Children in Workhouses Were Physically Abused
Aside from their dirty and poor working conditions, children in workhouses were often victims of corporal punishment. The Poor Law Commissioners tried to put regulations in place protecting children from too much abuse. But even in the new rules, hitting children was still allowed under certain circumstances. In 1838, a letter was written to The Times from Bath reporting an incident when an 8-year-old boy was beaten for three days straight after complaining that he was unjustly beaten. A man named Henry Morton Stanley grew up in a poor house, and would later go on to become a writer. He testified that one of his friends, Willie Roberts, was literally beaten to death by the workhouse schoolmaster. Another incident involved a woman called Nurse Gillespie, who would use “systematic cruelty” on children by whipping them with stinging nettles and forcing them to kneel on hot water pipes.