Destitution in England

Feilding Star, Volume IX, Issue 153, 26 July 1888, Page 3

Destitution in England

\From the London Times.) I write from a large and populou s rural parish, in which from special { causes, into which I need not now enter, the prevailing depression is felt with peculiar severity. There are around me many farm laborers, decent, steady men, able and willing to do a good day's work, who during this long winter have had no werk to do, and would have starved unless I, aided by a few generous friends, had been often able to help them to have a bit of fire in their grate, and a loaf of bread on their table. The general wage for the few men whom farmers are able to employ is 9s the week, deduction from this being made for the days (very frequent, alas!) and portions of days during which work cannot be done on this wet, clay soil. Two strong youths, aged eighteen, whom I am iust helping to emigrate, have been earning, one, 5s per week, and the other 4s 6d per week, deductions from these sums being also made for all time lost through the badness of the weather. As the mother of one of these lads said to me of his earnings : 'It is not enough to find him in food, let alone clothes.' A large proportion of these people are already deeply in debt to the little tradesmen of the place, and are sinking fast into utter despair. In many a village the parson, himself generally with sadly diminished means, is laboring wearily to assist the most grievous cases among his still poorer neighbors. — Yours, obediently, James A. Bonser. Shillington Vicarage, Beds, April 4, 1888.