The remarkable Miss Olga Hertz and her work for the children of Manchester

I doubt I would ever have come across Miss Olga Hertz, had it not been for a report she wrote in 1909 which surfaced recently.

The report, 1909

What makes the report and Miss Hertz particularly interesting for me, is that she was one of the elected Guardians on the Chorlton Union which was the Poor Law authority covering my bit of Manchester and she lived almost all her adult life just round the corner.

Now I say I wouldn’t, but as the plan has always been to research this Poor Law Union, I suppose I would in time have met up with her.

The Chorlton Union covered most of south Manchester with its first work house in Hulme and its later one in Withington.  This second workhouse built in the 1850s, saw the Union out and developed into Withington Hospital only closing in 2002.

Like other Poor Law authority’s, Chorlton migrated some of their young people to Canada, and at the beginning of the century the three socialist Guardians argued against the policy, raising concerns about the degree of monitoring of children were highly critical of an economic and social system which accepted poverty and inequality as natural.

And that brings us back to Miss Hertz who in the June of 1909 sailed from Liverpool to Montreal and then across Ontario, visiting the Marchmont Home and by degree the farms and homes where Chorlton children had been placed from both Marchmont and Belleville.

It paints a positive picture of those who had been sent over, raising some concerns about the monitoring of some children given the large distances.

There will be those who wonder whether it was “too positive”, but Miss Hertz was very dedicated to the welfare of the young people in the charge of the Union and maintained close contacts with many of them long after they had grown up, even referring to them as “Miss Hertz’s grandchildren".

The offices of the Chorlton Union, 2009

So like so much to do with British Home Children there will have to be much more research, matching the assertions of the socialist Guardians with the quality and quantity of the reports sent back.

For now it is Miss Hertz who interests me.  She was born in Scotland in 1851 and moved to Manchester in 1871, settling on Palatine Road in Withington sometime after 1881 and where she died in 1946.

Her adult life was predicated on public service, and she was involved with administration of nursing in the city as well as her work with young people.

She was first elected as a Guardian to the Chorlton Union in 1892 and served until 1930, during which time she did five years as chair of the committee responsible for the Styal Cottage Homes for young people run by the Chorlton Union.

She remained a champion of such provision, arguing such small homes were preferable to the older and larger “barrack” institutions or the practice of boarding children out.

And she campaigned for feminist issues, opposing the practice of one hospital for refusing to employ women doctors, argued that at least one of the Union’s three doctors should be a woman and consistently pushed for the establishment of maternity centres across Manchester and in 1914 had been a delegate at  the Fifth International Council of Women held in Rome.

The entrance to the offices of the Chorlton Union' 2009

There is much more to find out about this remarkable women but I will close with her work for "the Girls’ Lodging House which existed to meet the needs of young homeless, inexperienced domestic workers during their off duty time and during periods of unemployment, girls brought up in the Poor Law homes having first claim”.**

It had been set up in the 19th century and while it closed in 1937, Miss Hertz had remarked that "she considers that there are still young workers to whom such a place would be a boon".

Leaving me just to reflect that while her house has gone, replaced by a car park for Christies' Hospital, there are the offices of the old Chorlton Poor Law Union and by an odd quirk some of the Canadian soldiers from the Great War were treated in the Unions' hospital in Withington Workhouse, and some who died are buried Southern Cemetery which is close by.

And if all that is a coincidence some of those Canadians were British Home Children.

Location; Manchester & Canada

Pictures; cover of Report to the Chorlton Board of Guardians, the offices of the Chorlton Union, 2009, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Research, the Manchester Guardian, 1894-1946, selected census records and street directories

*Copy of the Report to the Chorlton Board of Guardians on a Visit to Emigrated Children in Canada, by Miss O Hertz, Chairman of the Cottage Homes Committee

**Miss Olga Hertz Her 90th Birthday, Manchester Guardian November 19 1941

What was lost is found …………. the buried object from Withington Workhouse

A little bit of Withington Workhouse came my way recently.

It is a round metal disk, measuring just over 2 cm, and bears the name Chorlton Union Workhouse on one side and has a small ring fastener on the back.

It was found by Frances Farrow on her allotment just off Nell Lane and was about 80 centimetres below the surface.*

There is no date on the disc, but it will date from between 1837, when the Chorlton Union was established, and 1930, when the workhouses were abolished.

And I think we can narrow that timeline, because from 1837 the Union’s workhouse was situated in Hulme, until it was replaced by the new one on Nell Lane in 1855.

Of course it might have originated in Hulme, and was dropped on the site of the future allotment, or might even have found its way there in a consignment of night soil, but given that the new Workhouse was very close to where it was found I rather think we have a window of time from 1855 onwards.

I thought that at first it might be a token, which could be redeemed for poor relief.

Such tokens were widely in use in the early years of the 19th when there was a shortage of currency, but had become illegal after 1814.

It might just have been customized with the ring on the back so that it could be worn on a bracelet or necklace, but I doubt anyone would want to be reminded of the Workhouse.

All of which just leaves me to think it might have belonged to an inmate or an official out on business. And it might be a button given its size from a workhouse uniform.

Those with a gruesome turn of mind will immediately point out that the burial ground of the old workhouse was close to where the disc was found …… but not close enough.

That burial ground was situated on the north eastern side of Nell Lane at the junction of what was Princess Parkway, and part of it was taken over when the road was widened, while the allotments are further north along Nell Lane.

So, it is a bit of a mystery, but one that someone will have an answer too.

I contacted Mr. Peter Higginbotham, who is one of the leading authorities on the Poor Law and Workhouses, and I can confirm that it is a button which he replied "do turn up sometimes".  So mystery solved and I can now just fall back on the disc itself and ponder what secrets it might hold.**

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; the Workhouse disc, 2020, found by Frances  Farrow, and the old burial ground, 1950, from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1956

*Plot  40A, Southern Allotments, Nell Lane, Frances Farrow and Akram Dadafarid

**The Workhouse; http://www.workhouses.org.uk/

Withington Hospital ....... sixty years ago

 This is Withington Hospital in 1965.

Withington Hospital from Cavendish Road, 1965

And it’s a lesson in how quickly we forget.

The image was taken from Cavendish Road and shows the rear of the complex, with the large field in between.

I must have passed it heaps of time but when confronted with the picture I was puzzled, and it took a few minutes rummaging through old maps and even older photographs to fix the place.

The view along with the hospital have long gone.

Interestingly the caption of the colour slide offered up the title “Union Workhouse”, which of course is what it was.

The hospital and field, 1956

Built in the early 1850s by the Chorlton Union, it replaced the smaller workhouse in Hulme and remained as such till the 1930s.

The hospital and field, 1935

Today some of the hospital buidlings have been converted into residential use and apart from a property in Styal, the only surviving building from the age of the Workhouse in south Manchester is the former offices of the Chorlton Union in All Saints.

In its day the offices administered the work of poor relief across south Manchester and early in its history added an infirmary to the workhouse.

The infirmary was requestioned during the Great War and served as a hospital catering for casualties from the battle front and some of those who died are buried in Southern Cemetery.

I rather think the recovering wounded in their “hospital blue” uniforms may have made good use of the field.

There are a few images from Manchester Library’s archive of images which show the field but none that I can find which places it beside the hospital.*

So perhaps a unique image.

Location; Withington Hospital

Picture; “Withington Hospital, former workhouse, seen from behind”, 1965, The 1965 Collection, the hospital and field  1956, from the OS Map of Manchesterster & Salford, 1956, hospital & field, 1935, m53369, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

* Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass