c ' Abstract This thesis is a study of the changing role which Toynbee Hell, the first university settlement, played in East London between 1884 and 1914. The first chapter presents a brief biography of Sainiel Augustus Barnett, the founder end ft ret warden of the settlement, and analyzes his social thought in relation to the beliefs which were current in Britain during the period. The second chapter discusses the founding of the settlement, its organiza-. tion&. structure and the aims which underlay its early v&rk. The third chapter, concentrating on Iliree residents, C.R. Ashbee, .H. Beveridge and T. dmund Harvey, shows the way in which subsequent settlement workers reformulated these aims In accordance with their own social and economic views. The subsequent chapters discuss the accomp1Ishnnts of the settlement in various fields. The fourth shows that Toynbee Hell's educational program, iich was largely en attempt to work out Matthew Arnold's theory of culture, left little i.mpact on the life of E85t London. The fifth chapter discusses the set tlanent residents' Ineffectual atteuts to establish contact with working men's organizations. The final chapter seeks to demonstrate that In the field of philanthropy the resident a were far nre success-. fu]. than in any other sphere in adapting the settlement to changing social thought. / ( Canon Barnett and the First Thirty Years of Toynbee Hall Exnily K. Abel Queen Mary College University of London PI4D t9 3 Table of Contents Key to Abbreviations Used in the Footnotes and the Text 4 Introduction .5 I. Canon Barnett 8 II. The Founding and Organization of Toynbee Hall 9.5 III. Major Trends in the History of the Settlement 147 IV. The Settlement's Educational Program 200 V. Toynbee Hall's Ties with Working I'en's Associations 248 VI. The Pole of Settlement Residents on Philanthropic Organizations 268 Appendix: Toynbee Hall Residents, i88+ - 1914 315 Bibliography 333 4 Key to Abbreviations Used in the Footnotes and the iext. Organizations. C.O.S. - Charity Organisation Society I.E.A. - Workers' . ducationa]. Association Persons. F.G.B. - Francis Gilinore Barnett H.0.B. - Henrietta Octavia Barnett S.A.B. - Samuel Augustus Barnett W.H.B. - William Henry I3everidge O.H. - Octavia Hill T.E.H. - Thomas .dmund Harvey Reports end Periodicals. Annual Reports - Toynbee Hall, Annual '(eports Record - The Toynbee Record 5 Introduction A study of Toynbee Hall between 1884 and 1914 helps to illuminate venous aspects of the soda], history of the period. The settlement is significant first becaise it attempted to rk out the social and economic doctrines of the 1880's. Embodying the beliefs held. by a siiif leant proportion of informed opinion, it was hailed at its foundation as one of the most constrictive attempts to deal with the novel problems created by urbanization and industrial- ization. An analysis of the activities undertaken by the residents in the fields of education and. philanthropy thus reveals the extent to which the social thought of the time proved, relevant to the problems actually confronting the society. Toynbee hail can also be viewed as a force in the history of social reform In Britain. Although members of an institution established with precise als, the residents sought to remain responsive to the changing climate of social opinion. 1oreover, as the settlement vrkers gradually recognized the futility of sme of the settlement's activities, they themselves helped to shape the social thought of the period. By 1914 many of the residents were involved in t3'pes of social work which the founders would have considered inappropriate to a university settlement. The history of the changing concerns of the residents demonstrates the way in which the nation's ideas about the nature of poverty in an industrial society slowly developed. r-- 6 Two works have generally be en regarded as the stand ard urc 08 for Toynbee Hall. Both, however, are Inadequate. Henrietta Barnett's two-volume biography of Canon Barnett, while incorporating a considerable amount of primary material, is highly subjective. Mrs. Barnett misconstrued large aspects of the life of her husband and many of her facts are inaccurate. kost seriously, she edited Bernett's personal letters. Some of her revisions were relatively minor. She substituted complete words for his abbreviations, corrected his punctuation and spelling, and added a few words and phrases for clarity. It is more siificant, however, that she rewrote many sentences and frequently canbined several letters into one, thus obliterating a sense of the progression of ernett's thought. The collection of his letters, formerly in the possession of his nephew, Mr. S.H.G. Barnett, and now available at the Greater London County Record Office, pennits the historian to revise the portrait which she presents. Toynbee Hall: Fifty Years of ocia1 Progress, 1884 - 1934 by J.A.R. Plinlott is not as deliberately misleading as Henrietta Bernett's work. It suffers, however, from reliance both on her biography end on the settlement's annual reports and monthly journal, The Toynbee Hall Record. Perhaps because the latter portray only the public side of the sett1nent's life, Pimlott does not consider either the way in which the residents actually viewed their work or the 7 inrpact which it had on East London. It is hoped that by making use of the private papers of such importt residents as C.R. Ashbee, Canon Barnett, W.H. Beveridge end T.L. Harvey it Will be possible to present a riore realistic Impression of the history of Toynbee Hall. 8 Chapter I: Canon Barnett The period between 1880 and 1914 was maited by an increasing UfleaslneS8 among the wealthy in Britain ebout the gulf betweam the ideals end reality of their society. Samuel Augustus Barnett, the founder end first warden of Toynbee Hall, both sharpened this sense of moral obligation and provided ways and means of expressing it. He was born in Bristol on Bebruary 8, 1844, the son of a manufacturer with strong Conservet lye views. The only document from his childhood is a journal he wrote during a trip with his father to Ireland where he was Impressed with everything but one town: "in truth It ws not much to see being one long irregular 1 street and mostly poor Inhabitants." Educated during most of his youth at home, he entered adham College, Oxford, in eptember 1862; according to his wife, his family chose the college beeause of its 2 Tory and. evngelica1 views. Although he later glorified the life of an Oxford student his own university career was undistinguished. Ho made no lasting friends, took little part in any of the societies he would eventually praise and graduated in 1865 with a second class degree. He spent the following two years as a master at inchester College, thus gaining his only experience of a public school, the 1. banuel Augustus Barnett, Diary of Tourney to Ireland, n.d. Barnett Papers. 2. Henrietta 0. Barnett, Canon Bernett; His Life, iork and. Friends (London, 1919), I, 9. - 9 frame of reference for a large part of Toynbee Hall as for other late Victorian middle-class institutions. On 6 April 186?, Barnett sailed for New York, beginning a trip of nine months through post-Civil War P1znerica. Many years later he encouraged his brother to allow his son to take a similar trip: "I ranember how it stirred me. The language, the social interests at once appeal to an Englishmen and Uely will find himself 3 a social refomtr without knowing it." He also rutedly said: "Born end nurtured in an atmosphere of Torylan what I saw and heard 4 there LTn Americ/ knocked all the Toryism out of me." But his journal belies these recollections. His first concern in every city was with the standard of ccnfort, of food and of service in 5 the hotel. The journal began: "With the 'Scotia' as a ship and a steamer no fault can be found, but it is a question whether the accoirinodation end coiflfort are such as might be expected by passengers paying 3l." Upon landing in Baltimore he wrote: "I stayed at the 'itaw House' not a good one, the so-called gentleman's parlour being totally unfit to sit in." In St. Louis, many months 3. 3.A.B. to F.G.B., 27 February 1904. 4. Quoted in W. Francis Aitken, Canon Barrett, arden of Toynbee Hall: His Mission and Its Relation to ocial hovanents (London, 1902), 25. 5. Unless otherwise noted, the subsequent quotations in this and the following two chapters are from S.A. Barnett, Journal of Thip to America, 6 April 186? - 13 July 186?. (The individual entries are not dated.) 10 later, he complained: "With no fat aniirls, no good butchers & no good means of cooking & a barbarous fashion of serving, it is alnost inioossible to enjoy dinner in kierlcan hotels." A perceptive sight-seer, he scrupulously recorded the details of everything he saw and heard, but women's dresses, the architecture, the layout of the streets end the nature of the foliage interested him as much as eocla]. questions. He was unimpressed by the one philanthropist he met and his conscience does not appear to have been touched by his first sight of a New York slum. The wealth of a few individuals, subsequently the object of his scorn, mmely filled him with awe. Only the certitude with which he pronounced his opinions end his consistently noralizing taie foreshadow the men he was to become. From the beginning to the end of the trip he retained the views of a Tory-, determined to preserve social prerogatives.