CLAPTON, a hamlet in the parish of ST-JOHN,
HACKNEY, Tower division of the hundred of OSSULSTONE,
county of MIDDLESEX, 3 miles (N. by E.) from
London. The population is returned with the parish.
It is divided into "Upper and Lower Clapton, and extends
from Hackney church to Stamford Hill: the houses, in
general well, built and respectable, are supplied with
water by means of pipes leading from a reservoir at
Lower Clapton, belonging to the East London Water
Works Company, into which it is conveyed from the
river Lea by a steam-engine. A proprietary chapel was
built at Upper Clapton in 1777, which has lately been
enlarged. There are places of worship for Independents
and Wesleyan Methodists. The London Orphan Asylum,
founded in 1813, for the maintenance and education
of destitute orphans, is a handsome building of
light-coloured brick, consisting of a centre and two projecting
wings, with a lawn in front and gardens behind,
situated on a gentle elevation at Lower Clapton, at the
distance of one hundred yards from the road: the number
of children in this institution at the general annual
meeting held on the 25th of January, 1830, including
boys and girls, was three hundred and thirty-four.