White Slaves; or, the Oppression of the Worthy PoorBanks, Louis Albert
History
White Slaves; or, the Oppression of the Worthy Poor
Banks, Louis Albert
Poor -- Massachusetts -- Boston; Sweatshops; Working class -- Massachusetts -- Boston
Among the men in this institution was pointed out to me a
marble-cutter, who was a thoroughly respectable, self-supporting
workman. He was hurt while at work by the falling of a stone, and so
disabled by an injury of the spine that he was unable to continue
employment. As soon as sickness had used up what money he had, having
no relatives who could help him, there was nothing left for him but to
come here. One of the officers spoke of him in the highest terms, and
told me how, without direction from any one else, he sought by many
daily circuits of the building to strengthen his spine. I was assured
by the same officer that many others who were inmates were there purely
through misfortune which was from no fault of their own, but from such
accidents as are likely to happen to any honest laboring-man. Now I
maintain that such men ought to be treated with a decent regard for
their self-respect, and given a comfortable home. It is an outrage that
this marble-cutter, and others like him, are fed more shabbily than if
they had been convicted of a crime.
In addition to the men on Long Island, there is one ward in the
hospital used for women. There were fifty-two sick women crowded into
this ward at the time of my visit. There was only one nurse, an
excellent woman, but with no special education for her duties. The
night helper is a woman who is hired for fifty cents a day. For this
ward of fifty-two sick women there was no bath-room at all. The nurse's
own room was situated at the other end of the building from her ward,
and she had to go across the men's ward to get to her patients at
night, if she went. There was no place for insane or refractory
patients, or for the dying, except in the general ward. Sometimes
their cries and groans are very distressing to the other patients. In a
recent case of death from mania, the whole ward was disturbed for
several nights.
Most of the women are kept at Rainsford Island, and there are many more
reasons for criticism there than on Long Island. The only hospital
there is an old smallpox hospital, more than three-score years old.
This is crowded beyond all thought of the requirements of sanitary
science. Think of a room for confinement cases only seven feet wide and
less than twelve feet long. In the annual report of Public Institutions
for 1889 we find the following statement by the then resident
physician: "It is remarkable that a building which was a small-pox
hospital fifty-seven years ago, and which since then has undergone no
material improvement, should up to the present time be the only
hospital connected with our pauper institutions." The doctor might have
added that this building was abandoned a quarter of a century ago by
the State, as unfit for sick persons. It is certainly no extravagance
to say that these arrangements for the care of the sick on Rainsford
Island are more than half a century behind the times. The only thing
modern I saw was the keen-eyed physician.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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