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English school uniform: historic schools ragged schools
English Historic Schools: Ragged Schools
Figure 1.--This is a view of the Ragged School at George's Yard in Whitechappel from 'The Illustrated London News' during 1859. Robert Hanbury, senior and junior, of Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co., brewers, began fundraising for a ragged school in Whitechapel,a district in East London (1852). Rev. Hugh Allen of St Jude’s church played a prominent role. At first they were thinking bout using Church faciklitids. They eventually instead to use a site off the east side of Commercial Street for a Boys’ Refuge and Industrial School. The George Yard school was founded (1854). George Holland (1824–1900), a grocer in the Minories was a key figure and devoted the rest of his working life to what became the George Yard Mission and Ragged School. Holland took an unused distillery building on the east side of George Yard at the back of 88 Whitechapel High Street. They began with ‘some thirty rough boys’, initially with pupil-teachers who assisted Holland in a single high ceiling room. Notice that there is only one adult teacher this whole lot. Put your cursor on the image for a closeup.
Ragged schools were free schools for poor children. The name for these schools appeared well adter individuals had begun founding the schools. These schools were also known as Industrial Schools for Destitute Children. The idea was to provide orphans or indigent children with a decent education and vocational training as wwll as three square meals a day. We suspect the meals attracted many of the children. The boys received training in shoemaking, tailoring, and other trades and a program designed to inculcate a work ethic and discipline. Through the 18th century, there were no schools or ways for poor children to obtain an education. The Victorians are often seen as prudish and insensaitive, but many of our modern humanitarian inpulses originated from the early 19th century and the Vicorian era in Britain. The 19th century Victorians exhibited a deep sense of philanthropy and Christian imperative to do good--something not chaacteristic of the 18th century. Just before Victoria became queen, a Portsmouth shoemaker, John Pounds, was struck by the terrible plight of poor children, especially abandonded children. He began teaching poor children without charging any fees (1818). He did not call his effort a ragged children, but as others began doing this, the name emerged as so many of the children wore ragged clothing. It was Thomas Guthrie who played a role in promote Pounds' idea of free education for poor and working-class children. The idea was not limited to England. oling for working class children. Guthrie opened his own a ragged school in Edinburgh. Sheriff Watson opened another in Aberdeen. It is a major effort for an individual to open amd maintain one of these schools--essentially a full time jon. So These schools became community efforts. They were supported by a group of benefactors and subscriptions from the town's inhabitants. Each school was run by a committee whose aim it was to remove/rescue as many waifs and strays from the streets of the town as finances would allow and to educate them in the "4 R's". Reading, writing, arithmetic and religion. That well known author of the day, Charles Dickens, said of a Ragged School in Lambeth: "They who are too ragged, wretched, filthy and forlorn to enter any other place ... are invited to come here." The step to go from individual effort to a national movement was taken by Lord Shaftesbury. He organized the Ragged School Union (1844). And as a result, over 200 free schools for poor children were established (1844-52). Wealthy individuals such as Burdett-Coutts gave large sums of money to the Ragged Schools Union. One assessment comments thart the movement 'was driven not by the wealthy but by common folk'. This is the kind of gratuitous comment often found in modern texts which routinely seek to demonize the wealthy. It is based in the Marxist principle that people only get wealthy by exploiting the poor. The author provides no documentation concerning the funding of these schools. And in fact the working-class was not in a position to fund them. And we know that wealthy individuals did suopport some of the schools. We suspect that the primary backers were successful middle-class individuals like John Pounds, ashoe maker, who fiunded the first Ragged School. In fact, the first major reforms of the modern era came when Middle Class Victorians achieved the vote and began demanding reforms like public education. There were some 350 ragged schools operating by the time Parliament passed the Education Act (1870). Over time with Governemt funds now available, the ragged schools were gradually taken over by local school boasrds and absorbed into England's developing public school system. A boy particularly associated with ragged schools is Jim Jarvis. This gave rise to the Truant Schools discussed below.
