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Victorian ChildhoodVictorian ChildhoodVictorian ChildhoodVictorian Childhood

HistoryHistoryYear 8Year 8

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• SO WHAT WAS IT LIKE FOR VICTORIAN CHILDREN?

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• A lot depended on which end of Victoria's reign you're thinking about, and it always depended on where you were on the social ladder.

If your parents had plenty of money, it was very different from how things were if they were poor.

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• Children of richer families would have education, and many other things, though their clothes were mostly smaller versions of what the adults wore.By 1901, all children were legally supposed to be attending school.

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• Later, more rich children would have education at fee paying schools.

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• There are lots of myths - stories which lots of us believe, but need not actually be true - about the Victorians.

• One is of the stern father. • There were lots of stern fathers, quite true. • But another side of the Victorian Ideal

Father was the family man who loved his children and played with them, as seen here when they welcome him home.

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• Of course, this picture might well also be idealised - made to look as good as possible, whether it was true or not...

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• At the beginning of Victorian times, children without rich parents would be working, often when still very young.

• What they wore and what they did would not seem like childhood to us - they just did jobs they were supposedly suited to; and they wore smaller versions of the clothes adults wore, or even adult clothes cut down and rolled up to make them fit.

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Child Labour

• Many factory workers were children. • They worked long hours and were often

treated badly by the supervisors or overseers.

• Sometimes the children started work as young as four or five years old.

• A young child could not earn much, but even a few pence would be enough to buy food.

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• The mill owners often took in orphans to their workhouses, they lived at the mill and were worked as hard as possible.

• They spent most of their working hours at the machines with little time for fresh air or exercise.

• Even part of Sunday was spent cleaning machines.

• There were some serious accidents, some children were scalped when their hair was caught in the machine, hands were crushed and some children were killed when they went to sleep and fell into the machine.

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Coal Mines

• The coal mines were dangerous places where roofs sometimes caved in, explosions happened and workers got all sorts of injuries.

• There were very few safety rules. • Cutting and moving coal which

machines do nowadays was done by men, women and children.

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• The younger children often worked as "trappers" who worked trap doors.

• They sat in a hole hollowed out for them and held a string which was fastened to the door.

• When they heard the coal wagons coming they had to open the door by pulling a string.

• This job was one of the easiest down the mine but it was very lonely and the place were they sat was usually damp and draughty.

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• Older children might be employed as "coal bearers" carrying loads of coal on their backs in big baskets.

• Or drawers who pulled the wagons

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But changers were coming

• The Mines Act was passed by the Government in 1842 forbidding the employment of women and girls and all boys under the age of ten down mines.

• Later it became illegal for a boy under 12 to work down a mine.

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Changes for the better

• It took time for the government to decide that working children ought to be protected by laws as many people did not see anything wrong with the idea of children earning their keep.

• They also believed that people should be left alone to help themselves and not expect others to protect or keep them.

• They felt parents had a right to send their children out to work.

• People such as Lord Shaftesbury and Sir Robert Peel worked hard to persuade the public that it was wrong for children to suffer health problems and to miss out on schooling due to work.

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The 1850 Factory Act

• The Factory Act of 1850 prohibited the employment of women and children after 2.00 pm on Saturdays. Reluctantly the mill owners gave way and men too were granted the same privilege. The situation for shop workers however didn't improve until the 1880s when shop owners finally granted an early finish during the week: on Thursday in Blackburn and Tuesday in Darwen, for example.

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• Many Victorians themselves realised that life was tough on working children.

• These pictures are typical of their sort. • It's interesting that most pictures like

this, published in magazines of the times, were meant to make you feel sorry for the children in the pictures... but not intended to be too realistic.

• They very often look far too clean!

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Dr Barnardo (1845 - 1900)

Thomas Barnardo was born in Dublin in 1845. He became a Doctor in 1876.

During his lifetime he was to become one of the most famous men in Victorian Britain due to his work with orphans.

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Dr Barnardo’s

London

• In 1866 Thomas Barnardo arrived in London to train as a doctor.

• The population in London had increased rapidly due to the Industrial Revolution - particularly in the East End where the poorest people lived.

• This led to unemployment, overcrowding, poverty and disease.

• Thousands of children were forced to sleep on the streets and beg to survive.

• Many had been injured terribly working in factories

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Dr Barnardo’s First School

• Because of everything Thomas Barnardo had seen he decided to open a school in the East End so children could get a basic education.

• Hope Place was opened in 1867 and termed a ‘ragged school’ – this photograph shows Hope Place with some of the children that it helped.

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Thomas Barnardo and the East End

• Thomas Barnardo continued to take a great interest in destitute children.

• One day a child called Jim Jarvis took him around the East End, showing him young children sleeping in gutters and on top of roofs.

• The sight affected Barnardo so much that he decided to devote himself to helping these children.

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Stepney Causeway

• This house in Stepney Causeway was to become the first of Thomas Barnardo’s homes for children. It was opened in 1870 as a Home for Boys.

• Barnardo would go out every night looking for homeless children.

• One night an 11 year old boy was turned away as the home was full.

• Two days later he was found dead.

• From that day on the Home’s motto was ‘No Destitute Child Ever Refused Admission.’

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Girls’ Village Home

• The Girls’ Village Home in Barkingside was opened in 1876. It housed over 1,500 girls at a time.

• This was different to the boys home as it was set in its own grounds; each cottage had its own front and back gardens and there was also a steam laundry on the grounds.

• The girls who stayed at the Village Home received training as cooks and domestic service maids. This meant that every child could find employment once they had left the home.

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Dr Barnardo’s

Belief

• The Victorians felt that poverty was the result of laziness – an unwillingness to work and something to be ashamed of.

• Thomas Barnardo fought against these ideas by accepting every child into his homes.

• He was determined to give any child the best possible start in life, no matter where they had come from.

• This meant that during most of his life he battled against these traditional Victorian beliefs, but by his death, the Barnardo’s charity was established housing over 8, 000 children.

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Homework• Open• http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Twork.htm • The types of people:• Factory Owners: Supported Child Labour : Adam

and Mohammed• Factory Owners: Opposed Child Labour: Ana and

Morwenna• Doctors: Opposed Child Labour: Ben and Nic• Supported Child Labour: Billy and Scarlet• Campaigners against child labour: Chloe and Nadia

and Courtney• Doctors: Supported Child Labour: Guilhem and

Tommy• Child Workers: Girls: Kat and Lauryn• Child Workers: Boys: Warren and Will

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This is what you are to do• Scroll down to the section you are to choose from.• Check out a few of the people in it.• Click on each one and it will open up into a page about

them. Towards the end of the page there are some sources – be sure to look at these

• For those sharing a group of names – this is the rule • The first one to pick a person emails the other one

QUICKLY with a copy to me [in case of disputes] – they get to keep that one – and the 2nd person has to choose someone else

• Introduce yourself to the debate and then support your point of view with evidence, either that this is what you did or this is what you said –

• We will be staging a debate on the last lesson of term. But I want your notes to be really clear, as it is almost certain that someone’s mike will be down that day, and we will have to take written evidence!