Thrale history
Historic Sandridge. The story of a Hertfordshire parish (1952).
The first substantial chronicle of Thrale history, written by R.W. Thrale (1931-2007) & E. Giles. Reproduced in full with consent of the author.
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own as they would be sent away for fear that they might in future become a charge on the rates. Later on in the century it was possible for a man to get work and settle in another parish, provided he brought with him a certificate from the overseers of his own parish undertaking responsibility for his maintenance when he was no longer fit for work. Thomas Raiment and Ann his wife came to Sandridge from Walden and the certificate they brought with them is still preserved at Sandridge. On the other hand, John Gurney, who had come to Sandridge in 1763 without a certificate was told to obtain one or quit.
Another humiliating social system was that by which paupers were hired out by the parish as servants to the more fortunate parishioners. The following is a minute of a Vestry Meeting held At the Queen’s Head In 1763:Ordered that Ann Kilby be look off the monthly bill in consideration of being turned over as a servant to Jonathan Parsons from the Date hereof to St. Michael 1764 on an allowance of two guineas as paid to Jonan Parsons which at the expiration of the said time He is to repay to the officers of the parish for the use of Ann Kilby or to Cloath her equivalent to the said sum. It is also agreed that if Ann Kilby should fall ill of the smallpox during the time Jonathan Parsons is to find her in keep and the Parish with a nurse and advice.
There were a number of similar cases which could be quoted.
The following year it was arranged that John White and John Dudley, being too old and infirm to support themselves, should go round the parish and be employed in turn by the ratepayers for one day for every pound of rates paid. For thrashing the men were to receive a penny a bushel for oats and three half-pence for barley. A contemporary poet comments on this “Roundsman System” -
Alternate masters now their slave command,
Urge the weak efforts of his feeble hand;
Who when his age attempts the task in vain,
With Ruthless taunts of lazy poor complain.16
In April 1776 the Vestry accepted the offer of Mr. George Whitbread to take care of the poor of the parish and provide medicine and surgery for six guineas; he was to receive a guinea for each confinement "where a woman cannot do the business." Mr. Whitbread was powerless, however, to cope with the smallpox which killed six parishioners during the years 1768 to 1770. The number of paupers in Sandridge became so great that the authorities decided that the most economical way of dealing with them was to build a workhouse, which was done by William Lawrence and John Lawford for £128. To meet this expense in addition to the usual poor relief the rates rose to three shillings in the pound. These workhouses were dreaded by the poor, and when the Sandridge house was five years old the following tines were published:
Their’s is yon house that holds the parish poor, Whose walls of mud scarce bear the broken door; There, where the putrid vapours, flagging, play, And the dull wheel hums doleful through the day; There children dwell who know no parents’ care; Parents, who know no children’s love, dwell there; Heart-broken matrons on their joyless bed, Forsaken wives and mothers never wed; Dejected widows with unheeded tears, And crippled age with more than childhood fears; The lame, the blind, and, far the happiest they! The moping idiot and the madman gay.
Here too the sick their final doom receive, Here brought, amid the scenes of grief, to grieve, Where the loud groans from some sad chamber flow, Mixt with the clamours of the crowd below; Here sorrowing, they each kindred sorrow scan, And the cold charities of man to man. Whose laws indeed for ruin’s age provide, And strong compulsion plucks the scrap from pride; But still that scrap is bought with many a sigh, And pride embitters what it can’t deny.17
Footnotes
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