143 years of caring for Manchester children

In the middle years of the 19th century the contrast between the great wealth of our city and the abject poverty endured by so many turned on a street corner.  

So the elegant houses of St John’s Street off Deansgate were surrounded by meaner dwellings where those on the margins of disaster worked long hours for meagre earnings and contended with the ever present threat that ill health or unemployment would pitch them into destitution and the workhouse.

All of which I suppose makes it unsurprising that on January 4th 1870 a group of wealthy men chose to open a refuge for homeless boys just minutes from St John’s Street.

Opposite; the first refuge, opened on January 4th 1870 on Quay Street

There was nothing here which would have excited the indignation of those then and now who see the poor as feckless and somehow to blame for their plight.

“The little dark room on the ground floor behind the Master and Matron’s was the eating room; the front cellar did duty as a general living room by day and a school room at night.  The back cellar, dark and damp as a cavern was the bathroom and lavatory, while the sleeping accommodation upstairs was in shape of hammocks which were hung out round the rooms for from strong hooks on the walls.”*

On its first night the Refuge accepted six boys and in the morning had to turn them out to fend on the streets.

Within a decade the charity had expanded to larger premises catering for girls as well as boys and seeking to off training and in time holiday homes as well as seeking to take legal redress to protect children from brutal parents.

Now the work of the Refuge and the reason for its existence is a subject I have visited before and will again, but what makes it special today is that it is 143 years since the charity opened its doors and so is a good moment to mention this week’s posting from its archivist. **

Happy Birthday to us is both a brief celebration and a description of the work to help young people during the late 19th century.

The charity has undergone changes, moved out of the city to Cheadle and changed its name to the Together Trust but continues the work begun 143 years ago today.

*Edmondson William, Making Rough Places Plain, 1920

**http://togethertrustarchive.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/happy-birthday-to-us.html

Pictures; the first refuge opened in 1870 and a group of young boys from the charity in 1883, courtesy of the Together Trust.