Cost and standard of living -- England -- London; London (England) -- Economic conditions; Working class -- England -- London
In this investigation forty-two families have been visited. Of these,
eight, owing to various reasons, were visited but for a short time.
Three were given up after several weeks, because the husbands objected
to the household accounts being shown to the visitor; and here it would
be interesting to mention that in three other cases, not reckoned in the
investigation, the husbands refused after the first week for the same
reason as soon as they thoroughly realised the scope of the inquiry. In
four cases the babies were born too soon, and lived but a few hours.
The investigation was primarily on infantile mortality, so that it
automatically ceased with the child’s death. One family moved out of
London before the child’s birth. There remain, therefore, thirty-four
babies who were watched and studied by the visitors for many months. In
every case but one these children were normal, and thriving at birth.
Only one weighed less than 6 lbs.; four more weighed less than 7 lbs.;
fifteen more weighed less than 8 lbs.; ten more weighed less than 9 lbs.;
and four weighed over 9 lbs. The average weight at birth for the whole
number was 7 lbs. 10 ozs. The child which weighed 5 lbs. 12 ozs. at birth
was always sickly, and died of diarrhœa and sickness during the hot
August of 1911 at the age of six months. Her mother was a delicate woman,
and had come through a time of dire stress when her husband was out of
work for four months before this child was born. A baby born since,
which does not appear in this investigation, is now about five months
old. Not one of the others seemed otherwise than sound and healthy, and
able to thrive on the nourishment which was provided for their special
benefit by the investigation. One child, however, a beautiful boy of
five months, who weighed 7 lbs. 12 ozs. at birth, and 14 lbs. 14 ozs. at
twenty weeks, died suddenly of bronchitis in December, 1910. His mother’s
health record was bad. He was the sixth child she had lost out of eleven.
She was an extraordinarily tidy, clean woman, and an excellent manager;
but her father had died of consumption, and she was one of those mothers
who economised in rent in order to feed her flock more adequately. She
paid 5s. a week for very dark ground-floor rooms. The death of the child
was so sudden and unexpected that an inquest was held. The mother was
horrified and bewildered at the entrance of police officers into her
home. She wrung her hands and repeated over and over, “I done all I
could!” and never shook off the impression that some disgrace attached
to her. The burial insurance money paid by the company was £1. Five
shillings specially earned by the mother and 5s. lent by a friend brought
up the amount to the necessary 30s., and the humble funeral took place.
The child was buried in a common grave with seven other coffins of all
sizes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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