19 OCTOBER

1867 On this day, Poor Law Inspector Mr R.B. Cane paid his first visit to the Kirkheaton workhouse, one of the four institutions then being operated by the Huddersfield Union. The elderly premises did not impress Mr Cane, who described it as 'wholly insufficient in every respect.' The male residents comprised two men and sixteen boys who all shared eight beds in two small rooms. Six women, twenty-one girls, and two infants occupied thirteen beds in another part of the house. Two of the elder girls, affected by incontinence, slept together in the same bed, which was in a very lamentable state. Three of the boys with a similar affliction slept together in the same bed which was also in an abominable condition — the urine had not only saturated the bedding and the boards beneath the bed, but had found its way through the floor into the room below. In the kitchen, Mr Cane observed that the copper in which the foul linen was boiled was also used for cooking the food of the inmates.