Uncovering the little detail which builds the picture

Now I have to admit that I am still new to the study of British Home Children.  

It was only three years ago that I discovered that my great uncle went off to Canada from the Derby Workhouse, and even less that I began seriously to research the subject.

In the course of that time I have made some very good friends and seen the study of BHC grow uncovering the hidden lives of those who were sent, exploring all aspects of the reasons behind the policy and challenging the assumptions made by the apologists then and now.

And like all serious historical studies the picture that is emerging is not clear cut with all the villains on one side and the just on the other.

All of which makes it very exciting and again points up that simple observation that history is messy.  And much of this work is being undertaken by people who do not regard themselves as professional historians but who are uncovering important information, making significant links and pushing our understanding way beyond what was known just a few years ago.

Amongst all of this it is often the little details which help give someone a close experience of a relative.

So with no expectations that the following is earth shattering but fully aware that it will reveal something for someone, here are two blog posts about the home that Maria Rye ran in Peckham for nearly forty years.

So here is Avenue House which she ran and the place just off Hanover Park.  Today the road is still there but the site of the house is now the car park of a supermarket

And by one of those odd twists was just a mile from where I grew up.

http://transpont.blogspot.co.uk/2010/03/child-migration-from-peckham.html

http://thevictorianist.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/bound-for-streetsunless-kindly-hearts.html

Pictures; courtesy of Avenue House from, the Victorianist and detail of Hanover Park from the OS map of London 1862-1872, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/