Gem From The Archive
Philip Tallent of Wickham Market Area Archive Centre reveals the bleak story behind a workhouse dietary table
A dietary table from a Suffolk workhouse, 1883
The workhouse system our Victorian ancestors would have known came into being because of the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act. This established a Poor Law Commission to supervise the workhouses, which were administrated by local boards of guardians. Living conditions in workhouses were meant to be worse than living in poverty outside, to discourage all but the truly destitute from living off parish funds. A dietary table from Plomesgate Union Workhouse in Wickham Market, Suffolk, reveals the poor diet that paupers were offered, says Philip Tallent, chair of the Wickham Market Area Archive Centre.
TELL ME ABOUT THE DOCUMENT…
The document is dated 1883. It’s a dietary table specifying the food that each of the inmates of the workhouse is allowed to have on a daily basis and meal-by-meal. It provides some revealing insight into the kind of harsh and monotonous regime that many of our ancestors had to live by when they went into the workhouse.
The monotony comes out in that every day for breakfast the men were allowed to have six ounces of bread, one pint of tea and one-and-a-half pints of porridge, although it does seem to say they can trade that allowance of porridge for half-an-ounce of butter. The women received exactly the same allowance, except that they were given one ounce of bread less than the men. Dinner is similarly monotonous, with a very restricted diet. The men on four days a week had eight ounces of bread and two ounces of cheese. When they got to Tuesday, they got eight ounces of cooked meat and 12 ounces of vegetables. On Thursday, they had eight ounces of bread and oneand-a-half pints of pea soup.
On Saturday, they had 14 ounces of suet pudding and 12 ounces of vegetables. With the children, the quantities came down but all the residents were basically eating the same thing.
WHAT OTHER RECORDS DO YOU HAVE FROM THE WORKHOUSE?
The Plomesgate Union Workhouse was opened in 1837, and closed in 1936. We’ve got records that show that discipline was fairly tight. The normal punishment for misconduct or disobedience was to be locked up alone for three hours or so. However, there’s a record of one lad aged 13 who broke some windows, utensils and a lock. He was locked up for 20 hours, and after that he was flogged in the boys’ yard by the schoolmaster with a rod in the presence of the governor. So there were pretty harsh punishments for residents who didn’t fall into line.
The other remarkable thing about the Wickham Market workhouse is how the building was used after it closed. During the Spanish Civil War, 4,000 children were evacuated from Spain to Southampton, and from there they were distributed around the country. About 100 of them came to Wickham Market, and they were housed in the workhouse. They were taught and fed, although it appears the Government wasn’t willing to put any money into it – so local people and the Ipswich Cooperative Society gave so that the children could have food and education.
TELL ME MORE ABOUT HOW PLOMESGATE UNION WORKHOUSE INSPIRED AN ESCAPE ROOM…
The archive centre for
‘About 100 Spanish children were housed in the workhouse’
Wickham Market has always been housed in four temporary buildings behind the village hall. Plans have been agreed to build
an archive centre in a new village hall so we’re now in the process of raising money for that, and I thought that if we put on an escape room it would help. The thought went through my mind that as we had the workhouse in Wickham Market, we could use a workhouse theme.
We created two rooms – a classroom with various lessons, and the kitchen and laundry, all decorated with artefacts lent by local people. The rooms were manned by a teacher and cook in costume.
Teams had to go into the classroom, solve the clues and then make their way into the kitchen, solve some more clues and get out within the hour. We raised £1,000 last year, and another £1,100 in January. That meant creating completely new clues. I’ve replicated the dietary table, so that formed part of a clue on the kitchen wall. We recreated the punishment of solitary confinement as well.
However, it was not just about raising money. It was a great way to bring home to people the conditions that residents of the workhouse experienced.
WHAT OTHER DOCUMENTS DO YOU HAVE?
Wickham Market Area Archive Centre was formed about 30 years ago, and has accumulated all sorts of records. We cover 26 parishes in the Upper Deben Valley, and we’ve got tens of thousands of photos and thousands of documents – we are constantly receiving information from people who find things in newspapers, parish magazines and so on. We’ve also got various wills and other legal documents.
We’ve had a few bequests recently, and have received some really big personal archives. In fact it has been said that we’ve got the largest archive in Suffolk except for Suffolk Record Office. Some collections are filed by family, others by property or theme. So if somebody gives us their personal archive we would keep it together.