From the Darkness, a Little Light
Whether it’s the Nativity story, A Christmas Carol, Little Women or the annual spike in charitable donations, the plight of the less fortunate is a steady theme through each festive season. As a reminder of how far our society has come, Cherri Greeno take
IT WAS A COOL SATURDAY NIGHT on the streets of Fergus when a young woman with two small children at her side was seen wandering through the small community. She told local residents she was about to give birth to another child and pleaded with them to take her in. No one would. Left with no other option, the frightened woman laid down on the sidewalk near Grieve’s Hotel and gave birth.
That was in September 1884 — a time when unwed mothers were frowned upon, a time when they received little support from their community.
In fact, a newspaper article written in the Fergus News Record at the time described the woman as being “about 36 years of age, dark complexioned and apparently of the tramp species.”
Luckily, for this woman, a doctor arrived and took her and her children into the hotel. They were later transported to the “Poor House,” otherwise known as the House of Industry and Refuge.
Built in 1877, the Poor House provided shelter for those described as the “deserving poor,” a 19th-century term for people who were unable to look after themselves — the destitute, the elderly, orphans, unwed and abandoned mothers, and mentally and physically handicapped people.
At the time however, not much was known about those with mental and physical challenges and many were described in the Admission Register as “idiots, imbeciles, weak-minded, or feeble-minded.” Others were described as “destitute, tramps and vagrants.”
Records from the time show that while the Poor House was built to accommodate between 50 to 60 residents, it quickly began to overflow, often housing as many as 90 residents at the time. During the years it was opened — from 1877 to 1947 — a total of 1,800 people sought refuge there.
Today, the large stone building, which sits atop a hill on Wellington Road 18 in Fergus, is known as the Wellington County Museum and Archives. Along with other travelling exhibits, the museum gives visitors a glimpse of the lives of those forced to live here when it was known simply as the Poor House.
“These people’s stories have not been told,” says Susan Dunlop, the curator at the museum. “A lot of it is stories of women’s history and of children’s history. Their stories deserve to be told.”
Dunlop helped create the exhibit If These Walls Could Speak, which showcases the hardships that many of the home’s residents endured. At the time, the people staying here were called “inmates,” a term that described anyone living in a public institution, including a jail, hospital, asylum or house of refuge.
“They didn’t use the term inmate the same way we do today,” Dunlop says. “It really just meant that you lived there.”
The term was later changed to “resident” in the 1930s.
Dunlop has been researching the lives of these residents since 2004, in the hopes of bringing the past alive.
“There is so much we don’t know,” she says. “We keep filling in little touches all the time.”
A year after the Poor House opened, 84 “inmates” were registered, says Dunlop. Each were expected to “earn their keep” by doing chores such as laundry, cooking, gardening and working in the fields or in the nearby Industrial Farm, which the House of Industry relied on for its food supplies.
The staff at the House tried to make the best of what they had for all the residents, especially during the Christmas holidays. An article in the Fergus News Record in January, 1878, described what it was like for the inmates during their first Christmas in the House.
It indicates the inmates were “treated to a first class dinner of roast beef and plumb pudding” and that “all kinds of household clothing is being rapidly made up, including mattresses, pillow and bolster slips, sheets, quilts, body linen ... for the females and shirts, pants, vests for the men.”
Local church groups would come and decorate, sing Christmas carols and give gifts such as handkerchiefs for the women and piped tobacco for the men, says Dunlop.
But while the House offered men, women and children a place to go when they had nowhere else to turn, it also produced some sad tales.
The stories of children strike Dunlop the most, including the story of Wellington Roberston, the first baby born at the Poor House in 1878 and, sadly, one of the youngest to die there.
Research shows Wellington’s “destitute” mother Elizabeth died from congestion of the lungs shortly after giving birth to her son. His death certificate indicates he was just 11 months when he died of “convulsions.” His mother’s body was exhumed and he was placed in the coffin with her.
There is the story of two-year-old Samuel Dixon of Drayton who was deserted by his
parents and admitted to the Poor House in 1888. He was born with what was then described as a clubfoot and endured several operations at the Guelph General Hospital. When he turned 14 he was sent to the Boys’ Home in Hamilton. What happened to him after that is unknown, Dunlop says.
In December 1877, six-year-old John Burgess and his brother James, 4, were admitted to the Poor House for being “fatherless.” The Admission Register reveals that many children and their mothers were admitted because they were “abandoned by parents,” “deserted by husband,” “orphaned” and “non-supported by husband.”
“You can imagine the stigma of being an unwed mother in that time,” Dunlop says. “Many of the mothers would come and stay for the rest of their lives because their reputation was tarnished.”
Because orphanages and the Children’s Aid Society had not yet been established, it was the policy of the House to find new homes for the children, either through adoption or a system known as “pauper ap- prenticeship,” in which a child would work for a family while receiving some schooling to prepare them for adulthood. However, these policies rarely ended happily.
Many of the children had frail health and were forced to work in harsh conditions, so many of them returned to the House within weeks of the start of their apprenticeships.
This was the case for young Julia Everson of Harriston, who was just seven years old when she entered the House with her destitute mother and young brothers. She was adopted and apprenticed many times but always returned. She lived at the House until 1948, when she died at 67.
But, according to Dunlop, it’s not just children who endured tough times.
Those suffering from mental or physical illnesses — conditions that weren’t clearly understood or medicated at the time — would be temporarily locked in one of three jail cells in the wash house until their symptoms went away. Having newborn babies and young children mixed in with the elderly and those suffering from mental and physical challenges was not necessarily a healthy environment, Dunlop says.
“We really have no idea what it was like to have infants surrounded by adults, some of whom suffered from schizophrenia or dementia,” Dunlop says. “Everyone was being placed here no matter who they were.”
That includes Jane Hunter, who moved to the area from Ireland in 1844. She never married but lived with her sister, Anne, and her family in Hollen, helping to raise her 13 nieces and nephews. When she became
Markers and plaques at a nearby cemetery where 271 of the House of Industry residents were buried. ill at age 87, Jane’s nieces wanted their aunt to remain at the family home. However, her nephews insisted on sending Jane to the Poor House.
“Jane’s story had such an impact on my family,” says Katie Anderson, who was first told the story of her great-great-great aunt from her mother. “Most of these stories get lost, but what happened to Jane particularly affected the women in my family, who passed on the story to each generation.”
Anderson, who now works at the museum, says it’s stories like Hunter’s that need to be told.
“It feels kind of like her story has gone full circle now,” she says. “I get this opportunity at the museum to really dig into Jane’s story and share it.”
Anderson says Jane died at the House in 1905, three years after she was placed there. She hopes by sharing her aunt’s “sad tale,” more families will come forward and search for information on their past.
“Maybe Jane’s story will inspire people to look into their own history and remember those lost voices,” she says. “These are people who ended up at the House of Industry and Refuge not because they wanted to but because they had no other choice.”
But, despite all the hardships faced by the residents of the House, Dunlop and Anderson say the lessons learned are not all negative. In fact, according to Dunlop, out of the bad came some good.
It was around 1898 when the government started recognizing that children should not be placed in an environment surrounded by the elderly and those suffering from mental challenges, says Dunlop.
New legislation under The Children’s Protection Act was put in place and required that all children under age 16 be removed from Houses of Industry and placed in orphanages. This was the time when Children’s Aid Societies were established and began taking in children.
“This was the root of the state’s responsibility to those who were vulnerable,” Dunlop says. “It was saying we can’t just leave it up to charities and churches to take care of these people, but that the state has a responsibility to each of us.”
It was houses like these — and stories like
the ones Dunlop and Anderson have researched — that made government officials realize the importance of social assistance, such as the senior citizens’ allowance.
“It became about human dignity and the state’s responsibility to every individual,” she says. “This was really the beginning of our social welfare system. It was an acknowledgement that you could not retire from your work if you didn’t have someone to support you.”
As the years went on and children were removed from the House, the residents left were mainly elderly and, in 1947, it became the Wellington County Home for the Aged.
In 1972 the Wellington Terrace, a seniors’ home, was built in Elora and council members decided to use the Poor House site to store the collection of the Wellington County Museum of Elora.
An extensive renovation and expansion project was conducted at the museum in 1986 and today, the Wellington County Museum and Archives offers the public extensive research facilities, several travelling exhibits, seasonal special events and education programs. In 1998, the site was designated a National Historic Site and to this day remains the oldest House of Industry and Refuge in Canada.
For Dunlop, keeping our history alive no matter how ugly it might look is crucial for understanding how far we’ve come.
“Social history cannot always be about triumphs and achievements,” she says. “This is about our history, about those that fell between the cracks and about the county that stopped it. Not all rural counties would have done that, but Wellington County did.”
Dunlop says her years at the museum have brought her very close to the people she has researched. When she receives a call from someone who has found old photographs of ancestors who stayed at the House she gets excited to add another piece to her puzzle. Recently, she and other museum staff decided to add markers and plaques to the nearby cemetery where 271 residents were buried. “It was a debt we owed them,” she says. Dunlop will continue researching the lives of those who sought refuge and is hoping anyone with any information on their ancestors will come speak to her so she can continue giving a voice to those who helped shape our future.
“This is very close to me,” she says. “I never stop. It’s a labour of love.”