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The Poor of the Parish: Social Care in Kingsbury in the Early Nineteenth Century

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The Poor of the Parish: Social Care in Kingsbury in the Early Nineteenth Century The Poor of the Parish: Social care in Kingsbury in the early Nineteenth Century. It would be easy to believe that the care we take for granted under the Welfare State only dates from the 20th Century, but evidence at Brent Archives reveals a different story. Among the many interesting old documents held there are the hand-written Kingsbury Poor Accounts from 1811 to 1829, which give a fascinating glimpse into social care nearly 200 years ago. The Poor Accounts book for St Andrew’s Parish, Kingsbury, from 1811 to 1829. [Source: Brent Archives, ref. 197747/4/1, from which all of the accounts entries below are shown.] From Queen Elizabeth I’s time, under the Relief of the Poor Act of 1597, each English parish had to appoint two Overseers to ensure that poor people in their area were looked after. They raised money based on the value of the property that local people occupied, and kept records of how this was spent. In 1811 Kingsbury’s Overseers were elected at Easter, but a few years later this was changed to a fixed date of Lady Day (25 March) each year, one of the official “quarter days” used for business purposes. Although the Overseers were only elected for a year, some men served the parish in this role for successive years. Samuel Harrison was one of them from 1812 until 1819, while Henry Pope was an Overseer for ten of the twelve years between 1817 and 1828, with seven different colleagues. The signature of Henry Pope, and mark of his fellow Overseer, George Cooper, from a page of the accounts in 1823. Cooper was the only Overseer between 1811 and 1829 who was unable to write. The costs of looking after the poor were met from “Poor Rates”, which were calculated on the value of all land and property in the parish. When extra funds were needed, an “assessment” was made, and the person occupying a property had to pay an amount (usually six pence) for each £1 of annual rental value. In Kingsbury, this usually raised about £90, which would cover expenses for between six and nine months. The extract from the 1 July 1814 assessment (aside) includes an entry for Barnett Collins, whose property value of £40 gave rise to a rates payment of £1 (as before the change to decimal currency in 1971, there were 12 pence in one shilling and twenty shillings in one pound). Edward Davis, one of the Over- seers that year, was a farmer holding several pieces of land with a rental value totalling £246, so that his rates payment was £6-3s. Many of the regular payments made by the Overseers were to support the elderly, orphans and other children. In 1811 widow Mrs Williams was receiving 5s. (five shillings) a week for herself, and a further 5s. for a boy she was looking after, Hobley’s child. The following year, in addition to the weekly amount, the accounts show £1-7s-8d paid for 3 shirts a cap a jacket & trousers for Hobley’s child. The parish was still supporting this illegitimate child of Mary Hobley in 1816, although only at the rate of 3s-9d a week, as the entry paid Mary Giles 8 weeks to June 3 for Hobley’s boy £1-10s shows. By 1825 there were several more children being supported by the parish, and the accounts for that year include: Relieved Sarah Gates child 4 weeks to 18 Sept. 12s, and Relieved Abigail Julings child to Sept. 8 1825, 70 weeks @ 3/-, £11-14s. From the November 1812 accounts. Throughout the years covered by the account book widowed women were a usually among those receiving poor relief. They were not always described as widows, but more detailed entries such as those for October 1814 (aside) confirm their status. We may think that Winter Fuel Payments are a modern idea, but the March 1812 accounts record £3-15s-6d paid for a chaldron [about 1¼ tons] of coals for Mrs Williams & Mrs Perkins. There are other examples where goods were given, rather than money. In 1818 the elderly Mr Hale received relief by way of a twelve shilling pair of shoes and 5s. in potatoes. More unusually, in 1812, 5s-9d was paid for a bottle of wine for Mary Pearce (when ill). 2 Over a century before the National Health Service, the Overseers were employing a surgeon, Mr Arbuckle, to treat the poor. In 1815 they agreed to appoint an apothecary, William Foote, to attend the Poor belonging to this Parish, and all casual poor therein, and to administer medicines. Each of these men was paid a salary of five guineas a year, Midwifery and Venereal cases excepted, for their services. The appointment of Mr Foote, as recorded in the Vestry Order Book in September 1815. [Source: Brent Archives, ref.197747/1.] Costs for maternity care in 1813 included: paid Mary Burr for nursing Eliz. Fuller during her lying in - 10s, paid Fullers wife in her lying in – 6s, and paid Mr Arbuckle for the delivery of Fuller’s wife £1-1s (one guinea). In 1818 the accounts record several payments for Mary Burridge during her confinement in Bethlem, a centuries-old hospital for the “sick of mind” which had recently moved to new premises in Lambeth. These were £4-2s for Tea, a bill for clothing of £3-11s-2d and ten shillings for a horse & cart & man to fetch her. Some poor people did not have a proper home to live in, but they still From the May 1818 accounts. received care, as this entry from the 1823 accounts shows: Paid Mrs Wallis a Bill for nursing a woman at Shoelands in a Barn £3-7s-6d. It was not just for their living expenses that poor people needed help. After showing regular payments to Mary Oldfield in 1812, the final entry for her in the November accounts reads: Paid for the funeral expenses of Mrs Oldfield £1-10s. Death did not only affect the elderly poor. The level of infant mortality was much higher in the 19th Century than it is now, as reflected in the March 1817 entry Paid Funeral expenses of Rance’s child – 15s and Paid for a coffin for Hale’s child £1-7s in 1825. When a man passing through Kingsbury died in 1817, the parish had to pay both funeral costs and £1 for the Expenses of a [n inquest] Jury on the Man that died in Mr Davis field. From the February 1817 accounts. 3 How did the Overseers decide which of the 300 to 400 people living in Kingsbury at this time were poor? It was usually up to the people themselves to apply for relief if they felt that they needed it, and one of the Overseers would accompany them to be examined by a Justice of the Peace (magistrate), who would decide whether they qualified as a pauper and whether Kingsbury, or another parish to which they “belonged”, should pay for their care. The record of Edward Howard’s examination in December 1824, from the Kingsbury Poor Relief Examinations book. [Source: Brent Archives, ref. 197747/1.] During agricultural depressions, when farm labourers were often out of work, applications increased. Accounts for the period April to July 1825 include an entry for Expenses of Overseer to Edgware 10 times with Paupers £1-5s. Able-bodied men were expected to work in return for the money they received, repairing roads in the parish or digging gravel ready for road repairs. Even at just The weekly rates of poor relief for road work, as recorded in the Kingsbury Vestry Order Book in November 1826. [Source: Brent Archives, ref. 197747/1.] five shillings a week for a single man, and nine shillings for a man with a wife and three children, Messrs Burridge, Matthews and Parker all applied for relief work on Kingsbury’s roads in November 1826. Most poor people would be cared for “in the community”, but if they had lost their home as well they might be sent to the nearest workhouse. This may be the story behind an expense of ten shillings in March 1817 described as Attending at Edgware with Wm. Marshall and taking him & his wife & children to Hendon. 4 Overseers were only meant to pay for the parish’s poor, but occasionally gave small amounts to Casual Paupers, and once paid 5s. for a Horse to remove a Pauper to Abbots Langley. Sometimes there were disputes between parishes as to which was responsible for the costs of relief for a particular pauper, and one of the few receipts in the accounts other than for Poor Rates assessed was the following in 1825: Received of St. Stephen’s Parish, St. Albans, amount of expenses incurred under Justices Order of Removal of John Miller £7-10s-2d. The Overseers’ accounts had to be approved by the ratepayers of the parish at a monthly meeting called a “Vestry”. St Andrew’s Church did not have a room of that name, so the Kingsbury meetings were held in a room at the Plough Inn, with ten shillings spent each time on Expenses of Vestry. Even more was spent to encourage people to attend the annual elections, with the April 1812 accounts including a bill of Dinner Expenses on Easter Tuesday to nominate Parish Officers £4-3s. Certificate of the Churchwardens and other men of the parish who had seen and allowed the Overseers accounts at the Vestry meeting in October 1814. By the early 1830’s, soon after the accounts book at Brent Archives was full, Parliament decided that the old system of Poor Relief had become too expensive, with about 10% of the population nationally classified as paupers.
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