Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges
1870-1960
Archives
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The official records of the Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges and Homes from its date of creation in 1870 through to 1960 when it changed its name to the Boys and Girls Welfare Society. Includes, Committee Activities and Management Records, Case Papers, Financial Records, Diaries, Homes and Activities, Affiliated Societies, Emigration, Publications, Newspaper Cuttings and Promotional Material, Photograph Collection and the Jubilee School for Girls.
The collection represents an important insight into the social history of the Manchester and Salford area in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The collection provides a particular emphasis on the effects of child poverty and how charities attempted to alleviate them.
Related Material:Manchester and Salford Boys' and Girls' Refuges and Homes annual reports, 1870-1910, in Local Studies (362.7 M1)
Material after 1960 can be accessed by contacting the Together Trust.
Photographs relating to the Refuge from 1870- present can be accessed by contacting the Together Trust
Invalid Children's Aid Association at Manchester Central Reference Library (GB127.M802)
Jubilee School for Girls at Manchester Central Reference Library (GB127.M41)
Records for the 'Indefatigable' Training Ship can be found at the Merseyside Maritime Museum.
See Edmondson, W., (1921) Making Rough Places Plain: Fifty Years of the Manchester and Salford Refuges and Homes, 1870-1920, (Manchester, Sherratt and Hughes), for a history of the early years of the Refuge.
Title:
Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges
Date of work:
1870-1960
Reference number:
GB127.M189
Level of description:
Fonds
Includes:
Custodial history:
Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges
The Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges was founded in 1870 by Leonard K Shaw and Richard Bramwell Taylor, both Sunday school teachers at the St Ann's Ragged School in Queen Street, Deansgate. Both were concerned by the number of homeless and destitute children living on the streets of Manchester and Salford. On the 4th January they opened their first home for children on 16 Quay Street, Deansgate, bearing the sign 'Night Refuge for Homeless Boys', which provided young boys with a bed for the night. The boys would leave the house each morning, having paid what they could, and fending for themselves during the day. This house consisted of a dark ground-floor room and two cellars with hammocks in upstairs rooms. In February the Watch Committee sanctioned the formation of a Shoe Black Brigade. In the same month a Parcel Messenger Brigade was also established, working in and from the railway stations, to provide the boys with an organised employment. The following year the premises of the Refuge were transferred to Strangeways and the industrial department was further extended to include printing, joinery, firewood, tailoring and shoemaking. From 1873 the first of what would eventually be four homes for 'Working Lads' was established in Lower Broughton to house the older boys who were in regular work. In 1878 the Trust bought a third house in Broughton, 'Heathfield', this time for girls. By 1881 the Boys Rest and Coffee Room was set up in Angel Meadow, well-known as one of the worst districts in Manchester. The object of this branch was to provide temporary aid to lads who frequented the Common Lodging Houses of the district. The service was discontinued ten years later. In 1882 the Society merged with the Children's Aid Society (CAS), which had been founded by Gilbert Richardson Kirlew in 1881. This Society organised city street work for boys, such as messengers and shoe-blacks brigades. As it duplicated work already done by the Refuge it was suggested it should merge with the CAS, expanding the Refuge's title to the Manchester and Salford Boys' and Girls' Refuges and Children's Aid Society. A shelter was established soon after on Major Street in 1884, which received needy children at anytime of the day or night. The Shelter moved to Chatham Street, Piccadilly in 1890 and by 1910 the building incorporated the Remand Home, which provided for delinquent children. In 1887 a Prison Gate Mission was set up, meeting mothers with infants as they left the gates of Strangeways Prison, and offering them advice and practical assistance. By 1915, when the work had been handed over to the Manchester City Mission, 265,959 people had passed through the mission room. More properties were also purchased on Great Ducie Street in 1888, which were converted into the Working Lads Home and Emigration Training Home. By 1890 the Society had established Bethesda Home for Crippled or Incurable Children and also owned several other houses on George Street, Cheetham Hill, which included the Six Homes for Orphan Children, Rosen Hallas, a training home for girls and Tetlow Grove. The Refuge was dedicated to providing a better environment for children and placed great emphasis on the operation of a family system 'home' rather than an 'institution'. From 1885 the Refuge established and ran the Manchester and Salford Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. This aimed at protecting children from deficient parents and relatives until it ceded its powers to the National Society of Prevention of Cruelty to Children in 1895.
An extension to the branch included the establishment of a Seaside home, initially set up in Lytham in 1883 and later transferred to a larger site in Tanllwyfan, Old Colwyn from 1915. This home provided a few weeks recuperation for those in extreme poverty and delicate health, who were not eligible for admission to the Refuge's permanent homes. During the World Wars the home w
Access restrictions:
UnrestrictedRestricted access. Permission of the Together Trust needed to consult collection.Restricted access. Permission of the Together Trust needed to consult collection. Ask customer to contact Records Manager / Archivist, Together Trust, Schools Hill, Cheadle, Cheshire SK8 1JE, 0161 283 4859 enquiries@togethertrust.org.uk
Use restrictions:
Unrestricted
General notes:
Arrangement:There are 10 series:
* Committee Activities and Management Records
* Case Papers
* Financial Records
* Diaries
* Homes and Activities
* Affiliated Organisations
* Emigration
* Publications, Newspaper Cuttings and Promotional Material
* Photograph Collection
* Jubilee School for Girls
Record types:
COLLECTION
Language:
English
Record number:
7190992
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Total copies: 1