VACCINATION MEMENTO
I thought that some of your readers might find the attached photograph (below) interesting in the present situation.
This is my great grandfather’s certificate of vaccination against smallpox. In 1853 a law was passed making it compulsory for all babies to be vaccinated before they were four months old. There were some exemptions on medical grounds, but I believe that children were not allowed to go to school if they didn’t have a certificate or an exemption.
If the parents didn’t have their baby vaccinated then they would be fined 20s, and if they didn’t pay it then they could be jailed.
As time went on more exemptions were allowed on religious grounds, but the law was only repealed in 1948.
The vaccination was free, but in some quarters it was thought
to be motivated not by concern for the poor but by worries that there wouldn’t be enough workers for the factories and the mines if too many children died.
My family don’t seem to have disposed of any documents since the 1850s.
Sue Whitfield, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: Thank you for sharing this Sue. What a great keepsake, and particularly interesting at a time like this.