Ancestry UK

A Visit to Chorlton Workhouse, Manchester

The text below is a alightly abridged version of an article by Mrs Emma Brewer, published as part of the series 'Workhouse Life in Town and Country', in the magazine Sunday at Home in 1890. Although the text refers to 'Chorley', the article is clearly a description of the Chorlton Union workhouse.

A Visit to Manchester Workhouse

The drive from Manchester to Chorley [Chorlton] Union is through an extremely pretty suburb of Manchester, and seeing it from a distance it looks like a town, so large are the buildings which go to make up this pauper abode.

It differs from any we have seen hitherto in that it has all its family in the one set of buildings, viz., children, old people, imbeciles, idiots, and sick — in fact, schools, infirmary, asylum and refuge all together; and it was for this reason we selected it in preference to the other large Manchester Workhouse.

The master was absent getting a few days' rest, but we could not have had a better guide through its intricacies than the matron, who knew every face and the history of each individual.

The schools, which have been built nine years, stand on one side of the road, and the Infirmary, House and asylum on the other. Our first visit was to the schools, consisting of various sets of buildings called homes, an administrative block and two large schoolrooms. The homes are six in number, three for girls and three for boys, each containing sixty children, and each being in charge of a woman, who, from the nature of her responsibilities, is called a mother.

Both inside and out attempts have been made, by flowers and by coloured walls and tiled dados, to make these homes as little like a workhouse as possible.

Each home has a bright day-room, and three dormitories, containing twenty beds each. The mattresses are of straw; a clean pillow-case is given to every child weekly, but only one clean sheet fortnightly. It would be little enough to have one each week, and there ought to be no difficulty in supplying this, as there are plenty of hands in the laundry.

Should a child fall ill, he or she is at once sent off to the infirmary across the road, and if on examination the doctor discovers that the child is suffering from anything infectious he sends word to the mother to have the bedding and clothing at once disinfected and removed.

The mother of the home has a little sitting-room on the ground floor, and a bedroom on the first, and the two pauper-helps sleep at the top in a room to themselves.

The six mothers have a small neat messroom next the kitchen where they take their meals.

From the homes, which are all alike, we went into the girls' schoolroom filled with rows of bright happy-looking children, who were busy at lessons, and whose faces smiled all over as the matron entered. They had short hair, blue-striped cotton dresses, and white pinafores; this is their dress winter and summer, but they have good cloth jackets to wear in cold weather. Some of the girls were pointed out to us as among those going to Canada the following week. We were pleased with the writing, spelling, and arithmetic, which were all we could spare time for.

Bidding the children good-bye, we made our way to the administrative department, passing on our way the sewing-room where classes are held in the afternoons under a mistress for learning sewing and knitting.

We next came to a large dining-hall for both girls and boys, and here they dine daily at half-past twelve. Bread and milk is their fare for breakfast, and for dinner the day we were there it was pea-soup and bread. The kitchen was bright, clean, and busy. One little girl was scrubbing the table to a state of immaculate whiteness, others were busy stirring the soup, and two hard at work in the scullery adjoining.

We next went into the laundry, where the little girls were in full force, folding, packing and ironing. The paid laundress assured us that some of them were beautiful ironers. They are so well trained that there is no difficulty in obtaining good situations for them; but it is at this point that the relations turn up to their hurt, hampering them in their struggles to be good and independent.

We were pleased with a large shallow white-tiled swimming bath, with a dressing-room attached, where the girls bathe on Wednesday nights and the boys twice a week. We could well understand the children's pleasure in this, and also that for an offence requiring punishment it is quite sufficient to deprive them of their bath.

On the boys' side, which is in most respects like the girls, we went into the tailor's shop and that of the shoemakers, where six boys at a time are taught by a paid man, those who are at school in the morning attending here in the afternoon, and vice versa.

Many of the boys were out in the grounds at work, for many of them are sent to Canada, and this sort of training is admirable for them.

The boys wear clogs, and, as they came running out of school to exercise on the parallel bars in the recreation ground, we thought of the song,
"Oh, the clang o' the wooden shoon!"

Twenty-six of these boys were about starting for Canada.

The head master has a charming little house to himself, bright with flowers; the chief mistress also has a house to herself; while the under masters and mistresses have apartments in the blocks close by, consisting of a sitting-room and bedroom each. The engineer and his wife have a home; so also have the bandmaster and his wife, for the boys have a brass band and play very well.

We now crossed the road and began our inspection of the mass of buildings there, by looking into the probationary ward for children, where they remain until admitted to the homes, and then into the bathroom where people are bathed before entering the buildings. We could not help laughing at the story of an old woman who went down on her knees to the person in charge begging and entreating not to be bathed, for she said, "I've never washed all over since I was a baby, and it'ull kill me!" Here close by was a small receiving ward and tiny bedroom for women, who are, when they first come, inexpressibly dirty.

The chapel is in the centre of the whole block facing the road. Church of England service is held here twice on Sunday, and the Wesleyan service once a fortnight. The Roman Catholics have their service in the dining-hall.

On passing the lodge we noticed that the gatekeeper was an old Crimean soldier, having on his breast two medals, and on enquiry found ho had been in the Balaclava charge.

We looked into the sewing-room, well supplied with sewing machines, and then inspected two day-rooms, clean, airy, and bright, where several old women were sitting who did not like pea-soup, and, as that was the day's dinner, had elected to remain here during the hour in which it was being eaten. Is it not possible to got a substitute for pea soup? I asked them why they did not go in to dinner, and one answered, "Not becos it's not good, mum, but 'cos it don't agree with us." They are well fed with nourishing food, as a rule, for they have boiled meat and potatoes on Sundays, and Australian meat and potatoes on Mondays.

From here we went into the nursery, where were forty-two little creatures. In the middle of the room stood a rocking-horse and rocking-chair, a present from some friend of little children; a small room adjoining had a large bed with six compartments, where the little ones take their mid-day rest. When we saw them they were lively enough, and stroked our gloves, examined our dress, and entreated to hear the "tick tick." No sooner was this granted than they came toddling from all parts of the room crying, "and me too" "and me too" till we had much to do to get away at all.

As we crossed their large recreation ground and stepped through a door in the wall, their merry shrill voices pursued us, and formed a contrast to the sad scene awaiting us.

This part of the house was devoted to the imbeciles and epileptics, all of whom were dressed in brown. There is a large grass plot set apart for their use, surrounded by paths and trees, provided with seats, and here we found them sitting in the sun or wandering aimlessly up and down, some of them talking and gesticulating wildly, others with a vacant smile or mirthless laugh. The block devoted to their service is necessarily large, for there are a hundred and twenty women and girls thus afflicted. We looked at their day-room, padded rooms, and night-wards, all made as comfortable and cheerful as possible for them. Divided from this block by a door is a sort of home for old women, who were found sitting in a day-room with a fire carefully wired in, and a sleek cat in whom they evidently took much pride, one old lady declaring "She can do everything but speak."

The night-wards were clean and comfortable, and the pink and blue quilts and pictures on the walls and screens added cheerfulness also. A sick-ward for the lunatics was the next we passed through; it was nursed by two trained day-nurses and one night-nurse. For the whole house there are three resident doctors.

Our next visit was to the nurses' home, which has accommodation for thirty-five nurses, each of whom has a bedroom to herself, furnished by the guardians, and made pretty by their own private possessions. In this home there is a dining-hall, a drawing-room and a kitchen. The superintendent's room was pretty and bright.

The fever cases are nursed by special nurses kept quite apart from the others, while employed in it. The Infirmary is on the pavilion system, and the seven pavilions are joined together by a roofed open-sided passage running from end to end. Rules hung on the doors and walls of the wards, for the guidance of patients and visitors. All the cooking for the Infirmary is done in the house, but there are small sculleries at the end of each ward for making beef-tea, and for washing up as in ordinary hospitals. One small room on each landing is set aside for any special case requiring extra care and quiet, but the large wards are the more cheerful with their grey and white-tiled dado, easy wheel-chairs, tables with plants, and drawers full of deftly rolled bandages, pictures on the walls, and neat-handed pleasant-looking nurses flitting about, ministering to the patients.

At the end of each ward was a convalescent room, where those capable of doing so were sitting up. The bathroom and lavatory for each ward were all that could be desired. The old wards (for part of the Infirmary is older than the rest) are not quite so nice in their arrangements, not having all the modern improvements possessed by the others, but they are kept sweet and clean and made the best of. The infectious cases are kept quite separate at the top of one of the pavilions. The day we were there, there were nine cases of scarlet fever.

Leaving the Infirmary we went to the kitchen, which is necessarily very large, as on an average between eighteen and nineteen hundred dinners are sent out daily. It is pauper labour here under a paid cook. The bakehouse was full of sweet-smelling bread; whole loaves are cut up at a time by means of a long, sharp two-handled knife. Different-sized loaves are made for the men and women — the former being five ounces, and those for the latter four ounces.

The dining-hall is divided down the centre by a wooden partition, on one side of which the men sit, and on the other the women. Pictures and a large clock were the only ornaments.

We next visited the store of clothing, every article of which passes through the matron's hands. All articles worn out are condemned by her. This ceremony goes on in an adjoining room called the condemned room. A third room is devoted to giving out the clothes, which are neatly rolled up in bundles and stacked away in bins round the walls. Every bundle as it is given out is written down in a book with the name of the recipient so that no mistake is possible. Each person has two suits. A list book is also kept here with the names of the inmates, and dates of entering and leaving.

The laundry came next under our notice. We thought it too low. It was, however, large, and had a good wash-house, and a small room for the dirty linen, which is thrown into a tank as it arrives. There were good drying closets, and the goffering was done by steam.

The women are largely employed in the laundry work, while the men are occupied in picking oakum, wool and cotton waste, and in wood chopping, but the young men grind corn. All this is done under the superintendence of two labour-masters.

We glanced in at the smithy, and at the bakery, where eight sacks of flour a day ate worked up in the summer, and in the winter as many as ten and eleven are used, as outdoor and indoor poor are supplied from this bakery.

The furnaces are very large and good, and reminded us of china factory furnaces.

We next saw the building in which the corn is ground. Idle dangerous characters among the men who will not submit to discipline are employed here.

Each man is locked into a sort of cell, quite dark, and separated by partitions from his neighbours, whom he cannot see, but with whom he can speak. On the other sides are receptacles for the Indian corn fixed into the wall, and bins are put underneath to receive it as it falls through, ground ready for the pigs and horses. One hundred weight a day is the task allotted to each.

We looked into the carpenters' shops and yards, and passed a large water tank, kept ready in case of a break down. We then walked through the large farm attached to the house. They have a hundred and fifty pigs, whose stys occupy a large portion of ground; a kitchen opposite is devoted to preparing food for them. Bones, and such garden produce as is not needed, are sold; but they lack fruit very much, and presents, even of windfalls, would be most acceptable to the inmates of the house and schools.

The farm bailiff has a house on the premises, and a very pretty one it is.

Last Christmas there were two thousand two hundred people in the house!

A telephone connects the buildings with the offices in Grosvenor Square, Manchester, and with the Fire Brigade.

No stimulants are allowed anywhere in house.

The matron gave us some curious glimpses into the inner life of the workhouse. She told us that people in Manchester having relatives or friends in the Workhouse invariably address their letters to Withington Hospital, in order to avoid the appearance of pauperism. Another fact was, that the married couples generally prefer to live apart. Only one couple to her knowledge begged not to be separated, and their desire being granted, they requested at the end of a fortnight to be parted I She also stated, that as no stimulants are allowed, a very little drink affects the inmates, or, as the matron euphemistically put it, "makes them happy," and when the old women have been out for the day they frequently return in this sadly "happy state of mind," but if they go to bed quietly, without a fuss, no notice is taken of it by the authorities.

We thought this Institution very well managed, and that the superintendents showed much kindness and forbearance to the inmates both old and young, sick and well, and were evidently regarded as friends.

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