In recent years, recent days even, we have heard people in
this country denouncing refugees crossing from France because, “the British
Taxpayer has to provide for them.” In
1834 the government passed the New Poor Law to reduce the burden on the rate
payers in England of providing for paupers with out relief by replacing it with
indoor relief within the Union Workhouse.
The old rules of Settlement, where birth in a parish was necessary to
receive help no longer applied so clearly but gradually the right of aid within
a union of parishes was established.
However, in one sad case in Surrey and Hampshire no rights
of support were legally allowed. It concerned a family where the wife,
Catherine Stringer, had been born in Prussia (Germany), the daughter of a
British soldier, and her husband, Michael Stringer, the son of a freed slave who
had been born in Jamaica was considered a foreigner even though he received a
soldier’s pension after more than 20 years’ service in the British army.
In November 1854, Catherine Stringer, who with her husband,
Michael, had given birth to 14 children, presented herself at Guildford Union
Workhouse, with her youngest 3 children because her husband had seduced their
adopted orphan child, who at 18 was expecting his baby. Catherine was a British
subject in every census record but had no right to poor relief. Her husband was stationed in the barracks in
Guildford, but when the Guildford Board of Guardians discovered she had a
son-in-law in Portsmouth (where Catherine had once lived) who could take her
in, they bought her train tickets so she could remove herself and her youngest
children to Portsea. Mr Ames, Master of
the Workhouse took them to Guildford station and accompanied them in the
carriage to Woking station where he put them on the Portsmouth train.
Subsequently the Poor Law Board in London ruled this removal
from Guildford to Portsmouth was illegal.
Michael Springer is described on his pension documents as 5 ft 8 inches tall with dark brown hair, grey eyes and a swarthy complexion. He had a good military record and was a Sergeant as well as a Bugle Major. He retired aged 38 because of arthritis, probably caused by many years of service in Ireland after his upbringing in the warmer climate of Jamaica where he was born. In 1821 Michael married Catherine after meeting her in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where her father was also serving as a soldier.
Michael had served as a Bugle Major for 19 years with the 2nd
Battalion 60th Infantry Regiment but prior to that he had enlisted in Jamaica at the age of 12. After being discharged in Ireland in 1834, where many of his
children were born, he moved to the more favourable climate of Portsmouth. Unfortunately
in 1851 he was convicted of the felony of larceny, which is why the 1851 census
lists Catherine as Head of the house.
On finishing his sentence in 1852, Michael joined the Surrey Militia in Guildford until his discharge in 1854 when like his estranged wife he moved back to Portsmouth where some of their adult children lived. Soon his itchy feet took him back to Cork in Ireland but in 1861 Catherine is still in Portsmouth with some of her children.
I believe Michael remarried in Cork, probably bigamously but in 1875 Catherine died in poverty in the Union Workhouse on Portsea Island.
Nothing changes! xx
ReplyDeleteAs Carol says, nothing seems to change, does it, Liz?
ReplyDeleteNo, we look back feeling sorry for families dependent on the workhouse but here we are again today, denying compassion for those in need.
ReplyDelete