Children asleep, Hackney, London by Nick Hedges
One of the main problems that homeless families faced was overcrowding. Whole families were often forced to live in one room that functioned as the living room, bedroom, bathroom and kitchen. Hedges did ...
Child’s ration book
Food rationing began in January 1940.
Child with Cat by Emma Barton
Child in basement, Liverpool 8 by Nick Hedges
Children’s health was often badly affected by the cold, damp spaces in which they lived. Bronchitis, asthma, and influenza were rife. Illness, and a lack of sleep caused by overcrowding, meant that children ...
Child Guidance Clinic Medical Director’s Report
Children and childhood in the early decades of the 20th century gained the attention of new professionals who were trained in psychology.
Child Guidance clinics were founded in the 1930s to treat ...
Cartes-de-visite
Technical innovations in the second half of the 19th century allowed photographs to be produced more cheaply. This made photography available to many more people, both as photographers and consumers. ...
Case Notes for Ellen Allport, 1873-1880, All Saints Mental Health Casebook
Other children with health and learning problems were less well served. In the middle of the 19th century Birmingham opened a Lunatic Asylum for Paupers in Winson Green. Extensive records were kept about ...
Calendar illustrated by Hans Schwarz showing an internment camp
This drawing looks like an internment camp. It is unclear whether it relates to German concentration camps or British internment camps, or when exactly it was drawn. Like many other refugees Hans was ...
Boys sitting on cars, Balsall Heath
From a series of photographs taken in Balsall Heath, by Alan J. Wood.
Boys on street corner by Nick Hedges
Boys of Gower Street School, Ladywood, with blacked-up faces
Like the maypole, the boys’ blackened faces were a part of May Day traditions. The day was historically associated with chimney sweeps. They would march in a procession led by ‘Jack-in-the-Green’, a garlanded ...
Boys Exercising in the School Yard, Birmingham by William Woollaston
This image shows boys exercising with dumb bells. A growing concern for the health and welfare of school children led to physical drill and exercises being introduced into the curriculum. Such activities ...
Boy with pigeon, Balsall Heath by Alan Wood
Boy selling newspapers with a blind man on the corner of New Street and Worcester Street by Thomas Clark
Booklet describing Birmingham Workhouse
In the past children from poorer families in Britain had to earn a living as a matter of routine. Going to school was not common until 1870. Many children worked from a young age, often in seasonal or ...
Blue Coat Charity School Apprenticeship Indenture
Mary Taylor would have entered the Blue Coat School when she was 7 years old. The entrance age was increased to 9 in 1819. The School later arranged for children to be apprenticed. Mary was apprenticed ...
Black Ivory. A tale among the slavers of East Africa by Robert M. Ballantyne (1825-1894)
Adventure stories, such as Black Ivory became a popular genre for boys in Victorian children’s literature. It was a genre which also reflected the growth of British power with the adventures opening up ...