The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-12-22 00:00:00

BATHS AND WASH HOUSES FOR THE POOR.

IT is proposed to raise, by Public Subscriptiok, a sum
of Money, to be invested for the benefit Nif Mrs.
WILKINSON, to whose benevolence and industry the Public
are mainly indebted for the establishment of literus and
WASH-HousEs for the Poon.

The following account of the labours of this excellent person
may be relied upon :

ORIGIN OF THE LIVERPOOL BATHS AND WASH

HOUSES.

" In the spring of the year 1832 the apprehension of cholera
impressed the importance of cleanliness upon all classes with
the vividness of a newly-discovered truth. The visitors of the
poor, while they exhorted them to the immediate practice of
this virtue, looked hopelessly round the dark cellar, or small
garret, containing a whole family, often lodgers also, for the
facilities of washing, or the possibility of drying, the clothes of
the inmates. From the blackened blankets and bed, they
turned as from evils for which they could devise no remedy.
" But the poor, when their energies are aroused, can often
find resources where their friends can see none ; and their
mutual benevolence is their surest reliance. A poor woman,
(Mrs. Wilkinson,) living in one of the crowded streets of Liver-
pool, had a back kitchen in which three people could just
stand, containing a small boiler. On the Monday she washed
her own clothes ; the rest of the week her kitchen was filled by
her still poorer neighbours, as was the covered passage into
which her house opened, and in fair weather her yard also. To
dry all these cloth& was the next difficulty. This was over-
come by passing cords from her own back window to that of a
kind neighbour opposite, on which they could hang and freshen
in the air, out of reach of theft, or giving annoyance to any one.
" The cholera soon appeared, and that street was one of the
earliest and most severely visited. The bedding and clothes of
the dead were ordered to be burnt. How were the survivors to
supply the change of linen and the warmth dethanded, in an
unprecedented degree, by this dreadful disease?
" We meet among the poor with a courageous. self-denying,
persevering benevolence, such as privation often develops,
which makes us feel the high purposes for which the severe
discipline of life is designed. The same active kindness which
opened her house to her neighbours, led the woman above-
mentioned, regardless of all dancer to herself, to visit the sick,
to lend them all her sheets, her blankets, her clothes. But she
could not allow them to be burnt. A medical man assured her
that some chloride of lime put into the water in which she
steeped them would destroy the infection. The rapid circula-
tion of her own little stock being quite inadequate to supply the
pressing wants of her neighbours, she applied to the visitors of
the District Provident Society for more sheets and clothes to
lend, fOr soap to wash them with, and women to assist her.
For her own services, or for the use of the kitchen, she re-
ceived, during the first visitation of the cholera, no remunera-
tion.

Q° The value of this mode of assisting the poor, when thus
brought under their notice, was at once felt by the visitors.
The cellar under this house was hired, and fitted up with a se-
cond-hand boiler, a wine cask for a cistern, and some troughs
divided into compartments for tubs. It was low and dark,
crowded, and filled with steam ; yet, with only this accommo-
dation, an average of eighty-five families a-week were for se-
veral years preserved from all the evils of washing in their own
confined and crowded rooms, and of putting on their clothes
half dried.

All infected clothes were received and waslied in the kitchen.
A note from any medical man was all that was required. The
expenses of this part of the establishment were met partly by
assistance from the Provident District Society, partly by pri-
vate subscriptions."—Historical Register.
No danger or fatigue has deterred her from sitting up with
the sick ; and she and her husband have worked hard, and
lived hard, to support orphans whose only claim upon them
was the remembrance of the kindness they had received when
left orphans themielves.* Many of the children had claims on
the parish, but these were never urged, and 2s. a-week, which
one child was receiving at the time they took charge of him,
and ss. which five others were receiving, was at once returned;
and a remission of her payment of poor-rates is all she ever re-
ceived for her care. The South Corporation Infant School
arose from a number of children she had collected in her bed.
room, whose parents were ill of cholera.

* some of the orphans referred to were—
Four Joneses, taken in 1824. Father died of typhus; the
mother, six mo. the after.
Ann, aged 11. Went to service; now married to Thomas
Barker, dock-gate keeper.
John, aged 8. Got into Blue-coat School at 9 ; now in the
navy.
Helen, aged 4. .Went to service at Mr. Rathbone's at 17 ;
then married.
George. aged 2. Went into the Blue-coat School at 9. Now
a tailor, Affieck-court, Frederick-street.
John and William Wild. 1827, orphans, twins; supposed
about 14. Found sleeping in a hayloft by her son. Put into
Seaton's paper manufactory for six months ; then sent to sea
under Captain Finley of the Halifax. William was lost in the
Grecian; John is a servant in America.
Three Pnns, in 1830. The father worked at Fawcett's, and
lodged with Mr. Wilkinson.
Thomas. aged 15, apprenticed to Mr. C. Hayes, block-maker;
now married lives at 68, Upper Frederick-street.
Betsy, aged 13; went to service in a year; married Mrs.
W.'s son, and lives with her, No. 70, Upper Frederick-street.
William, aged 10, got into Blue-coat School in six months;
now clerk to Mr. Cross, Valparaiso.
Five Harrisons, 1832. Mother died of cholera. Father out of
work for long after. Mrs.W. received something at times from
the father, but seldom, and very insufficient. The aunt, who
had them privionsly, had ss. a-week from the parish,which
Mrs. W. immediately stopped on taking the children.
Mary, aged 11, remained two years.
Catharine 9, apprenticed at 11 to Mr. Greg's cotton-mill;
still there.

Sarah, 7, Ann, 5, apprenticed to Mr. Greg's, in 1838; still
there. _ _ _

Elizabeth, 18 months, died at five years.
Five Coventrys, 1832. The mother died of consumption; the
father deserted them, and has not since been heard of.

Mary. 8, was put in Blue-coat School at 9.
Ralph, 7, Margaret, 5, and William, 3, were kept two years,
and then sent to some relations.

Jane, 3 months, died at 10 months.
Two Hughes, 1535. On the death of the mother, Mrs. Wil-
kinson took in the father, dying of the same complaint, and his
children. He lived ten months.
David, 3 years; got into the Blue-coat School at 9; is now in
Fawcett's foundry.
John is still with her, going to school.
Three Christians, 1835.
Thomas, 21. Dying of consumption. Lived three months.
William, 12. Bound to Mr. Dutchman. In eighteen months
went to sea.
Betsy, 10. Got into the Blue-coat School in about eighteen
months, where she died.
1843.—T0m Quin, 10. Had 2s. from the parish when Mrs.
Wilkinson took him, which she stopped. He is still with her.
To these cases may be added many others.

A Lady in this neighbourhood, feeling deeply the important
nature of the services of Mrs. Wilkinson, and anxious to pro-
cure for them a just appreciation and reward, has issued the-
following prospectus :
It is humbly proposed that a fund should be raised for the
purpose of rewarding Mrs. Wilkinson, in whose unwearied
efforts to assist her poor neighbours at the time of the cholera,
the first attempts originated to establish a public wash-house or
laundry, which have since been carried into such noble effect
in Liverpool, holding out an example, in many instances fol-
lowed, to the admiration and imitation of England.
A memorial has lately appeared in favour of Mrs. Wilkinson,
as a candidate for the office of superintendent of the newly-
completed establishment. It has described the unwearied en-
ergy with which she toiled to assist her poor neighbours, in
destitute old age and helpless infancy; lending all her scanty
means and humble appliances to resist or to remedy the evils
of sickness and contagion : the scene of her labour—the dark
cellar, with its damp and dingy chambers, its troughs and
water-barrels, its frugal expedients and primitive contrivances
—has been surpeseded by an institution that exhibits' in its
simplicity the perfection of scientific usefulness, which the
highest and most enlightened of all ranks in England have been
delighted to contemplate.
Nurtured by the dews of Heaven, the seed sown by this wo-
man's humble hand has been blest in its increase; its growth
was fostered by one single personification of that spirit of
Christian charity which delights to do good in secret—to her
remains the unclaimed but heartfelt reward of silently seeing
the lowly but noble work (which might have perished without
such timely aid) carried out to its completion, and established,
a sulendid and permanent benefit to society.
Hut to return to its originator. It remains with our country
to reward a merit, which, in its fearlessness of danger and con-
tagion, emulates the courage, and. in its lowly bearing, the lofty
and heroic simplicity of Grace Darling;--in its zeal for doing
good to the poor and distressed, the untiring energy and acti-
vity of Mrs. Fry; and this, too, in an instance where all the
motives that minister to ambition and vanity were unknown or
withdrawn—unseen and unheard, save by the poor creatures
who surrounded her—instead of praise, and congratulation, and
fame, she had only •' the blessings of those who were ready to
perish."
Nor should we hesitate to recognise and to appreciate, in this
humble instance, the spirit of charity, by the blessing of
Heaven, so widely diffused throughout the families of the
(arth, but more especially amidst the poorest of the poor.
There, woman exercises her gentle but most important mi-
nistry, by . the subdivision of her scanty and precarious meal,
by daily visitings and nightly tendance, in the time of sickness,
of destitution, or of death—before the ear of public charity has
been awakened, or while its organized relief has been delayed
or suspended. Where else on earth shall we find so near a ful-
filment of that divine injunction which has commanded'us "to
love our neighbour as ourself?" Where else a stronger enforce-
ment of that holy lesson which enjoins th 2 rich to " consider
the-poor?"
4th Nov., 1846. • R. L. '

The efforts thus made have succeeded in obtaining most inns-
trious sanction and support.
The time, however, has arrived, when this business 'Tr-mires
the active labour of gentlemen connected with the town of Li-
verpool. To them the lady with whom this proposal origi-
nated is desirous to give up the further and more active prose-
cution of the matter. Several gentlemen have expressed their
anxiety to support the benevolent intentions of the writer of the
prospectus. A Committee has been formed, with power to add
to their numbers; and, in the meanwhile, Subscriptions will be
received by ROBERTSON GLA DSTONE, Esq., .TouN (7.1,0 w, Esq.,
THOMAS TODD, Esq., WM. EA RLE, Esq., and the SECRETARY.
Communications may be addressed to the Committee, at the
Sessions-house, Chapel-street, Liverpool, or to the undersigned,
Exchange-place, Exchange-street East.
JOSEPH S. RUSHTON, Secretary.