Agricultural colonies; Poor -- Great Britain; Salvation Army; Unemployed -- Great Britain
Such is the Scheme as I have conceived it. Intelligently applied, and
resolutely persevered in, I cannot doubt that it will produce a great
and salutary change in the condition of many of the most hopeless of
our fellow countrymen. Nor is it only our fellow countrymen to whom it
is capable of application. In its salient features, with such
alterations as are necessary, owing to differences of climate and of
race, it is capable of adoption in every city in the world, for it is
an attempt to restore to the masses of humanity that are crowded
together in cities, the human and natural elements of life which they
possessed when they lived in the smaller unit of the village or the
market town. Of the extent of the need there can be no question.
It is, perhaps, greatest in London, where the masses of population are
denser than those of any other city; but it exists equally in the chief
centres of population in the new Englands that have sprung up beyond
the sea, as well as in the larger cities of Europe. It is a remarkable
fact that up to the present moment the most eager welcome that has been
extended to this Scheme reaches us from Melbourne, where our officers
have been compelled to begin operations by the pressure of public
opinion and in compliance with the urgent entreaties of the Government
on one side and the leaders of the working classes on the other before
the plan had been elaborated, or instructions could be sent out for
their guidance.
It is rather strange to hear of distress reaching starvation point in a
city like Melbourne, the capital of a great new country which teems
with natural wealth of every kind. But Melbourne, too, has its
unemployed, and in no city in the Empire have we been more successful
in dealing with the social problem than in the capital of Victoria.
The Australian papers for some weeks back have been filled with reports
of the dealings of the Salvation Army with the unemployed of Melbourne.
This was before the great Strike. The Government of Victoria
practically threw upon our officers the task of dealing with the
unemployed. The subject was debated in the House of Assembly,
and at the close of the debate a subscription was taken up by one of
those who had been our most strenuous opponents, and a sum of #400
was handed over to our officers to dispense in keeping the starving
from perishing. Our people have found situations for no fewer than
1,776 persons, and are dispensing meals at the rate of 700 a day.
The Government of Victoria has long been taking the lead in recognising
the secular uses of the Salvation Army. The following letter addressed
by the Minister of the Interior to the Officer charged with the
oversight of this part of our operations, indicates the estimation in
which we are held: --
Government of Victoria, Chief Secretary's Office,
Melbourne.
July 4th, 1889.
Superintendent Salvation Army Rescue Work.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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