Tag Archives: Poor laws

Documents relating to a legal dispute between the overseers of the poor

Posted on by
Reply

selection of printed sheets fanned out

A collection of ten documents concerning a dispute over which of two parishes in Derbyshire should be responsible for a pauper family. The family of Thomas Bottom, his wife Hannah, and their five children (Ann 12 years, Thomas 10 years, Sarah 7 years, Charles 4 years, and Lydia “aged abt 1/2 year”) had been adjudged by two local magistrates to be lawfully resident in Bradburn and therefore were the responsibility of the Overseers of that parish. The Bradburn Overseers, however, produced strong evidence to the contrary and were thus appealing the decision.

  • Title: Documents relating to a legal dispute between the overseers of the poor of the parishes of Bradburn and Kniveton, in Derbyshire : manuscript and printed text.
  • Production: Derbyshire, England, 1817.

Catalog Record

LWL Mss File 155+

Acquired May 2022

The town book of Smallburgh

Posted on by
Reply

manuscript notebook

Record of the poor rate collections, disbursements and expenses for the village of Smallburgh in the County of Norfolk over a period of 60 years. Written in multiple hands, mostly in ink, and signed by the town officials.

  • Title: The town book of Smallburgh : manuscript.
  • Production: Smallburgh, England, 1777-1837.

Catalog record

Folio LWL Mss vol. 271

Acquired February 2022

To wit. We [blank], church-wardens and overseers of the poor

Posted on by
Reply

description below

A settlement certificate signed, and with seals, by the church wardens, overseers of the poor, and witnesses, for a husband, wife, and their two children in the Parish pf Tamworth in the county of Warwick.

  • Title: To wit. We [blank], church-wardens and overseers of the poor in the parish of [blank] in the [blank] of [blank] aforesaid, do hereby own and acknowledge [blank] to be [blank] inhabitant legally settled in the parish of [blank] aforesaid …
  • Publication: [London] : Sold by J. Coles, stationer, in Fleet-Street, [ca. 1766]

Catalog Record

File 66 766 T627+

Acquired May 2021

Interior of an English workhouse* under the new Poor Law Act

Posted on by
Reply

Emaciated and shaven-headed paupers treated as slaves by cruel overseers: adults beating hemp and children picking rope in the foreground, others in the background manacled to the wall or hanging from the ceiling, tied up by their feet and hands; to right, a manager with a scourge seizing an elderly man, and a man pulling a cart, which he says is full of dead infants to be sold to surgeons; to left, a manager turning away the starving poor who beg to be let in.”–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Grant, C. J. (Charles Jameson), active 1830-1852, printmaker.
  • Title: Interior of an English workhouse* under the new Poor Law Act [graphic].
  • Publication: [London] : Printed and published by G. Drake, 12, Houghton-Street, Clare-Market, [ca. 1833]

Catalog Record & Digital Collection

Folio 75 G750 833 Copy 2 (Oversize)

Acquired December 2016