The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-09-17 00:00:00

SUNDAY SCHOOL CANVASS MEETING

A public meeting of Sunday school teachers, can-
vassers, and friends of Sunday schools, was held in the
Concert-hall, Lord Nelson-street, at seven o'clock last
night, for the purpose of receiving the report of the
executive committee appointed to organise the canvass
for Sunday school scholars. The chair was taken by
the Rev. Dr. Hume, chairman of the executive com-
mittee. Among those present were—Rev. Messrs. Birrell,
itarcus, Hugh Stowell Brown, V. M. White, Scott,
Johnston, Orr, L. Thomas, Aspinall, W. Hunt, Cowan ;
Yevsrs. Mounsey, Breeze, Pilcher, Mallett, Buckley,
Brown, Hall, Dalton, Mitchell, Perkins, M`Diarmid,
R. A. Macfie ; Rev. Messrs. Pain, Bannerman, Dewsnap,
Forfar, Webb, Railton, George Scott, Preston, Joseph
Fidler, A. C. Smith, incumbent of Macclesfield ; Mr.
Alexanfler M'Farlane, Leith ; and Mr. Samuel Holmes,
Young Men's Christian Association, New York.
The proceedings were opened with a hymn and
prayer.
The Chairman called upon Mr. Edward Mounsey,
one of the honorary secretaries, to read the report, of
which the following is an abstract :
The time which can be spared to-night for a report on the
canvass is necessarily limited. We therefore propose to
proceed at once to present you with some statements which
we trust may serve as a brief history of the canvass, showing
the kind of machinery employed and the results obtained.
We believe that Birmingham has the honour of originating the
movement which has since been taken up by so many other
large towns, such as London, Bath, Manchester, Edinburgh
&c., for bringing tinder the blessings of Sunday school instruc-
tion the large number of young children who have not bee❑ in
attendance at any school, and many of whom have hitherto
been totally uncared far, and appear only to be training for our
prisons and poorhouses. The first steps towards the canvass of
Liverpool were taken in November last, when a number of
persons representing the largest schools of all denominations
met in the Reference Liherary of the Sunday School Institute
on the invitation of the committee of the Sunday School Union.
After fully discussing the whole subject, it was resolved that it
was desirable that a canvass should be undertaken. A commit-
tee was formed first of all, however, " to obtain the statistics
of the youthful population at present attending Sunday
schools, and to ascertain what accommodation these schools
could provide for an increase of scholars." After four months'
labour, this committee presented their report at a meeting of
ministers and delegates of schools, held in Hope Hall, on the
18th of March last, at which Dr. Raffles presided. That
report stated that from returns obtained it appeared that in 122
evangelical Protestant schools in Liverpool there were on the
books the names of boys and girls amounting to 23,376, and
attendance on Sunday afternoon, the 16th of Dec, 16,551.
Adding 8,000 to the number on the books, as an estimate of
children attending Roman Catholic and other schools, it gave
31,376 as the number under instruction. It was also esti-
mated, from Horace Mason's statistical returns, that the num.
ber of children of the industrial classes, who might be in
attendance in Sunday schools in Liverpool was 66,804. It
thus appeared that 33,428, or 53 per cent of children of the
working classes did not belong to any Sunday school. The
schools applied to also stated that they had further accommodation
for an increase of 12,459 new scholars. In these statements there
were, therefore, good grounds for undertaking the canvass, and
it was therefore resolved that " a simultaneous canvass of the
parliamentary borough for Sunday school scholars be at once
undertaken on behalf and by the joint co-operation of all evan-
gelical Protestants." An executive committee was unani%
mously appoin.ed, comprising representatives from nearly all
denominations of Protestants. The committee so appointed at
once proceeded to perfect the plan which had been laid before
the meeting at Hope Hall, and generally approved of there.
The boroughs was divided into fifteen districts, generally coin-
cident with the municipal wards. Each school in the districts
was invited to appoint two teachers to act upon the district
committee, and meetings were held in each district, when the
committee were organised and received their instructions. The
duties of the district committees were principally to obtain
canvassers, allot their district to each pair of canvassers,
who were to be of different denominations, if possible,
and generally to superintend the work in that district.
In laying before you the statistics showing the result of all
these labours, the committee much regret to say that many
of the hooks are most imperfectly made up. They have reason
to know that in many cases the district secretaries have been
quite unable to make up from them the proper returns. Some
of the canvassers appear not to have lead carefully the instruc.
tions in the " Street Record Book," which the committee
fa,,cied were models of plainness, and in which a specimen page,
showing how each column was to be filled up, was given, in
tho hope of securing uniformity of entry. This is much to be
regretted, as to that extent they cannot gi vo the number as
correctly as they could wish. These remarks apply principally
to the number of families visited, the number of children aged
from 4 to 18, and the number previously attending school.
They can give, with considerable cerrectness, the number of
children and young people promised, because they have their
names and addresses. The following, then, appears to be the
result : _ _

RETURNS OF SUNDAY SCHOOL CANVASS. 1856

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Remarks

District.

District
Secretaries

Kirkdale..
Evertou
Scotland, E ....
Ditto, W
Vauxhall and St. Paul's 1301 2501 3360 2030 721
Exchange and Castle-st 110 i 1599 2700 1183 302
Sr. Peter's and Piet-st B7i 1649 1882 1368 274
Great George
Rodney-street
Abercromby go 2675 2592 1650 337
Lime-street .......... 292 6350 .. .. 721
St. Anne's.. ..... 135 6070 .• .. 784
West Derby
North Tosteth. - .. 770
South Toxteth l3Bl 6000

5041

It is here only right to mention that Mr. R. A. Made, in
addition to a donation of £2O towards the expenses of the
canvass, handsomely offered to contribute one tenth of the
expenses, for two years, of any new schools the committee
could establish. Applications have been received and grants
made as follows :