Shropshire Workhouses

Shropshire Workhouses

Atcham
Bridgnorth
Church Stretton
Cleobury Mortimer
Clun
Ellesmere
Llanymynech
Ludlow
Madeley
Drayton
Oswestry
Shifnal
Wellington
Wem
Whitchurch

Shropshire Poor Law Unions and Workhouses

The Poor Law Unions classified as being in Shropshire are Atcham, Bridgnorth, Church Stretton, Cleobury Mortimer, Clun, Ellesmere, Ludlow, Madeley, Market Drayton, Newport, Oswestry, Shifnal, Wellington, Wem and Whitchurch

Records

The Shropshire Records and Research Centre,
Castle Gates,
Shrewsbury SY1 2AQ
Telephone: +44 (0)1743 255350

Twenty Second Report of the Commissioners in Lunacy to the Lord Chancellor

p 255 J - Workhouses, List of those visited in 1867
With Name of the Workhouse and numbers of
insane, idiotic, and imbecile inmates,

SALOP	MALE	FEMALE	TOTAL
Ludlow	1	4	5
Oswestry	2	13	15

From Census Statistical Volume 1901
County of Salop in PP 1903 Vol LXXXVI Cd 1,430
Submitted by Alan Longbottom

Summary of Results.
Workhouses.
Pauper inmates of Workhouse establishments in the Registration County number 1,808 persons of all ages, 1,410 Males and 668 Females. These represent approximately 0.7% of the general
population.
At advanced ages the proportion is far higher; at 55 years and upwards the % is 2.4% and at 65 years and upwards is 3.8%.

Prisons
Prisoners in Shrewsbury Prison number 80 Of these 75 are Males and 5 Females.

The Blind, Deaf and Dumb
The number of persons returned as Blind is 204, and of these 3 suffer from some other Infirmity also.

Deaf and Dumb persons including 9 returned simply as Dumb, number 112, and of these 3 suffer from some other Infirmity also.

Lunatics
Lunatics number 856, and the Imbecile and Feeble-minded 376, including 6 otherwise afflicted. The total of these classes is 1,232
Of the 1,232 persons returned as mentally deranged, 989 were the inmates of institutions, including 868 in Public and Private Lunatic Asylums, 121 in Workhouses, the remaining 243 were residing with relatives or in unlicensed houses.

The 121 mentally deranged persons enumerated in Workhouses, were returned as Imbecile, or Feeble-minded; and of the 243 not enumerated in Institutions, 5 were returned as Lunatics and 238 as Imbecile or Feeble-minded.

Extracts from Churchwardens Accounts from 1565-1770 p057

Including :-
1598-99 John Colcot and Thomas Crowther churchwardens Paid to John Wicherley the xiiij'th daie of Maie for writeing the names of all the poore in the parish viij' d

1607 Edmund Maunsell and Richard Cheshire churchwardens Parish Apprentices first occour.

1622 to Constable Bagley to hunt roggs and beggars out of ye parishe 6d

1627 spent by the Wardens and Overseers looking for inmates xij'd

1627 spent in looking what poor children were in the
parishe vj'd

1632-33 item, received towards a cessment made for clothing of children sett apprentices, and the beadles wages £1-16s-4d

1649 Sep 24th Dorothy Barker late of Shrewsbury spinster dau of Richard Barker esq Judge of North Wales and the Recorder of Shrewsbury, left by will £12 to be lent in £4's to 3 persons for 3 years on bond.

1721 paid for 2 hell fire papers 1s

Source: Transactions of the Shropshire Archaeological and Natural History Society 1878-
Submitted by Alan Longbottom

Page updated August 06, 2007