Part 26

“I doubt not but that you will feel surprised at receiving a letter from me, an entire stranger to you; but I feel certain that the subject which I wish to bring before you will be a sufficient apology for my intrusion on your valuable time. I have very recently seen in the public journals allusions to another appeal from you on behalf of our poor gipsy and van children, whom you are striving to reclaim from a life of utter ignorance, and I wish you a hearty Godspeed in your noble endeavours. I doubt not, if it could be ascertained, there are thousands of these poor children in our land of boasted Christianity growing up in ignorance and crime, and enduring the greatest amount of misery that we could imagine. I have no doubt but that a large percentage of our worst criminals emanate from this class of poor children. When I think of these poor outcasts, and think that they are my brothers and sisters, made by the same Divine hand and bearing His own image, and for whom Christ died that they should be raised up to Him, I feel my heart burn within me, and I often pray to God that He would raise up some one able to plead their cause.”

Early in 1880 a lady at Sherborne, Dorset, wrote me as follows:

“I have always taken a deep interest in them. I have again and again wished that I could help to make them more intelligent and useful, for they are not a stupid race. About two months since a poor young woman of this class called at my house with a beautiful infant almost naked. I relieved her, and inquired the whereabouts of their encampments, which was about one and a half miles distant from my home. I went over to see them, and I assure you my heart yearned to do something to help to sweeten the atmosphere of their moral life. There were youths and maidens, children, old women and old men; but alas! I was powerless to do anything for them.”

A clergyman of high standing, near Salisbury, wrote me in 1880 to say that a committee of the Salisbury Diocesan Synod had commissioned him to collect information bearing on the neglected condition of the population accustomed for the greater part of the year to live in caravans and attend fairs in the diocese. “I could,” continued the worthy clergyman, “bring before you many proofs of the wretchedly ignorant and degraded condition of the class I am speaking of, which have come under my own personal notice; but I know I am writing to one better informed on the subject than any one.” Later on the Canon wrote me stating that the clerk of the market in Salisbury had told him that the stray population imported into the town as traders, showmen, &c., for an autumn fair amounted to about five hundred, and the fair was by no means a large one.

Last year a clergyman at Tavistock wrote me as follows:

“DEAR SIR,—

“Your letter in yesterday’s _Western Morning News_ respecting the education of the canal boat children reminds me of the question of the education of gipsy children, in which subject I believe you take a very active interest. I occasionally visit the gipsy tents and vans when they come into this neighbourhood, and find that a great many of these people admit that they cannot read, and others say they can read a little; but I fear that the great majority of the gipsy population are quite unable to read, and have very hazy ideas on the great principles of religion.

“It seems quite a reproach to the English nation to allow these wandering people to continue in its midst without some efforts towards Christianizing them. Although the subject is no doubt a difficult one, it would not seem impracticable to get these gipsy children to attend school at certain centres for portions of the year. I don’t know what has been done in the matter, but I wish you every success in your efforts for attaining this object, as well as for obtaining the efficient carrying out of the Canal Boats Act.”

In 1881 a leading and active county magistrate of Danbury, Essex, wrote me as follows:

“DEAR SIR,—

“I observe that you say in your recent letter to the Secretary of the Lord’s Day Observance Society, that the ‘extension of the principle of the _Canal Boats Act_ to all _gipsy tents_, _vans_, and other movable or _temporary dwellings_, should be brought about by all means.’ I should he extremely pleased to aid in this work, for we reside near Danbury Common, where all the worst features of the vagrant life may be certainly seen. Numbers of little ones are daily passing before us untaught, and suffering in health through exposure to cold and wet, versed in arts of deception and quite inaccessible to influence. During the severe weather lately we had several ruffianly fellows on the common who defied interference with the most lawless proceedings. They went about in gangs breaking up gates and fences, and committing thefts and depredations all around the common. Any ordinary police force is quite inadequate to check or control them when a few reckless men chance to come together. They carried away and broke up two pates from a farm of mine on the other side of the common, and several occupiers on that side suffered severely from their violence. But all this is really of little importance compared with the question of _the children’s_ condition of ignorance and general ill-being. I am sure that those who dwelt _under tents_ must have perished or laid the foundation of fatal disease during the late severe weather. It is clearly against public policy that parents should be allowed thus to trifle with the health of their children; and of course the same objection applies to their want of education. There are gradations of well (or ill) being among these poor wandering folks, as you no doubt are well aware. Some are in comfortable vans, and earn an honest livelihood by some handicraft—tinkering, basket-making; but those who possess scarcely anything but the tent that covers them are in a miserable plight in deep snow or in wet weather, and young children are placed in peril. I will not weary you by enlarging on this topic, which must, moreover, be sadly familiar to you. I desired to assure you, as I now do, that I will do anything in my power to extend the legislation which you have already had the happiness of effecting to those poor outcasts who may doubtless through England be reckoned by thousands.”

Early in the present year a Scotch Presbyterian clergyman at Aberfeldy wrote me to say that he had been deeply impressed for some time by the necessity there was for the State to take in hand the gipsy and similar travellers, and had last year got the Presbyterians of Breadalbane to petition Parliament to take some action in the way of improving the condition of the gipsies.

J. T. Pierce, Esq., J.P., county magistrate of Essex, writes me again under date October 2, 1882:

“Can you oblige me by forwarding a copy of the Bill amending your Act, 40 and 41 Vict. c. 60? I am desirous of bringing the question of _registration of vans_, &c., before my fellow magistrates at our next quarter sessions. The children who dwell in small vans and _under tents_ cannot receive education under the present state of things, and it is seldom any of them are got into industrial schools. Possibly the magistrates of different counties might help forward the extension of your scheme in favour of these poor children. There is a common here on which we get a large number of them every year, and I have had a fair opportunity of seeing how urgent is the need of legislation, unless the children are to remain in their present state of ignorance and dirt. No thoughtful man can desire this, and you have already done so much in this direction that every one who thinks about it must wish to strengthen your hands for further work.”

The foregoing independent statements, given by persons I have never seen, extracted out of shoals of letters I have received, will faintly show what is going on all over the country among our English heathens and hell trainers; while sensual, backwood, romantic gipsy novelists have been drawing a film over our eyes.

I have received a number of suggestions as to how the gipsy problem should be solved. A Scotch Presbyterian minister suggests that the children should be sent to an industrial reformatory; in fact, he would obliterate them with an iron hand from the face of the earth. He goes on to say that the recent School Act is useless for them in Scotland. They can and do with ease evade all its requirements.

One kind-hearted lady, who writes to me from Brentwood, thinks that separate schools should be built for the gipsy and other travelling children. Neither of these suggestions are practicable and workable: the former is too severe for English liberty, and the latter too wild and scattered; and it would also be too costly, and in the end it would prove a failure.

On October 25, 1882, I sent Mr. Mundella copies of my Social Science Congress papers, with the hope of eliciting something from him as to what steps the Government proposed taking in the matter, and the following is his reply:

“PRIVY COUNCIL OFFICE, WHITEHALL, _October_ 26, 1882.

“DEAR SIR,

“I am much obliged to you for the copies of the papers read by you in the Health Department of the Social Science Congress on the Canal Boats Act and on the gipsy children, and I will give the same my careful attention. I shall be very thankful if anything can be done to remedy the evils affecting the neglected children referred to in your papers, and to whose interest you have given such long and faithful service.

“I am, dear sir, Yours faithfully, A. J. MUNDELLA.

“_George Smith_, _Esq._”

I have thought since I took up the canal crusade in 1872, as my letters will show, and I cannot for the life of me do otherwise than think so now, that the Canal Boats Act Amending Bill I am humbly promoting could be made to include all movable habitations and temporary dwellings. The counsel to the Education Department, Mr. Ilbert, thought otherwise, and of course I have had to submit to the “ruling of the chair.” He thought that a separate Act would better meet the case of the gipsy and other travelling children. I am not now alone in my idea of including all movable dwellings in my Canal Amending Bill; for since I mooted the subject in my letters to the press and in other ways, friends have come round to see that there is something in the suggestion worthy of notice. Canal-boat cabins and vans are boxes in which are stived up human beings of all ages and sizes, without either regard for health, morals, sense or decency, packed closer than the poor unfortunate creatures in the black hole of Calcutta were. These moving homes are drawn, in many instances, by animals with only one step between them and the blood- or foxhound’s teeth. The only difference is, one home is moving through the country upon our magnificent, black, streaky canals, of the enormous width of about twenty feet, and an average of three feet deep. For the size of boats and boat cabins and other particulars I must refer my readers to my works, “Our Canal Population,” and “Canal Adventures by Moonlight,” and for the full particulars of gipsy tents, vans, &c., to my “Gipsy Life.”

The last Essex Michaelmas Quarter Sessions, with Sir H. Selwin Ibbetson, Bart., M.P., in the chair, was supported by between forty and fifty leading county magistrates. The following is taken from the _Chelmsford Chronicle_, October 20, 1882:

“THE CANAL ACT AMENDMENT BILL.—Mr. Pierce suggested that this Bill should be referred to the Parliamentary Committee, with a view to their considering whether clauses should not be recommended to Parliament to be added for dealing with gipsy and travelling show-man life as well as canal life. Mr. Pierce spoke of the miserable squalor and unwholesome condition in which the gipsies and travelling showmen lived, and said he thought it was necessary that their children, who are absolutely uneducated, and who number about 30,000, should be looked after. Seconded by Mr. G. A. Lowndes. This motion was carried.”

In a leading article upon the subject the _Chronicle_ stated:

“An excellent suggestion was made to the court by Mr. Pierce. It was that they should refer the Canal Boats Act Amending Bill to the Parliamentary Committee, with a view to their recommending to Parliament the addition of clauses bringing nomadic life—like that of the gipsy and showman fraternity—within the scope of the measure. Of gipsy life we have some experience in Essex, and we know that it stands in sad need of regulation. Mr. Pierce stated, _inter alia_, and on the authority of Mr. George Smith, of Coalville, that there are about 30,000 children belonging to gipsies and travelling showpeople, most of whom are being brought up wholly without education. It is no less a duty to society than to the children themselves that this state of things should be put an end to, for we cannot hope to banish the ruder kinds of crime, such as the vagrant classes are commonly guilty of, without first banishing ignorance. In this view we hope that other public bodies will follow the example, and that the promoters of the Bill about to be brought forward will be induced to extend it so as to embrace the gipsy and kindled classes.”

In July, 1880, Mr. Joseph Cowen very kindly put a question to Mr. Dodson, the President of the Local Government Board, relating to the education of gipsy and other travelling children, and the sanitary arrangements of their homes, and Mr. Dodson replied, “There is considerable difficulty in dealing with gipsy tents and vans, but the matter has been brought under the notice of the Board, who will endeavour to deal with it when a suitable opportunity presents itself for that purpose.”

The Government had their hands pretty full last year—Ireland and the Irish at the beginning, Ireland and the Irish in the middle, and Ireland and the Irish at the end—nearly altogether Irish, which no one grudges to make our Brothers and Sisters on the Emerald Isle contented, prosperous, and happy. God grant that her noble sons and daughters may go ahead, and her “Moonlighters” be swallowed up in the greater light that rules the day. This being so, I kept myself pretty well occupied in piloting, altering, and manœuvring my Canal Amending Bill through its initiatory stages, and had no time to deal with the gipsy problem other than to try “at every turn and twist” to find a niche, nook, or a peg in the Bill upon which to hang the gipsy question, which to me did not, and does not even now, seem at all a difficult thing to do. The more I go into the details of the canal and gipsy question the simpler they become. All that is required, as in the case of the brickyard children, is to take hold of them and to begin to deal with them in a business fashion, as other questions are dealt with.

The subject is studded with prickles, but immediately it is grasped the prickles become harmless. In the distance they look like drawn glistening daggers, which, as you approach nearer to them, are no more dreadful than rushes in the meadow. Unearth the Guy Fawkes gipsy monster, and we shall soon find out a way to deal with gipsy vagabonds and to reclaim their children. Standing by whimpering, sobbing, and sorrowing over the children will not pull them out of the gutter; nor will covering them with backwood gipsy nonsense and trash make them white. The gipsies and their children are dark and down, and to whiten and raise them the law and the gospel must come in: first, the law, schoolmaster, and sanitary officer; and second, the Christian minister and the gospel.

In bygone days, under the reign of Elizabeth and the Georges, the hangman’s hemp and the whipper’s thong were used as a cure for the gipsy social evil, but with worse than no results. Recently, in Hungary, measures of another kind were adopted to compel the gipsies to make themselves scarce. Innumerable complaints had at times reached the chief of the police from the townsfolk of Szegedin, in Lower Hungary, with whose portable chattels and goods the gipsies persisted in making free. The police official was sorely perplexed how to deal with the wandering ragamuffins. The gipsies in Hungary, as well as in other parts of the world, have masses of hair—our present race of English gipsies cannot boast of the raven black hair as formerly—so the chief of the police conceived the idea of barbering their pates of all their locks. The gipsies were taken into custody and the town barbers were summoned to clear the heads of the swarthy gipsies of their present adornments. The orders were obeyed to the letter, regardless of either sex or age. In a few minutes the whole tribe with pates as smooth as an ostrich’s egg were conveyed to the town gates in a state of indescribable discomfiture. I “guess,” as Jonathan says, they will not for a long time visit Szegedin again. There is a wide difference between the Hungarian authorities and the Nottingham town authorities. Not being able to attend the recent Nottingham goose fair, I wrote to the town clerk and the chief constable for a few particulars, relating to the condition of the vast numbers of poor neglected gipsy and other travelling children who attended the borough fair. The town clerk deigned not to descend from his high pinnacle to order a reply to my letter. The chief constable, after some days had passed over, said he would send me some facts, which, though I reminded him of his promise more than once, are not yet to hand. Gipsy children may live and gipsy children may die, but these officials, I suppose, think that they shall go on for ever, and in the end, as a writer in _The Christian Age_ says, they will

“Rest where soft shadows lie and grasses wave;”

at least they hope so. Full particulars of the hardships and cruelties practised upon the gipsies for their wrongdoing will be found in my “Gipsy Life.”

Knowing full well as I do that nothing but salutary measures of the kind I propose, and have proposed for many long years, will meet the case, I had again the audacity to put the question to the Government, through Mr. Burt, with the object of eliciting from them the steps—if any—they proposed taking this Session for dealing with the gipsy problem.

“WELTON, DAVENTRY, _November_ 16, 1882.

“MY DEAR MR. BURT,

“I shall be glad if you will put the enclosed questions to the Government for me relating to the gipsy children. With kind regards,

“Very sincerely yours, GEORGE SMITH, _of Coalville_.”

The questions and answers are taken from the _Times_, _Morning Post_, _Standard_, _Daily Chronicle_, and the leading papers throughout the country.

“TEMPORARY ABODES.

“Mr. Burt—To ask the President of the Local Government Board if the Government intend taking any steps early next session for bringing temporary abodes such as shows, tents, vans, and places of the kind, under the influence of the sanitary officers.”

Mr. Dodson, the President, said he would “consider whether the law as it stood was in need of amendment in this respect; but he could not, on this any more than on any other subject, now give any undertaking as to the introduction of a Bill next session.”

“GIPSY CHILDREN.

“Mr. Burt—To ask the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education if the Government intend taking any steps early next session for bringing about the education of gipsy and other travelling children living in vans, carts, shows, and other temporary dwellings.”

Mr. Mundella said: “It is exceedingly difficult to devise any effectual scheme for the education of the nomadic population referred to in the question of my hon. friend, and up to the present we have received no suggestion for dealing with the subject which appears to be practical. The matter, however, is ‘under consideration,’ and we propose during the recess to confer with the Local Government Board respecting it.”

Mr. Burt wrote to me as follows:

“HOUSE OF COMMONS, _November_ 22, 1882.

“MY DEAR MR. SMITH,

“You will see from the _Times_ to-day the answers given by Mr. Dodson and Mr. Mundella. They are not so encouraging as one would like, though it may do good to call attention to the subject.

“Very truly yours, THOMAS BURT.”

Parliament having been opened February 15, 1883, I began to make a move towards getting my Canal Boats Act Amendment Bill before the House of Commons for the third time—last year it was introduced to the House of Lords by Earl Stanhope—and lost no time in seeing my friends Mr. Burt and others upon the subject, some of whose names are upon the back of the Bill. The names upon the Bill are as follows: Mr. Burt, Mr. S. Morley, Mr. John Corbett, Mr. Pell, and Mr. Broadhurst. Feeling anxious, and seeing no difficulty in the matter, I wrote to Mr. Burt on March 3, 1883, about introducing a clause in the Bill to include gipsy and other travelling children—my plans for improving the condition of the canal children and gipsy children being identically the same in _every __particular_ so far as the provisions of the Act are concerned—and he replied as under:

“HOUSE OF COMMONS, _March_ 8, 1883.

“DEAR MR. SMITH,

“If you want a new clause or any alteration in the Bill, kindly write it out on a copy of the Bill and forward it to me.

“I have seen Sir Charles Dilke, and he advises me to talk the matter over with Mr. Hibbert. I shall do so as soon as I can see Mr. Hibbert.

“I go to Newcastle to-morrow, returning on Monday night or Tuesday.

“I am not hopeful that the Government will do anything in the present state of business.

“Yours truly, THOMAS BURT.”

I added the following clause to the Bill, and at the same time I gave under the Bill more power to the Education Department than I had done in the previous Bills.

The new clause affecting gipsy children runs thus:

“11. The expressions ‘Canal Boats,’ ‘Canal Boat,’ and ‘Boat,’ in the principal Act and this Act, and also in the regulations of the Local Government Board and Education Department, shall include all travelling and temporary dwellings not rated for the relief of the poor.”