The arrival of the British German Legion in 1857 led to the decision to create the village of Panmure on the eastern bank of the Buffalo River, opposite the original town of East London. Each soldier was given a building lot there, as well as an acre lot further from the village, and a 10 acre agricultural lot along the Nahoon River. The one acre lots were given no names but slowly evolved titles because of their geographic positions. The lots "to the north end of the town" became known simply as North End.

North End was not included in the original boundaries of the East London municipality in 1873 but was incorporated in 1876 when the Government cleared up certain vexing issues about the town's commonage. In 1881, both North End and Southernwood were included in the new Ward 3. In 1896, North End became a Ward in its own right, while Southernwood and the Quigney together made up Ward 4.

Because of a failure on the part of the Town Council to draw up regulations preventing the subdivision of property, the acre lots in both North End and Southernwood quickly became sub-divided and sold off, causing a rapid devaluation. Indeed, the District Surgeon's report for 1882 pointed out that the two suburbs should have formed the finest building sites in the town but the plots had already been sub-divided to such an extent that there were ten or twelve to the acre, with narrow paths down the centre. The streets, he said, had become no more than tracks which were only twelve feet wide and many ending in a cul-de-sac. The lots would therefore in times to come form the "vilest rookeries" where the "most disgraceful scenes" might be expected in the "dark corners of the town that is to be".

North End was the closest suburb to the East Bank Location. Because there was no regulation to prevent Black persons from renting houses in the town if they had sufficient means, most persons "of colour" tended to migrate to North End because of cheap rents and its close proximity to their kin living in the "location". North End was therefore East London's main mixed neighbourhood.

It was also the home of some of East London's most conservative and segregation-minded townspeople. Councillor Henry Willetts represented Ward 3 for many years and was behind many of the calls to have all the "natives" expelled from the town which, he believed, should be kept as a "European only" domain. These attempts failed because of a colonial law which protected Black people who had acquired the franchise.

Dr Keith Tankard