Incidentally, I'm not sure about 'centre of mystique'. It was certainly a pretty notorious centre in its day, but I don't think mystique was its main claim to fame...[
http://londonhistorians.wordpress.c...-misery-clings-to-misery-for-a-little-warmth/]:
"the area certainly continued in its inclinations towards crime, poverty and vice of all persuasions. A stone’s throw from the theatre district of Drury Lane, the local area was home to countless bawdy-houses and streetwalkers, conspiring with swarms of thieves to empty the pockets of passers-by. In 1865, one visitor wrote “all about are men whose countenances and general appearance proclaim them to be thieves and cadgers.” Indeed, crime rates were among the highest across the whole of London, and it was widely acknowledged that “the walk through the Dials after dark was an act none but a lunatic would have attempted.”
I'm pretty sure it had at one time the highest rates of child mortality in London: a newborn had something like a one in three chance of seeing its tenth birthday.