Threads of Feeling Online
We have covered this magnificent exhibition at the Foundling Museum already, but I didn’t realise that they have a superb online rendition of the show, brought to our attention by Prof. Amanda Vickery. Do check it out, and then do your utmost to visit the show itself. The museum is worth a visit in its own right, particularly if you enjoy beautifully appointed rooms, Hogarth and Handel to mention but a few of the joys. It’s worth mentioning too that the Charles Dickens Museum is just around the corner.
Threads of Feeling ends on 6 March, the clock is ticking.
I suppose it seems harsh to us now that inmates of the Foundlings’ Hospital were separated from their parents in so draconian a way. On the other hand, such charities were remarkable innovations for their day and must have saved thousands from misery and an untimely death who would have had no other source of help.
We take our modern standards of charity and social support for granted but we have arrived at this position only through a process of gradual improvement and evolution in thinking. It was charities such as the Foundlings that planted the seeds that have matured into the modern network of support. Without philanthropists like Coram, we would not be so far along the road today.
So many abandoned children! Many or perhaps most of them must have wondered about their families. I wonder if any ever traced their parents. What a story such a search would make!
As I understand it, only one per cent or so – a relatively tiny number at any rate – of the many thousands of foundlings were reunited with their parent or parents.
As you say, without Coram, who knows what might have happened to these desperate mothers and their equally desperate infants?
Thanks for the information.
I am surprised that any managed to be reunited with their people but I am glad that at least some did.
It would be interesting to know whether any left an account of their lives.
At the other end of life, we have the almshouses (the lovely Geffrye Museum is an example, though converted to other uses) and these, too, always fascinate me.
The whole point – probably the only point – of the docket and fabric system was for re-claiming of the children, such a shame it happened for so few.