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Workhouse birth

Does anyone know what workhouse, i assume summer lane was called Birmingham Workhouse? My Gt Gt Aunt was in there in 1901 she died not long after, she is listed as patient in the Birmingham Workhouse Infirmary... would anyone know if it would be the Summer Lane one or a different one, i have searched the pages of the Census for a clue but can't find anything.. many thanks Claire
 
Thanks for that mike i wasn't sure as there were a few in Birmingham then, my second thought was maybe it was the Steelhouse lane one (now the Childrens Hospital) but i'll check that link and see what i can find out, more then likely her grave wont be marked :( but i can get her death Certificate anyway
 
shavedfish49 said:
Thanks Alberta. Of course William Salmon's name could be a red herring! It's fishy whatever way you look at it. (sorry too good to miss)
Click to expand...
Hi Shaved fish49 I am tracing the birth of my friends father who was also born at 1 Union Road Erdington MUnicipal U D,he was born in 1905 illigitimate.His mothers address 1 back of 51 Saltley Road amazing that the details you have for your ancestor are the same.
Pam
 
this is an example of workhouse punishment,this one is kieghly,

Workhouse punishment books record the severity of punishments meted out to inmates. Some chilling examples of this can be seen in the "Pauper Offence Book" from beaminster Union in Dorset. Offences against property, for example breaking a window, received particularly harsh punishment:




NameOffenceDatePunishmentElliott, BenjaminNeglect of work31 May 1842Dinner withheld, and but bread for supper.Rowe, SarahNoisy and swearing19 June 1842Lock'd up for 24 hours on bread and water.Aplin, JohnDisorderly at Prayer-time22 July 1842Lock'd up for 24 hours on bread and water.Mintern, GeorgeFighting in school26 July 1842No cheese for one week.Greenham, Mary and Payne, PriscellaQuarreling and fighting14 Dec 1842No meat 1 week.Bartlett, MaryBreaking window21 Mar 1843Sent to prison for 2 mths.Park, JamesDeserted, got over wall4 Sep 1843To be whipped.Hallett, IsaacBreaking window25 April 1844Sent to prison for 2 months hard labour.Staple, JohnRefusing to work7 Jany. 1856Committed to prison for 28 days.Johnson, JohnRefusing to work19 Oct 1858Cheese & tea stop'd for supper. Breakfast stop's altogether. Soaper, ElizabethMaking use of bad language in bedroom.
Trying to excite other inmates to insubordination. Refusing to work.17 Jany. 1863Taken before the Magistrate & committed to prison for 14 days hard labour.Note by Chairman of the Guardians: "Would not 28 days be better
 
My mother, who was born in 1892, asked me before she died to try and find out the truth about the birth of her grandmother, Fanny (Frances Ann) Jackson. The story that my mother had been told about this ancestor was that she (Fanny) had been born in the Workhouse in Birmingham, that Fanny's mother aged 16, (daughter of a well-to-do ex Jamaican rum plantation owner), had been cast out, pregnant, into the snow in Lichfield and had trudged to Birmingham to give birth to Fanny in the Workhouse.

Records now accessible on the internet clearly show that this story is not exactly true.

We think, but cannot prove for certain, that Fanny, illegitimate daughter of Caroline Jackson (farmer's daughter from Middleton) and John Riley (gentleman), was born in 62 Great Hampton Row in 1843, in premises rented by a John Jackson (either Caroline's father or her brother). Caroline registered the birth herself. Certainly Birmingham Workhouse was not far from there.

We have been able to find a likely John Riley in Censuses in later years but no record of this John Riley, (father of the baby born in Gt Hampton Row), anywhere in Birmingham, in Warwickshire or in Staffordshire in 1841-1843 - 1851.

What we haven't been able to do is to exclude the possibility that there is another Fanny Jackson who was born to a Caroline Jackson in the Workhouse in 1843.

My great grandmother Fanny (nee Jackson) was definitely born in Birmingham in 1843 and her mother was named Caroline Jackson.
 
There is a Mr John Riley of Soho hill listed in the 1849 Whites directory. Calling him Mr meant, I think ,that he was a gentleman. There certainly wasn't another Mr on the page
Mike
 
Thank you very much Mikejee. We'll follow that one up.

The John Riley, whom we had thought likely, in much later records was always "John Shorthouse Riley". He married an Eleanor (Buggins middle name, perhaps Woodward surname) soon after our Fanny was born, which might explain why he did not marry our Fanny's mother, Caroline Jackson.

Caroline and young Fanny returned to the Jackson Cockhill Farm in Allen End, Middleton, where John Jackson was a tenant farmer of a hundred or so acres (landlord Lord Middleton). There Caroline was married off to a local, Joseph Langley, and the Jackson father, in 1850, set them up in a pub, The Leopard, in Shenstone, on the Walsall Road. Later on they ran, for a short time, The Boat Inn nearer to Muckley Corner before settling in Chasetown.
 
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