Case 262

N

Female

N's mother died of "creeping paralysis" in January 1884. Her father was not married to her mother who was a widow. N. was the youngest of 6 children and her father had deserted the family more than once, leaving them dependent on her half brother who was in poor health and could barely look after himself and his wife. They lived in a very poor area of Southampton and it was feared "impossible [the child] could grow up anything but vicious in such surroundings". Her father drank and was "very bad". He did nothing to help maintain his daughter. In March 1884 N. was boarded out in Reigate. In December 1890 she was placed in Mrs Kitto's Orphanage in Reigate and discharged in August 1895. This was not one of the Waifs and Strays' Society's Homes. In May 1897 she was admitted to the St Barnabas Home for Girls, Newark and on 2 May 1898 was apprenticed to a dressmaker in Warrington. In 1902 N. was living in Manchester and making enquiries about her parents. No record of her birth in Southampton was traceable. A card with the date 1930 and bearing N's married name and her address in Manchester records that she made further enquiries about her parents.