The Sun.
London, England, 1839-12-31 00:00:00

rations."

The Board have inspected the various Reports of the
charitable bodies of the time, for further facts illustra-
tive of the effects of the panic upon the condition of the
working classes. In Birmingham large subscriptions
were raise,l, to relieve the distress of the almost unpre-
cedented numbers of unemployed workpeople. Shef-
field was divided into districts, and upwards of 1.5,000
persons were at one time supported by charity. The
Committee of the Distress Fund stated, in a public ap—
peal, that " in hundreds of families children were crying
fur food to parents unable to give it ; and, in others,
sickness, arising from the want of the necessaries of
life, threatens, without a speedy relief, to bring the suf-
ferings of the wretched individuals to a close." The
eighth annual Report of the Liverpool District Visiting
Society, for the year 1837, states that `` During the
four preceding years,. the average number of cases re-
lieved by the 13:iard was 2,892, at a cost in provisions of
557/. 4s. 2d. ; whereas, during the past year, the num-
ber was 9,902 at the cost of 1,3381. Is. 2d." And by
a table of the number of inmates of the Liverpocl
Asylum for the Houseless Poor, it has been found
that 13,781 persons were admitted in 1837, whilst
the highest number relieved in any one of the three
preceding years amounted only to 10,559. The Leeds
Church of England District Visiting Society, in their
annual Report to the Ist of October, 1837, begins with
lamenting the commercial embarrassments, " and the
consequent privations of the poorer classes."

Scotland was the first, as usual, to feel the effects of
a pecuniary crisis. A public meeting was held in G:as-
gow,ori the 19th May, 1837, to use a subscription for
the relief of the distress of the working classes. Upwards
of 8,0001. was placed at the disposal of the Committee.
At one time about 18,500 persons were fed from the I
soup kitchen, of whom upwards of 3,800 were adtilts.
Large bodies of operatives wet e, at the same time.
thrown out of employment, and rendered destitute, in -I
Dundee and other large towns of Scotland. In Paisley, t
a public meeting was held on the 1 Ith April, 1837, to
raise a subscription, and in June it was calculated that
20,000 persons were unemployed ; and at Strathaveo,
Airdrie, Pollockshaws, and other towns and villages in
the west of Scotland, destitution and disease prevailed
to an alarming degree.
Nor did Ireland escape her share of the common
calamity. The Committee of the Dublin Mendicity
Association, in their report for 1837, state that "they
have struggled through a year of most unparalleled
difll-
culties, and that within the recollection of the oldest int
habitant, there has seldom or ever occurred a period
when out-door employment was so much restricted."
And the 27th Report of the Belfast House of Industry,
dated the 16th March, 1837, dwells upon the urgent
and numerous claims of the poor " among whom th'4..
depression of trade, arising from a panic in the money
market, has produced much distress."
It is natural that disease and crime should follow in I
the train of so much suffering and privation, and accord-
ingly the Reports of the several medical charities, and
the records of our prisons, bear testimony to the fear-
ful injuries icflicte'l, by the money crisis of 1836-7, upon
the health and morals of the people. In the general
hospital of Birmingham, the number of patients relieved •
bore the unprecedented disproportion of 7,468 cases in
1837, to 5,849 in the previous year. The Report of tai'
Leeds General Infirmary, for 1837, states, that 1,508
patients were admitted in that year, whilst the number
for 1836 amounted to 1,343. In the Report of Ole '
Committee of the Glasgow Towns' Hospital, it
stated, that the expenditure for 1837 reached to
13,325/. 6s. 11d. whilst the highest amount given
for any one previous year is 10,4381.95. 2d. The in-
crease in the number of claimants at the Manchester ;
Infirmary, in 1837, as compared with the preceding
year, amounted to 2,755 ; and the annual Report states.