Winifred Proctor – Preston Poor Law

A paper by Winifred Proctor titled ‘Poor Law Administration in Preston Union 1838-1848’ was published in vol 117 (1965) of the journal of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, where you can find dozens of articles relating to the history of Preston. It is reproduced here with the society’s permission.

See also Steve Harrison’s article’ on the ‘The New Poor Law in Preston‘

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What the New Poor Law meant for Preston is captured by Winifred Proctor here:

The new statute was born after the publication in 1834 of a government report on poor law administration, and at first it was enforced in the southern part of the country. For two years the parish officials and the ordinary citizens of Preston lived in hope that the new medicine for poverty prescribed in the report would not be administered in the immediate area. But in December 1836 Mr. Power, one of the nine assistant commissioners appointed to aid the central authority in its gigantic task, arrived in the borough, and, says the Preston Chronicle:

“Without in the first place making his mission known, he went with one of the overseers to visit the workhouse every part of which he minutely examined, and made sundry inquiries respecting the treatment of the inmates. We understand … that he appeared dissatisfied with the rule which has always been followed in this place, of allowing the people as much food as they cared to eat at mealtimes!”

Shades of Oliver Twist! Mr. Power’s stern comment augured ill indeed for the future.

She traces the rivalry between the opposing forces in Preston: the pro-poor-law faction led by Thomas Batty Addison and the antis led by Joseph Livesey:

The leader of the pro-poor-law party was Thomas Batty Addison, recorder of Preston. As a county magistrate he had striven to enforce the introduction of the 1834 poor law into Oldham and Rochdale, and in Preston he gave it his whole-hearted support. Both Addison and those who followed his lead were children of their age, preaching with evangelistic fervour the puritan virtues of abstinence, self-reliance and self-discipline. The leader of the rival faction was Joseph Livesey, one-time weaver, later cheese factor, founder of the Preston Guardian and temperance reformer. After his retirement from the board, Livesey continued to act as a sort of watch-dog over the activities of his former colleagues, and in the pages of his newspaper to denounce their niggardliness in the distribution of out-relief to those in dire need.

And she reminds us of the dreadful conditions which the poor had to endure in Victorian Preston, and the unfeeling disdain shown for them by the town’s middle class:

It is difficult today to understand the attitude adopted during the early Victorian era by the wealthier members of the community towards their poorer brethren. Only too often the destitute were regarded almost as outcasts of society. Even Thomas Batty Addison, recorder of Preston and county magistrate, a man of sterling worth who was highly respected in his own circle, gave vent to torrents of unrestrained abuse in his condemnation of those who dared to seek parish relief. Here is one of his tirades:

“Many paupers were the slaves of debased habits, clothed in rags, covered in filth, and without funds to provide for the purposes of cleanliness. Their children were uneducated and were thus brought up ignorant of the duties which they owed to God and man … He rejoiced to know that many places of worship were numerously attended, but he was painfully convinced that the congregations did not include many of the outdoor poor. On the contrary he too well knew that their filthy habits rather drove them to beer shops and gin shops and to the indulgence of a practice which he deemed quite as pernicious the wasting of their limited funds on tobacco, indeed he thought it the greatest abuse of all.”

Yet at no great distance from Preston town hall, and within sound of the bells of that very parish church which Addison himself attended, there lay the miserable dwellings of the Preston factory workers. The front windows of these houses faced on to rows of privies and unswept, evil-smelling courts. Piped water was the privilege of those who could afford to pay the subscription demanded by the water company. The poor had to buy a pailful at a time from the carts which passed daily through the streets.

As she notes, ‘men of Addison’s complexion hardened their hearts and welcomed the policy of the government as outlined in the act of 1834’.