Regeneration: Being an Account of the Social Work of The Salvation Army in Great BritainHaggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
Religion
Regeneration: Being an Account of the Social Work of The Salvation Army in Great Britain
Haggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
Great Britain -- Social conditions; Salvation Army
The matron in charge informed me that even for these rough women there
is no system of punishment whatsoever. No girl is ever restricted in
her food, or put on bread and water, or struck, or shut away by
herself. The Army maxim is that it is its mission not to punish but to
try to reform. If in any particular case its methods of gentleness
fail, which they rarely do, it is considered best that the case should
depart, very possibly to return again later on.
She added that although many of these women had committed assaults,
and even fought the Police, not one of them attacks another in the
Home once in a year, and that during her twenty years of work,
although she had lived among some of the worst women in England, she
had never received a single blow. As an illustration of what the
Salvation Army understands by this word 'work' I may state that
throughout these twenty years, except for the allotted annual
fortnight, this lady has had no furlough.
THE MEN'S SOCIAL WORK
GLASGOW
I saw the Brigadier in charge of the Men's Social Work in Glasgow at a
great central Institution where hundreds of poor people sleep every
night. The inscriptions painted on the windows give a good idea of its
character. Here are some of them: 'Cheap beds.' 'Cheap food.' 'Waste
paper collected.' 'Missing friends found.' 'Salvation for all.'
In addition to this Refuge there is an 'Elevator' of the usual type,
in which about eighty men were at work, and an establishment called
the Dale House Home, a very beautiful Adams' house, let to the Army at
a small rent by an Eye Hospital that no longer requires it. This house
accommodates ninety-seven of the men who work in the Elevator.
The Brigadier informed me that the distress at Glasgow was very great
last year. Indeed, during that year of 1909 the Army fed about 35,000
men at the docks, and 65,000 at the Refuge, a charity which caused
them to be officially recognized for the first time by the
Corporation, that sent them a cheque in aid of their work. Now,
however, things have much improved, owing to the building of
men-of-war and the forging of great guns for the Navy. At Parkhead
Forge alone 8,000 men are being employed upon a vessel of the
Dreadnought class, which will occupy them for a year and a half. So it
would seem that these monsters of destruction have their peaceful
uses.
Glasgow, he said, 'is a terrible place for drink, especially of
methylated spirits and whisky.' Drink at the beginning, I need hardly
remark, means destitution at the end, so doubtless this failing
accounts for a large proportion of its poverty.
The Men's Social Work of the Army in Glasgow, which is its
Headquarters in Scotland, is spreading in every direction, not only in
that city itself, but beyond it to Paisley, Greenock, and Edinburgh.
Indeed, the Brigadier has orders 'to get into Dundee and Aberdeen as
soon as possible.' I asked him how he would provide the money. He
answered, 'Well, by trusting in God and keeping our powder dry.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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