CHAPTER XXVII.
THE FOUNDLING HOSPITAL AND NEIGHBOURHOOD.
"The helpless young that kiss no mother's hand She gives in public families to live, A sight to gladden Heaven."—Thomson.
Establishment of the Hospital by Captain Coram in Hatton Garden—Its Removal to Lamb's Conduit Fields—Parliamentary Grant to the Hospital—Wholesale Admission of Children Tokens for the Identification of Children deposited in the Hospital—Withdrawal of the Parliamentary Grant—Rules and Regulations—Form of Petition for the Admission of Children—Baptism of the Infants—Wet-nurses—Education of the Children—Expenditure of the Establishment—Extracts from the Report of the Royal Commission—Origin of the Royal Academy of Arts—Hogarth's Liberality to the Institution—His "March of the Guard, to Finchley Common"—The Picture Gallery—The Chapel—Handel's Benefactions to the Hospital—Lamb's Conduit Fields—Biographical Notice of Captain Coram—Hunter Street—A Domestic Episode in High Life—Tonbridge Chapel—The British College of Health.
This quaint and dull old-fashioned looking building, which reminds us of the early days of the last century, stands on the north side of Guilford Street, and forms part of the south-eastern boundary of the parish of St. Pancras. It is constructed of brick, with stone dressings, and consists mainly of a centre and wings, with a large open space before it for the exercise of the children, and extensive gardens at the back. These gardens, including the court in front, which is laid down in turf, cover some acres. The hospital was first established by royal charter, granted in 1739 to Thomas Coram (master of a trading vessel), for the reception, maintenance, and education of exposed and deserted young children, after the example of similar institutions in France, Holland, and other Christian countries. The first intention of Captain Coram, however, was modified after his death, because it was feared that the hospital would prove in practice only an encouragement of vice, if illegitimate children were admitted as long as there was room, without any restriction; and the restrictions imposed so far diminished the applications, that in a few cases the doors were thrown open for the reception of some legitimate children of soldiers.
In the petition which Coram makes for a charter, backed by "a memorial signed by twenty-one ladies of quality and distinction," he recites that, "no expedient has been found out for preventing the frequent murders of poor infants at their birth, or for suppressing the custom of exposing them to perish in the streets, or putting them out to nurses" (i.e., persons trading in the same manner as the baby-farmers of more recent times), "who, undertaking to bring them up for small sums, suffered them to starve, or, if permitted to live, either turned them out to beg or steal, or hired them out to persons, by whom they were trained up in that way of living, and sometimes blinded or maimed, in order to move pity, and thereby become fitter instruments of gain to their employers." In order to redress this shameful grievance, the memorialists express their willingness to erect and support a hospital for all helpless children as may be brought to it, "in order that they may be made good servants, or, when qualified, be disposed of to the sea or land services of His Majesty the King."
The governors first opened a house for "foundlings" in Hatton Garden, in 1740–1; any person bringing a child, rang the bell at the inner door, and waited to hear if the infant was returned from disease or at once received; no questions whatever were to be asked as to the parentage of the child, or whence it was brought; and when the full number of children had been taken in, a notice of "The house is full" was affixed over the door. Often, we are told, there were too children offered, when only twenty could be admitted; riots ensued, and thenceforth the mothers balloted for the admission of their little ones by drawing balls out of a bag.
It was not until some years after the granting of the charter that the governors thought of building the present hospital. Fresh air is as necessary for children as for plants; and so the governors, wandering round the then suburbs in search of some healthy spot whereunto they could transfer their tender "nurslings," found it in the balmy meads of Lamb's Conduit Fields, then far away out in the green pastures, five minutes' walk from Holborn. The governors bought fifty-five acres of these fields from the Earl of Salisbury, for £5,500; in fact, the governors bought the whole estate, not because they required it, but because the earl, its owner, would not sell any fractional part of it. As London increased, the city approached this property; and in course of time a considerable part of the estate—indeed, all that was not actually absorbed in the hospital and its contiguous grounds—became covered with squares and streets of houses, the ground-rents producing an annual income equal to the purchase-money. The new building was at once commenced, the west wing being completed first, the east wing afterwards; the chapel, connecting the two, was finished last. The edifice was built from the designs of Jacobson.
