Memoirs of John Kitto

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE WORKHOUSE. Towards the close of the year 1818, imperative circumstances compelled Kitto's grandmother to remove from Plymouth to Brixton, and the same circumstances forbade his accompanying her: for the first time since his birth, he now became solely dependent on his parents. The year...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE WORKHOUSE. Towards the close of the year 1818, imperative circumstances compelled Kitto's grandmother to remove from Plymouth to Brixton, and the same circumstances forbade his accompanying her: for the first time since his birth, he now became solely dependent on his parents. The year that followed this separation from his aged and much loved relative, was to him a year of intense misery. Very often, during that period, he was destitute of the means of shielding his form from the inclemency of the weather, his feet from the stones, or his appetite from gnawing hunger. He had nearly completed his fifteenth year, and no prospect appeared of his being able to obtain a livelihood of the scantiest kind by his own exertions. As the last resource, application was made on his behalf to the guardians of the poor; and in November 15, 1819, he was placed among the boys in the workhouse.1 Havingbeen allowed, ever since his accident, to be master of his own movements, it was found needful to employ some kind of artifice in order to bring him within the precincts of the place; nor, till the doors were closed upon him, was he aware of the purpose for which he had been brought thither. His anguish was indescribable when he found himself no longer at liberty to visit his wonted haunts; and he was often on the point of forming plans for making his escape, for, like the wolf in the fable, he used to say, he would rather starve in a state of freedom, than fatten in a chain. 1 Also called The Hospital of the Poor's Portion. It was founded in 1630 by John Gayer, Abraham Colmer, and Edmund Fowell. In 1674 John Lanyon endowed it with L.2000, which was invested in houses, which in 1812 produced a rental of L.374, 12s. per annum, which is applied to the maintenance and educati...