The realities of medical attendance on the sick children of the poor in large towns / by T.P. Heslop.

Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The realities of medical attendance on the sick children of the poor in large towns / by T.P. Heslop. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    correspondence, that the particular plan which the Guardians have thought proper to sanction—viz., for the erection of a building for the accommodation of 200 epileptic patients—is one to which this Board entertain and have already expressed their objection. « in a letter, dated October ] 3th, 1868, the Board declined to consent to the proposal of the Guardians to build additional wards for the reception of harmless imbecile patients who were at that time in the Borough Asylum, and in a subsequent letter, dated December 1st, 1868, in reply to a letter of the Guardians, in which they propose to build for the accommodation of 125 male epileptic patients, the Board observing upon the similarity and con- nection of the two proposals repeated their objections, and urged that, if additional accommodation was required for any of the adult classes in the Workhouse, the completion of the schools for girls as well as boys, would, in the opinion of the Board, be the most economical mode of providing it. “ The Board must, therefore, express their regret, not only that the Guardians persist in recurring to a proposal which has been thus emphati- cally condemned, but that they have proceeded upon the assumption that the Board would now assent to that from which they have already dissented. “ The Board must repeat their opinion that the accommodation which is needed for adults must be sought for not in the direction suggested by the Guardians, but rather by erecting a school for girls and infants, and thus obtaining in a larger measure that relief which will, to a certain extent, be experienced when the school now in course of erection for boys shall have been completed. “ The Board are of opinion that the number of inmates now aggregated together in the Workhouse imder a single management is already sufficiently large; and that if there is auy one class which it is inexpedient to collect together in large numbers, it is that particular class of epileptic patients which the Guardians seek to accommodate. “ It is very doubtful whether the proposed arrangement would tend to the diminution of the cost, while it is certain that it would directly aggravate the existing difficulties of management. “ I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, “ H. FLEMING, Secretary. “ W. Thompson, Esq., Clerk to the Guardians of the Parish of Birmingham.” I cannot speak of the next illustration of the Poor Law system, extracted from the Daily News, August 18th, 1869, as amusing. I read it with mingled grief and anger, and ask with impatience, how long is this to endure? We have now to deal with the Metropolis itself, and with doings not far removed from the direct observation of the Poor Law Board. TKEATMENT OF THE ST. PANCRAS POOR. Yesterday Dr. Hardwicke, deputy coroner, held an inquest at the College Arms, in Crowndale Road, Camden Town, on the body of James Crew, aged fifty-nine, a coachman, who died in the infirmary of the St. Pancras Workhouse.