The abuse of charity in London : the case of the five royal hospitals.

  • William Gilbert
Date:
[1878]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The abuse of charity in London : the case of the five royal hospitals. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    its wording those of the other hospitals, and the full control of its funds and management is given to the Lord Mayor, commonalty, and citizens of London in such equally explicit terms, that it would be a useless waste of the reader's time to go into the details. Stowe, in his summary, 1556, when speaking of Christ's Hospital says: It was established to take the chylde out of the streete, which was the seede and increase of beggaiy, by reason of ydle bringing up. And to nourysh the said chylde in some goode learninge and exercise profit- able to the commonweale. He goes on to say, that in one month from the opening of the school, November 21st, 1552, chyldren had been taken from the streetes to the number of fower hundred. Machyn also, in his Diary about the same time, makes frequent mention of the children in this school, all tending to prove that they were taken from precisely the same class of children as those winch now come under the authority of the Poor-law Board. Hi From this short description of the foundation of the five Royal Hospitals the reader will easily perceive in them the original model of the present Poor-law administration in the metropolis. If further proofs were wanting they might be produced in abundance from different records still existing in the City archives, all tending to show that for more than a century after they received their charters the hospitals strictly fulfilled the uses for which they were instituted. Nor were they solely dependent upon their endowments, for, in case of any insufficiency of funds for their maintenance, the Corporation had the power to levy taxes for their support. For example, the Corporation, by an Act (5 Philip and Mary), which on several occasions was put in force, had granted to them the profits of sundry offices, &c, for the use of the hospitals, especially duties on the balance commonly called the King's Beame, the gawginge of wyne and fyshe, and the measurynge or measurs of silk and woollen clothes, &c. The revenue of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, in conse- quence of its expenditure being more than its income, was supple- mented by a tax levied on the citizens, and one curious circumstance connected with the power of raising money forthe support of this charity was that the Livery Companies were called upon to supply a large por- tion of the amount required. In the year 1548, an Act was passed by the City Council for assessing the City Companies in the sum of 500 marks, to be paid annually to St. Bartholomew's Hospital. The Livery Companies afterwards attempted to relieve themselves from the responsibility, but the governors of the hospital, in the year 1712, commenced a suit in Chancery against the Companies, and obtained a decree in their favour which exists now. Again, in the first year of the reign of Edward VI. (1547), the Common Council made
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