taken over our social media and is doing a wonderful job. Everyone decries the young generation, but they’ve bumped everyone up so to speak. We’ve got Instagram, Facebook and Tik Tok.

The interview completed, we decamped to Clive’s favourite pub in the City, the Lord Raglan, where he regaled us with more fascinating stories of his life and yes, we did get the long-awaited rendition of Tipperary on the spoons!

To find out more about the Pearly Society, who they support, or to make a donation, please visit: https://pearlysociety.org.uk/