THIS photograph of Mary Smith, the East End knocker-up wielding a pea shooter, was taken by Sidcup photographer John Topham in 1931.

He was a policeman at the time and, although it was against the rules, he carried a camera.

He sold the picture to the Daily Mirror for £5 and it changed his life.

Setting himself up as a freelance photographer, Topham began to document urban life on the expanding edges of south-east London.

He took pictures of ordinary people doing ordinary jobs, before moving on to rural life.

He came into his own in the Second World War, with images which still stir powerful emotions.

Topham worked continually from 1931 to 1973, documenting (in his words) “the little things of life, the way it really was”.

By the time he retired, Top, as he was known, had accumulated a legacy of 121,228 negatives, of which the first 20,000 or so were glass plates.

I wonder how many News Shopper readers saw the documentary on the work of John Topham on The One Show on the BBC.

Presented by Angellica Bell, it featured interviews with Top’s daughter Glynne Topham, and Alan Smith of the TopFoto Gallery which bought his entire body of work when Top retired.

Also on the show was Terry Irish, one of the last surviving children pictured in a trench, sheltering in the hop fields of Kent as the Battle of Britain raged overhead.

Topham died at his home in Edenbridge in 1992 but how pleased he would be to know his work is on display every day at the Topfoto Gallery in Edenbridge, in the same building as the family-owned image library which began with his collection.

The picture of Mary Smith is included in the collection.

She woke up very early (sometimes as early as 3am) to rouse sleeping people so they could get to work on time.

Most knocker-ups used a long light stick, often bamboo, with a piece of wire at the end to reach windows on higher floors.

Mary, and her daughter Molly Moore, used a long rubber tube as a pea shooter and shot dried peas at their clients’ windows in the East End of London.

They were paid a few pence for this job and would not leave a window until they were sure their client had woken up.