CHILDREN OF THE POOR IN LONDON 1700 – 1780 Dianne Elizabeth Payne A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of Hertfordshire for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy February 2008 Abstract Poor children are elusive in historical records, essentially invisible and unheard, and there is a significant gap in the secondary literature for the period 1700 to 1780. This thesis uses a range of largely unexplored material to access the experiences of poor children in London. By placing children in the foreground and examining their experiences by reading archival sources ‘against the grain’, it reveals details of individual lives and substantially changes our understanding of growing up poor in eighteenth-century London. Experiences are explored in five areas where poor children were found in significant numbers: in parish workhouses and as recipients of outdoor welfare relief; in the capital’s charity schools; in the Marine Society, a charity that sent poor boys to sea; in casual work and apprenticeship; and in the courts of the criminal justice system. This project re-appraises the contribution of poor children to the life of the capital, incorporates their experiences into the historical record, and creates a rounded and substantial picture of their lives in a variety of situations. The thesis argues that the deep- seated prejudices of the elite, clearly evident in the rhetoric of eighteenth-century social reform, misrepresented and denigrated the children of the poor, a misrepresentation that has been assimilated into the historiography of the capital. It also suggests that recent historiography has given us an inaccurate account of the functioning of charitable institutions aimed at children and a limited assessment of the capital’s apprenticeship and criminal justice system. ii Contents Tables, charts and illustrations v Acknowledgements vii Abbreviations viii Introduction 1 1700 to 1780 4 Childhood or children? 5 The children of the poor 12 Elite perceptions of ‘the children of the poor’ 19 ‘Poor’ London 26 A new perspective 32 1. Parish and Workhouse Children 38 Eligible for relief 43 Who is responsible? 48 Workhouse entry and discharge 51 The ‘workhouse family’ 55 Experiences of the workhouse child 58 The workhouse regime 60 a. Nursed by the parish 67 b.Workhouse education 72 c.Workhouse labour 74 d.Workhouse religion and discipline 76 A workhouse tragedy 80 Outdoor relief 81 Relief on demand 85 Conclusion 87 2. London’s Charity School Children 92 A new free school 95 Entry procedure 99 ‘Objects of charity’ 105 Charity school uniform 109 Education versus labour 112 A ‘fine example of an institution’ 115 iii School staff 117 Discipline 122 Public occasions 126 Education and the uses of literacy 129 Conclusion 132 3. Marine Society Children 136 Charities in competition 139 The reality behind the rhetoric 144 The boys’ registers 150 The ‘criminal’ boys 155 Home backgrounds 159 Schoolboy recruits 162 Recruits in employment 164 Conclusion 167 4. Children at Work 170 Casual employment 173 Apprenticeship 179 a. Parish apprenticeship 180 b.Charity school apprenticeship 184 c. Foundling Hospital apprenticeship 188 d. Bridewell Apprentice School 194 A typical apprentice? 199 Apprenticeships for girls 207 Conclusion 212 5. Children and the Criminal Justice System 216 The Age Problem 218 Death or Transportation? 220 Innocent or Guilty? 233 London’a Child Thieves 238 Child Witnesses 260 Child Victims 269 a. Clothes Theft 269 b. Murder 272 c. Rape 278 Conclusion 288 Conclusion 291 iv Bibliography 313 Tables, charts and illustrations Tables 1.1 Chelsea Workhouse: Admissions of Children Aged 3 to 14 Years, 52 1743 – 1780. 1.2 Chelsea Workhouse: Reasons for Admissions of Children 53 Aged 3 to 14 Years, 1743 – 1780. 1.3 Chelsea Workhouse: Reasons for Discharge of Children Aged 3 54 to 14 Years, 1743 – 1780. 1.4 Chelsea Workhouse: Residents on 5 February 1745, 1755 and 1765. 56 1.5 Mortality-rate for children aged 4 and under born or received in 69 Chelsea Workhouse 1743 to 1769. 2.1 Occupations of fathers of boys attending Peter Joye’s Charity 106 School, 1705 – 1707. 3.1 Marine Society Recruits, 1770-1780. 152 4.1 Marine Society Boys: Occupations of Parents and Literacy Claimed 176 by the Boys. 4.2 Marine Society Boys: Working for their Father or a Close Relative. 177 4.3 Foundling Hospital Children Apprenticed, 1760 – 1770. 190 4:4 Foundling Hospital Children Apprenticed and Fees Paid, 190 8 July 1767 – 5 June 1771. 4.5 Apprenticeship and Work Experience Recorded in the Settlement 201 Examinations of St Luke’s Parish, Chelsea. 5.1 Punishments of children aged 8 to 15 and ‘boys’ and ‘girls’ for 222 theft at the Old Bailey, 1740 - 1759 5.2 Murder cases involving child victims aged 3 to 15 . 273 v 5.3 Prosecutions for Child Rape at the Old Bailey, 1730 – 1779. 281 Illustrations 3.1 Engraving of the Marine Society’s Office by J.B. Cipriani (1758). 143 3.2 Engraving by Samuel Wade, Picturing Marine Society Boys, Britannia 147 and Charity in Hanway, Three Letters (1759) and others. 5.1 Dr Dodd and Joseph Harris at the place of Execution. 231 vi Acknowledgements I would like to thank Tim Hitchcock, who has supervised this research, for his enthusiasm, guidance and invaluable support throughout this project. I am also grateful to the many friends at the Long Eighteenth-Century Seminar at the Institute of Historical Research who have encouraged me to discuss my work and offered useful advice and suggestions. My thanks go also to Roland Pietsch who generously gave me access to his database of the early years of the Marine Society. I am grateful to the Arts and Humanities Research Council who have provided funding for this research and to the staff of the Guildhall Library, the London Metropolitan and the Westminster City Archives, the National Maritime Museum and the British Library, who have always been informative and helpful. vii Abbreviations GL Guildhall Library LMA London Metropolitan Archive NA National Archive NMM National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London OBP Old Bailey Proceedings : consulted at www.oldbaileyonline.org prior to 1 May 2007 WCA Westminster City Archive CSBE Chelsea Settlement and Bastardy Examinations, 1733-1766 , Tim Hitchcock and John Black (eds), London Record Society 33, (London, 1999). CWAD LMA, X/15/37, ‘Chelsea Workhouse, Admissions and Discharges, 1743-1799’, a transcription of the original records made by Tim Hitchcock in 2003, consulted prior to 1 May 2007 at www.http://users.ox.ac.uk/~peter/workhouse/Chelsea/Chelsea1734 . viii INTRODUCTION In 1748, seven year-old Francis Eldridge lived in the parish of St John’s Hackney in London. His parents, like many poor parishioners in the capital, were not permanent ‘objects of charity’, but in times of crisis were forced to rely on the parish. Francis had an unsettled childhood. His father absconded more than once and warrants went out for his arrest for refusing to support his family. Francis spent several short periods in the workhouse and watched his mother, Susannah, negotiate with the parish authorities over welfare relief for herself and her four children. Susannah knew her rights, so pushed, manipulated and even made false claims to gain assistance. When the parish was generous, Francis received several pairs of new shoes and various items of clothing, as well as a flock bed and blanket to share with his brothers and sister. At the age of ten, he was sent to the neighbouring parish of Shoreditch for a trial apprenticeship with a weaver, but it was unsuccessful and he returned home. Only children sent out from the workhouse were entitled to parish apprenticeships and Francis had already experienced the stigma of being a workhouse inmate, symbolized by the badge sewn on his clothing labelling him as a ‘parish’ child. So when circumstances were not desperate, Susannah ignored repeated instructions to take him there for re-admission. They were both astute enough to realize that by avoiding a parish apprenticeship, he could still take casual employment and contribute to the family income. Susannah, nevertheless, valued outdoor relief, and despite not always being entitled to it, made constant applications. After the birth of her fifth child, Francis looked on as his mother’s bogus demand for lying-in expenses was refused. When her claim of desertion by her husband was also found to be false, Francis, 1 like the rest of the family, experienced more straitened circumstances as parish relief was withdrawn. Susannah continued to seek support from the authorities over a number of years but her requests were invariably refused. 1 This story is taken from the archive of the parish of St John’s Hackney and in its original form was a series of entries in the minute book of the workhouse management committee. Most social historians dealing with documents of this kind read them from the point of view of the person who wrote them, drawing conclusions about administrators or benefactors and occasionally about the lives of the poor. But historical sources such as this can be read in other ways. Instead of viewing a document through the lens of the official who wrote it, it can be read ‘against the grain’, in ways not intended by the author. 2 This enables the historian to adopt a different focus, to see events from an alternative angle, to question the text and to consider what has not been recorded. In the story as told here, Francis Eldridge, a child, was placed in the foreground and his experiences became the point of focus. By collating details from the workhouse minutes over an eight-year period, his life and experiences were retrieved for the first time.