Rosen Hallas Home and a second life chance

“A girl comes years ago in the dawn of her maidenhood, not trailing ‘clouds of glory,’ but giving painful evidence of the staining power of the polluted moral atmosphere in which she lived.”*

Change some of the old fashioned words and it could be a description of countless young people who still face abuse at the hand of adults.

It was written in 1921 and refers to an incident that occurred perhaps twenty years earlier.  In this case it turned out well, for the girl who experienced that “polluted moral atmosphere” became a “wife and mother, mistress of a pretty Canadian farm, loved by her husband and valued as a worthy member of an enterprising community.  What lies between the past and present?  A sympathy, a faith, a hope and a vision, working a modern miracle.”

Now William Edmondson who told this story was a devout Christian and the language he uses reflects that faith but he had also been Secretary of the Manchester and Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges and Homes which had been engaged in rescuing children off the streets of Manchester from 1870.

At first the organisation had concentrated on destitute boys, offering them a bed for the night and a meal.  In time in branched out into a fully campaigning organisation bringing neglectful and abusive parents to court and running holiday homes as well as seeking to provide work and training for young people and emigrating some to Canada.

In 1878 it opened its first girls’ home on George Street which was off Cheetham Hill Road.  This was number 12 George Street and in the same row the Refuge had another five homes.**

A little later in 1886 and a little further along on Bury Old Road it opened the Rosen Hallas Home which was a pretty impressive building and stood in its own gardens with a small hospital in the grounds.

What marks this place out for me is that it was where some of the girls after their training in domestic skills were emigrated to Canada. It looked after between 30 and 40 older girls and they “came voluntarily, stayed willingly, and were free to leave after due notice.”

There were success stories and many of the “girls have responded to the influences brought to bear on them while at Rosen Hallas Home. 

Opposite; reunion of old girls

Some have been difficult cases, often owing to their misfortunes rather than to their fault because of their earlier associations, but the very difficulty has been a challenge to the love and patience of those weaving good character from the raw material of neglected childhood.”



Pictures; Rosen Hallas Home and reunion of old girls, courtesy of the Together Trust, http://togethertrustarchive.blogspot.co.uk/ map of the area around Rosen Hallas courtesy of Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Edmondson, William, Making Rough Places Plain, Fifty Years’ Work of the Manchester and Salford Boys’ and Girls’ Refuges and Homes 1870-1920, Manchester 1921 pp 78-79
** Numbers 2-12 listed in 1909 as Orphan Homes with Thomas R Ackroyd, secretary. Slater’s Manchester, Salford and Suburban Direct