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A spartan regime for desperate people

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The workhouse was 19th century England’s attempt to solve the problem of poverty.England at this time was a thriving industrial centre, but there was still a huge growth in the population that meant thousands of people lived in poverty.Hunger, disease and squalor were a part of everyday life for so many. The government decided to try to stop this and make the country a better place for the poor to live in.

3

Following on from the 1601 Poor Law Act, the 1834 Poor Law Act was passed.

In it was the instruction to all unions to build a place in which all their poor could

be housed.Workhouses were originally meant to be

places where the poor could work in return for food and board but the

workhouse was not a place of comfort for those who were forced to enter them.

Instead they were institutions of terror, in which inmates were harshly treated, put

to work and made to suffer for being a burden. They were essentially being

punished for being poor, and the workhouse served as a deterrent to

being poor.

4

There were several pieces of legislation created to provide relief to the poor, but only two made any real impact upon the lives of the poor

The 1601 Poor Law Act gave local parishes the responsibility of providing for

their poor. The parish was also able to claim assistance to enable them to fulfil their duty of poor relief. The poor relief

was given out the poor in their homes, they were still able to remain at home and

attempt to gain employment.

The 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act was a complete turn around, and a shock to

those who had been quite happy with the 1601 Act. The 1834 Act replaced the "Old

Poor Law", dating from the time of Elizabeth I. The act required the

amalgamation of local parishes into larger poor law unions. These unions

were then responsible for the construction and running of their workhouse.

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The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 also decreed that external relief for the poor was to be stopped within two years, leaving these unfortunates with the choice of the workhouse or starvation.

It was a deliberately ruthless measure, intended to wipe out "pauperism", which was judged to be caused by the idleness, fecklessness, drunkenness, and over-dependence on poor relief of "the lowest class".

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The workhouse was the main objective of this new act. Those claiming relief from their union could now only do so if they gave up their home, lodgings, and all personal property they had. Their relief would be the provision of basic shelter, food and clothing in return for their hard labour.

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The poor were no longer pitied, so all dignity the poor had once held was stripped away.

It was the belief that only the real poor would degrade themselves to such a level, and that the vast majority of poor who had claimed relief before had only done so out of idleness. A sin in the eyes of Victorian society.

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However this was not the case and society was faced with a huge number of inmates.Society and the landscape of the country was now to change forever.The workhouse had arrived.

By 1926 there were some 226,000 inmates in the 600 workhouses.

In 1929 the Local Government Act

abolished workhouses and their unions

passed their responsibilities to

county boroughs and local councils.

9

The Cincinnati Workhouse:

As it was …

as it is

10

People ended-up in the workhouse for a variety of reasons. Usually, it was because they were too poor, old or ill to support themselves. This may have resulted from such things as a lack of work during periods of high unemployment, or someone having no family willing or able to provide care for them when they became elderly or sick.

Unmarried pregnant women were often disowned by their families and the workhouse was the only place they could go during and after the birth of their child.

For many people the workhouse was the place of last resort. Inmates were generally classed as two different groups:

The "impotent poor" were those unable to look after themselves, like the very old, the very young, the sick, crippled, unmarried mothers, the blind and insane.

The "able bodied poor" were those who had no work and therefore did not have any money to live on.

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Life within the workhouse was meant to be harsher than normal. The workhouse itself was built to be grim and intimidating - designed to look and function like a prison. It was the belief that such an environment would act as a deterrent leaving only those in absolute poverty to enter.

As the number of inmates entering grew rapidly, the workhouse became a place of overcrowding

and disease.Admittance to the workhouse was also made a

degrading experience. Initially inmates were segregated into specific groups eg. Men, Women,

Girls, Boys, Elderly, Infirm, Sick.

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This saw families being divided, often never to be reunited or have contact with each other again.

Upon entering the workhouse, paupers were immediately stripped, searched, bathed (under supervision), and given a severe haircut. Their belongings and clothes were taken away. Their own clothes would be washed and disinfected and then put into store along with any other possessions they had and only returned to them when they left the workhouse. Few, if any personal possessions were permitted.

Interior of 1889 Male Vagrants Block, showing cell doors, Stoke-upon-Trent Union

Workhouse

13

Women’s ward , Hackney workhouse 1900

Inmates were then given a workhouse uniform, it was often coarse, dull, simple and as cheap as possible. From here inmates would then be sent to their block.

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Originally, the Poor Law Commissioners expected that workhouse inmates would make their own clothes and shoes, providing a useful work task and a cost saving. However, they probably failed to realise

the level of skill required to perform this and uniforms were more usually bought-in. Uniforms were usually made from fairly coarse materials with the emphasis being on hard-wearing rather than on

comfort and fitting.

For many people the workhouse was the place of last resort. Inmates were generally classed as two different groups:

The "impotent poor" were those unable to look after themselves, like the very old, the very young, the sick, crippled, unmarried mothers, the

blind and insane.The "able bodied poor" were those who had no work and therefore

did not have any money to live on.

15

In later years, the uniform for able-

bodied women was generally a

shapeless, waistless, blue-

and-white-striped frock of cotton

material reaching to the ankles, with a smock over. (Some

wore white aprons and some

did not.)

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Old women wore a bonnet or mop-cap, shawl, and apron over .

They had woollen material shawls to wear, and red flannel petticoats tied around the waist, thick black stockings and black shoes or boots.

17

For many years, certain categories of inmate were marked out by clothing or badges of a particular colour, for example, yellow for pregnant women who were unmarried. In 1839, the Poor Law Commissioners issued a minute entitled "Ignominious Dress for Unchaste Women in Workhouses" in which they deprecated these practices. However, more subtle forms of such identification often continued.

Glasgow

The men wore thick corduroy trousers, thick black jackets and black hats, grey flannel shirts, black thick socks and hobnailed boots.

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Workhouses, though, were never prisons, and entry into them was generally a voluntary although often painful decision. It also carried with it a change in legal status — until 1918, receipt of poor relief meant a loss of the right to vote. The operation of workhouses, and life and conditions inside them, varied over the centuries in the light of current legislation and economic and social conditions.

Prior to the establishment of public mental asylums in the mid-nineteenth century (and in some cases even after that), the mentally ill and mentally handicapped poor were often consigned to the workhouse.

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With such an intimidating building and brutal routine, aversion to the 'house' became extremely strong.The jobs inmates were forced to do was deliberately made to be tedious. Householders within the union area surrounding a workhouse did not wish to pay to keep idlers, so work was seen as a means of keeping them busy, as well as subsidising the cost of relief provided by the union.

A strict timetable was adhered to within the house to ensure everything ran properly.

Rise………………….at 5:45amBreakfast…………...at 6:30am - 7amWork…………………7am till 12 noonLunch.………………from 12 to 1pmWork…………………from 1pm – 6pmSupper and wash….6pm - 6:30pmBed…………………..at 8pm

Southwell Workhouse

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Half an hour after the workhouse bell was rung for rising, the Master or Matron performed a roll-call in each section of the workhouse. The bell also announced meal breaks during which the rules required that "silence, order and decorum shall be maintained" although from 1842 the word "silence" was dropped.

Communal prayers were read before breakfast and after supper every day and Divine Service performed every Sunday, Good Friday and Christmas Day.

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Inmates were given a variety of work to perform, much of which was involved in running the workhouse. The women mostly did domestic jobs such as cleaning, or helping in the kitchen or laundry. Some workhouses had workshops for sewing, spinning and weaving or other local trades. Others had their own vegetable gardens where the inmates worked to provide food for the workhouse.

In rural areas, inmates were sometimes used for agricultural labour.

Other more menial work included: Stone-breaking — the results being saleable for road-making Corn-grinding — heavy mill-stones were rotated by four or more men turning a capstan (the resulting flour was usually of very poor quality) Bone-crushing — this was abolished after the Andover scandal) Gypsum-crushing — for use in plaster-making Oakum-picking Wood-chopping

22

From 1882 all workhouses were given a list of tasks that inmates were supposed to undertake.

Stones were crushed by pounding with a long heavy bar of iron about four feet long (1.2 metres). The stones had to be broken into small enough pieces to pass through the metal grille in the window shown in this drawing.

Oakum picking (unravelling lengths of rope) was commonly done by small children, and the very old. Both tasks left the hands covered in blisters and bleeding.

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Stone-breaking was a task often given to male inmates.

It was physically demanding, the amount performed could be readily measured, and the results could be sold for road-mending.

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Oakum-picking involved teasing out the fibres from old hemp ropes — the resulting material was sold to the navy or other ship-builders — it was mixed with tar and used to seal the lining of wooden ships.

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Apart from stone crushing (for road building) and oakum picking, other types of work were gardening, sewing, corn milling, sack making. They were all typical jobs done within the workhouse.

Bone crushing had also been done until it was banned in 1845 following a scandal whereby the inmates of a specific workhouse were forced to eat the flesh from the non-animal bones to satisfy their starvation.

In 1858 the St Marylebone workhouse (London) hosted the trial of a new invention — Stevens's bread-making machine — which claimed to to make dough more efficiently and hygienically

than by using manual labour.

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However it was typically cooking that was the main job performed by the able-bodied inmates, whilst the aged and infirm were expected to care for and teach the children.

This in-house regime being a great part of the foundation of the workhouse.

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The operation of workhouses, and life and conditions inside them, varied over the centuries in the light of current legislation and economic and social conditions.

The General Workhouse Act of 1723 gave parishes the authority to build their own workhouses or join with other parishes to do so.

The aims of many pre-1834 workhouses are well expressed in this 1776 sign above the door of Rollesby workhouse in Norfolk.

The emphasis in earlier times was more towards the relief of destitution rather than deterrence of idleness which characterized many of the institutions set up under the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act.

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Whatever the regime inside the workhouse, entering it would have been a distressing experience.

New inmates would often have already been through a period of severe hardship.

It was for good reason that the entrance to the Birmingham Union workhouse was through an arch locally known as the "Archway of Tears".

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Admission into the workhouse first required an interview to establish the

applicant's circumstances. This was most often undertaken by a Relieving Officer

who would visit each part of the Union on a regular basis.

However, the workhouse Master could also interview anyone in urgent need of

admission.

Formal admission into the workhouse proper was authorised by the Board of Guardians at their weekly meetings. In

between times, new arrivals would be placed in a receiving or probationary

ward. There the workhouse medical officer would examine them to check on

their state of health.

Those suffering from an illness would be placed in a sick ward.

30

After 1834, workhouse inmates were strictly segregated into seven classes:

• Aged or infirm men. • Able bodied men, and youths above 13. • Youths and boys above seven years old and under 13. • Aged or infirm women • Able-bodied women and girls above 16. • Girls above seven years old and under 16. • Children under 7 seven years of age.

Each class had its own area of the workhouse. Husbands, wives and children were separated as soon as they entered the workhouse and could be punished if they even tried to speak to one another. From 1847, married couples over the age of sixty could request to share a separate bedroom. Children under seven could be placed (if the Guardians thought fit) in the female wards and, from 1842, their mothers could have access to them "at all reasonable times". Parents could also have an "interview" with their children "at some time in each day".

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The workhouse was like a small self-contained village. Apart from the basic rooms such as a dining-hall for eating, and dormitories for sleeping,

workhouses often had their own bakery, laundry, tailor's and shoe-maker's, vegetable gardens and orchards, and even a piggery for rearing pigs. There would also be school-rooms, nurseries, fever-wards for the sick, a chapel, and a dead-room or mortuary. You can get a good idea of the complexity of a

workhouse from old maps or plans. Once inside the workhouse, an inmate's only possessions were their uniform and the bed they had in the large

dormitory.

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Irish workhouses were particularly cramped, with the narrow attic space pressed into service as sleeping space for children as shown here at Londonderry.

For vagrants and casuals, the 'bed' could be a wooden box rather like a coffin, or even just be a raised wooden platform, or the bare floor. In some places,

metal rails provided a support for low-slung hammocks.

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In some workhouses beds were simply constructed with a wooden or iron-frame, and could be as little as two feet across. Bedding, in the 1830s and 1840s at least, was generally a mattress and cover, both filled with straw,

although blankets and sheets were later introduced.

Bed-sharing, particularly amongst children, was common although it became prohibited for adult paupers.

Londonderry

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The inmates' toilet facilities were often a simple privy — a cess-pit with a simple cover having a hole in it on which to sit — shared perhaps by as many as 100 inmates. Dormitories were usually provided with chamber pots or, after 1860, earth closets — boxes containing dry soil which could afterwards be used as fertiliser. Once a week, the inmates were bathed (usually superintended —

another assault on their dignity) and the men shaved.

Londonderry

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Each ward had an open fireplace; a lavatory and water-closet in a recess or lobby; in some instances the latter served for two or three wards. In several cases the grossest possible carelessness and neglect were

discovered in some of these wards.

Thirty men had used one closet, in which there had been no water for more than a week, and which was in close proximity to their ward; and in an

adjoining ward so strong was the ammoniacal smell that we had no doubt respecting the position of the cabinet, which we found dry. In No. 4 ward (female), with 17 beds, the drain-smell from a lavatory in a recess of the

room was so offensive that we suspected a sewer-communication, and soon discovered that there was no trap; indeed it had been lost for some

considerable time.

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The lists of rules under which workhouse operated were often printed and prominently displayed in the workhouse, and also read out aloud each week so that the illiterate could have no excuse for disobeying them. They outlined the daily regime.

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ART. 119.—No written or printed paper of an improper tendency, or which may be likely to produce insubordination, shall be allowed to circulate, or be read aloud, among the inmates of the Workhouse.

ART. 120.—No pauper shall play at cards, or at any game of chance, in the Workhouse ; and the Master may take from any pauper, and keep until his departure from the Workhouse, any cards, dice, or other articles applicable to games of chance, which may be in his possession.

ART. 121.—No pauper shall smoke in any room of the Workhouse, except by the special direction of the Medical Officer, or shall have any matches or other articles of a highly combustible nature in his possession, and the Master may take from any person any articles of such a nature.

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After 1834, the breaking of workhouse rules fell into two categories: Disorderly conduct, which could be punished by a withdrawal for food "luxuries" such as cheese or tea, or the more serious Refractory conduct, which could result in a period of solitary confinement. The workhouse dining hall was required to display a poster which spelt out these rules: Workhouse punishment books record the severity of punishments meted out to inmates.Offences against property, for example breaking a window, received particularly harsh punishment.

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Being "lock'd up" might well mean a spell in the "refractory cell" — this was often underground in one of the workhouse cellars, such as the one at Keighley workhouse

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This notice set out the strict rules for "casual paupers", who were people without jobs staying for a short period in the workhouse.

After 1850 the workhouses mostly contained the "deserving poor", plus a shifting population of vagrants and "casual paupers" kept apart from the others.

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The diet fed to workhouse inmates was often laid down in meticulous detail.

From 1835 onwards, the Poor Law Commissioners issued sample dietary tables for use in Union workhouses. Each

Board of Guardians then used one of these tables as the basis for the particular diet in their own workhouse, subject to the

agreement of the Poor Law Commissioners.

Children and the aged or infirm had a slightly different diet, usually with more meat-based meals, and with inclusion of milk or tea. From 1856, special diets were also provided for children aged from two to five, and from five to nine. Special or medical

cases might require extra or alternative food.

Thus, each workhouse had to cope with at least seven classes of diet for the various categories of inmate, each carefully

measured to comply with the regulations.

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The main constituent of the workhouse diet was bread. At breakfast it was supplemented by gruel or porridge — both made from water and oatmeal (or occasionally a mixture of flour and oatmeal). Workhouse broth was usually the water used for boiling the dinner meat, perhaps with a few onions or turnips added. Tea — often without milk — was often provided for the aged and infirm at breakfast, together with a small amount of butter. Supper was usually similar to breakfast. The mid-day dinner was the meal that varied most, although on several days a week this could just be bread and cheese.

Although healthy in some respects, for example sugar was rare in the

workhouse diet until the 1870s, it was often created from the cheapest ingredients. Milk was often diluted

with water.

Fruit was rarely included.

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Dietary Table:

Breakfast, Supper (same as Breakfast)

Males above 15 years of age - 8 oz. (=gr. 227) of Bread or 6 oz (=gr. 170) of Bread, and 1 pint (=l. 0,56) of Gruel or 1 pint of Broth. -

Females above 15 years of age, Children from 7 to 15 years of age - 6 oz of Bread, and 1 pint of Gruel or 1 pint of Broth. -

Children under seven years of age: For each child under the age of seven months - half pint of Milk and half oz (= gr. 14) of Sugar. For each child between the ages of seven months and two years - half pint of Milk, half oz of Sugar, and 2 oz (= gr. 57) of Bread. For each child between the ages of two years and seven years - half pint (= l. 0,28) of Milk, 4 oz (= gr. 114) of Bread, and half oz (= gr. 14) of Cheese.

44Here is a table showing the diet of children aged two to three in the Rhayader workhouse.

45

These menus had been established in the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act to ensure that the very basic levels of nutrition were met. H.M. Prisons official ration was 292oz (=8,28 kg.)of food per prisoner per week.In the Workhouse this ration was only 137oz (approx.) (=3,9 kg.) of food per inmate per week.

The staples were bread, cheese, gruel (thin oatmeal), soup, potatoes, and very rarely meat and bacon.

Food was also stripped of everything that might have been attractive to inmates. Especially salt.

Bath Workhouse c.1900

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The Governor and Matron shall allot the quantity of provision for each day's consumption agreeable to the following Bill of Fare, shall see them weighed, and properly dressed and distributed.

Sunday:    Broth - meat and potatoes -peas, soup.Monday:   Rice, milk - soup and bread and cheese - mashed potatoes.Tuesday:  Broth - pork and peas pudding or bacon broth.Wednesday:  Milk, porridge - meat and potatoes or bacon and vegetables broth.

Thursday:  Broth, porridge - soup and bread and cheese - mashed potatoes. Friday:  Rice and milk - Ox cheek or legs of beef with potatoes - broth.Saturday: Milk porridge - a clearance of what has been cooked made with bread and cheese - rice milk.

47

Until 1842 all meals were conducted in silence without cutlery. All meals were basic and tasteless, following the same mundane weekly menu.

Meals were usually eaten in a large communal dining-hall which often doubled-up as a chapel.

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In larger workhouses, inmates commonly sat in rows all facing the same way, with separate men's and women's dining halls.

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The poor diet, contaminated water supplies, and unclean and overcrowded conditions led to illness and disease. The most common of these being measles, opthalmia, small pox, dysentery, scarlet and typhus fever, and cholera.

Cholera victims turned blue and had terrible sickness and diarrhoea. At least half of those who caught cholera died. It was spread by unclean drinking water. Dysentery was similar with many victims dying of dehydration.The extract shown below lists the symptoms of Cholera as printed on a warning notice from around 1840. The references to the "extremities of the body" means fingers and toes. "Stagnant" means still or very slow moving, and if the flow of blood around the body is slower than usual it causes the coldness mentioned. Dehydration - loss of fluid from the body.Typhus fever was carried by lice that lived in the hair and clothes. The patient usually had a swollen face, smelt terrible and the skin often turned black.Scarlet fever was common and recognised by headache, fever and a red rash all over the skin.Smallpox usually attacked babies and quite large number recovered. Unfortunately the pus filled blisters often left survivors terribly disfigured.Opthalmia was very common in workhouses. It affected the eyes and left untreated it often led to blindness.

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Before 1863, not a single trained nurse existed in any workhouse infirmary outside London. In the 1860s, pressure began for improvements in workhouse medical care. Some of the most notable campaigners were Louisa Twining, a prominent figure in the Workhouse Visiting Society, Florence Nightingale, and the medical journal “The Lancet”. In 1865, “The Lancet” began a serious of detailed reports about conditions in London's workhouse infirmaries.

Virtually all workhouses had at least a small infirmary block for the care of sick inmates. However, with the exception of the medical officer, early nursing care in the workhouse was invariably in the hands of female inmates who would often not be able to read — a serious problem when dealing with labels on medicine bottles.

51

In some places, the workhouse had a special coffin for transporting bodies to the cemetery. This one at Londonderry had a hole on top where a warning flag would be placed when the coffin contained a body.

52

Any pauper could, on giving three hours notice, leave the workhouse. In the case of a man with a family, the whole family would have to leave if he left. Short-term absence

could also be granted to an able-bodied pauper seeking work. It was not unknown for a pauper to discharge himself in the morning and then return demanding re-admission the same

evening, possibly the worse for wear from drink. Various attempts were made to deal with these "ins and outs", for example by lengthening the amount of notice required.

53

There was actually little to prevent a pauper from walking out of the workhouse, although delaying the return of his own clothes could be used to achieve this — if he left wearing

workhouse clothes, he could be charged with theft of workhouse property and brought before the magistrates. Many

inmates were, however, to become long-term residents of the workhouse. A Parliamentary report of 1861 found that, nation-wide, over 20 percent of inmates had been in the workhouse for more than five years. These were mostly consisted of elderly, chronically sick, and mentally ill

paupers.

54

Changing attitudes towards poverty

Towards the end of the century, attitudes towards the ways in which the poorest people in society were being treated were at last

changing, and conditions were slowly improving.

By that time it was common for children to be taken away from workhouses and placed in children’s homes or in foster homes.

By 1900 the harshness of the workhouse system was under attack from social reformers and charities. The poor were no longer being thought of as being always responsible for their own circumstances

but seen more as victims of the economic and social conditions of the times. The extension of the vote and the election

of more sympathetic MPs led to the beginning of the end of the unforgiving treatment of the poor. Today’s alternative approach to

social welfare was to be set in train by 1911, with the introduction of old age pensions and state benefits.

55

Some workhouses became "Public Assistance Institutions" — continued to provide care for the elderly and infirm and the destitute. In such establishments (often given names such as "The Laurels") this often meant little more than the abolition of uniforms and a little more freedom to come and go.

For many years, the "superintendent" of the Institution would still be referred to as "Master" by the former "inmates", now called "residents".

Even when conditions did improve, living in the workhouse was something that would never lose its stigma.

56Suffolk, Bosmere and Claydon workhouse site, 1904