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| Mealtime in the Workhouse |
Here’s a very sad story of a local Keighley elderly gentlemen who spent his last years living in the workhouse when he clearly was suffering from mental issues which would have today been managed under better health facilities, although to be fair it is probable that no better facilities would have been available in those days for a poor person like John Bancroft, a man without any money to pay for this.
The story was reported in the Bradford Daily Telegraph of 14th April 1908 as follows:
“Attempted Suicide at Bingley”
‘John Bancroft [78, formally a Carter], an inmate of Keighley Workhouse, attempted suicide yesterday afternoon by cutting his throat with a pair of scissors at the house of one of his daughters in Bingley.
The old man has two daughters living in Bingley and had been in the habit of paying them a visit periodically. His arrival upon one of these visits was just before noon yesterday and had dinner at the house of his daughters, Mrs Sarah Wigglesworth, wife of Joseph Wigglesworth. Both daughters were present and after dinner they had to leave him in the house on their return to work in the mill. They had however asked a neighbour to look after him, as he did not appear to be in good health. The neighbour remained in the house till two o’clock, and then as he appeared better she left him and returned to the house at about three o’clock. She found him sitting on the couch near the table and bleeding from a wound to his throat which had apparently been inflicted with a pair of scissors.
She asked him what he had been doing and he answered “Trying to cut my head off” she stanched the bleeding with a cloth and went for assistance, and Dr. Craig subsequently dressed the wound. He said the injury was not of a serious nature except for the man’s advanced age. Mr Bancroft was afterwards removed to the Workhouse Infirmary at Keighley.
He had been an inmate of the Workhouse for about three years, and for four or five years had at times been affected with a delusion that someone was going to kill him.’
Although this is a terribly sad story, and I have not been able to work out what happened to this man after this incident, the stories not many years earlier in the Keighley Workhouse were very much worse. Here are stories from there, and please be aware they make grim reading.
The local Workhouse in Keighley is listed on the census for 1891 as having
about two hundred ‘inmates’, both in the actual workhouse building and the
nearby hospital, many of them listed as either ‘imbacile, blind or deaf &
dumb’ and was managed by a Workhouse Manager, his wife and a handful of others
who were listed as porters, nurses, a cook & a gardener. The last workhouse
building in Keighley was built in 1858 at a cost of £7000, and still exists
today, albeit is now turned into residential accommodation. A previous smaller
establishment existed up until that date at nearby Exley Head, and earlier in
1777 a parliamentary report on this establishment stated that it had forty
inmates.
Workhouses largely came about because of an act passed in 1601 called “The Act
for the relief of the Poor” which made parishes legally responsible for looking
after their own poor, and was funded by the collection of a poor-rate tax from
local property owners. These funds were then used to provide unpaid work for
the unemployed….with the threat of prison for those who refused! It also set
out proposals for the erection of houses for the “impotent poor, the elderly
and the sick” Parish poor relief was initially dispensed in the form of money
to enable people to buy clothing, food or fuel for those living in their own
home in exchange for work without pay. This procedure was it seems, open to
abuse, so by 1723 the “Workhouse Test Act” was passed and gave parishes the
option of denying money to claimants and offering only the Workhouse.
In 1887 a local writer and bookseller called Mr CW Craven, went undercover into
Keighley workhouse to try and experience what is was like first-hand, and later
published an account of his experience called “A Night at the Workhouse”….here
are some extracts from it:
“I found myself in a room where a regular pauper was in charge, who at once
told me to undress myself. Whilst doing this, a piece of dry bread, about 4 oz
in weight was thrown onto a board with the exclamation, “ Thear’s yer Tommy”.
On getting my coat, waistcoat and trousers off and discovering my underclothes,
the attendant exclaimed several times “You don’t look as if you hed been on
t’road long anyhow”. “No!” says I “ this is the first time”. He then told me to
take my shirt off, and strip myself entirely. “Why take my shirt off?” I asked.
“ Because ther might be sum o’ them thear things abaght!” he replied. “ Are
there many of these things round about these quarters?” I further interrogated.
“Nah, ah doan’t think there’ll be so monny, we mostly stove ‘em when we find
onny” With this answer I was somewhat comforted. When I undressed myself to a
state as naked as when I was born, I was told to tie my cloths up and place
them alongside a series of other similar bundles laid against a wall. I was
then furnished with a couple of rugs and ordered into the sleeping room and the
lock tuned on me. All was dark as pitch. My bare feet slipped on what I
afterwards found was the vagrant’s spittle on the stone floor, and the
sensation was cold and slimy. It made me think of snails and worms, and other
loathsome creeping things…...I laid myself on the hard slanting boards, with
bare wood as a pillow to experience twelve hours of misery.
I did not sleep a wink all night, and kept fancying “some of them thear things”
were creeping over me. By the time the welcome streaks of morning dawn
appeared, my bones felt terribly sore, and I was half starved to death. At
about a quarter to seven the key turned in the door, and the order was given to
“get dressed and bring your rugs in here”. Seven naked forms then flitted about
in search of their cloths, and commenced to dress. I found the piece of dry
bread I had left untouched the night before, and told one of the vagrants he
could have it if he cared to do so. He appeared exceedingly grateful and at
once commenced to devour it.
Breakfast was brought in by a pauper attendant, and consisted on seven pieces
of dry bread on a board, each piece weighing 8 ozs, one for each vagrant. They
were placed on the stone floor. A rusty can was then brought in, containing
about two quarts of cold water, which was to serve as a drink for us all. A
strong feeling of indignation rose within me as I observed this miserable fare,
and the contemptuous manner in which it was served.
After a sufficient time had been allowed for breakfast, we were ordered out to
perform our task work. Two were relegated to some lighter labour, whilst five,
amongst whom was myself, were set to corn-grinding. We were placed in a room,
where protruding from the wall were six wheels with handles attached, and
nothing else but the dead wall was discernible. After being ordered to grind
away at these, we were locked in. some of the machines were dreadfully hard to
turn, whilst others were not so bad. The most aggravating part of the affair
was that none of us could observe how much work had been accomplished.
The atmosphere was very warm and in midsummer must have been nearly stifling.
Being in want of something to drink, we thrust a tin through an aperture in the
window, with a request for one of the paupers to fill it with water. The tin
was taken away, but no water appeared, and nearly an hour elapsed before our
wants were supplied in this respect, and then only because of repeated knocks
and shouting. Drearily the hours passed until twelve o’clock, when we were
liberated for dinner consisting of thick soup, which I could not bring myself
to taste. From one till five o’clock corn-grinding was again our portion, after
which the night was spent much similar to the last one. I was greatly pleased
when my time expired and I was again a free man.
My impression of the general treatment of vagrants is that the system is much
too severe. Making every allowance for the shortcomings of the class
constituting them, I am of the opinion that the lowest of mankind deserves
better treatment than that accorded to pigs, dogs, and other animals of
creation. The food furnished was scarcely fit for these last mentioned, whilst
about the harsh treatment, the less said the better. It is a disgrace to any
civilised country.”
Thankfully the end of the workhouse system came in 1930, when the Boards of
Guardians across England and Wales were abolished, and responsibility passed to
the local authorities. The Keighley Workhouse site was taken over by the West
Riding Council and became Keighley Public Assistance Institution. It later
became Hillworth Lodge old people's home and was afterwards used by Keighley
College. In 2000, the site was redeveloped for residential use. The photograph
below shows part of the original workhouse complex, as it is today.
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| Hillworth Lodge [The old Workhouse] |
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