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The City Parochial Charities: The “Dead Hand” in Late Victorian London

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2014

David Owen
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Extract

In the familiar line “Time makes ancient good uncouth”, James Russell Lowell enunciated what can almost stand as a natural law of endowed charities. Over the decades, as social values change and new institutional arrangements develop, obsolescence becomes the inevitable destiny of masses of these benefactions in perpetuity, especially those with specific and rigid trusts. And broadly speaking, the more ancient the good, the more uncouth it will seem in the light of latter-day needs.

The goodly company of Victorian reformers numbered in its varied ranks a small group of individuals whose particular concern was the condition of Britain's charities. Here, they suspected, was a national resource that might be made to contribute more productively to the new age. Early in the century Henry Brougham had professed to see in properly administered endowments the basis for an adequate system of elementary education, and had inspired the exhaustive survey of the nation's nearly thirty thousand charitable trusts. The inquiry lasted for two decades, cost more than £250,000, and filled about forty volumes — the “Domesday Book of Charities.” Parliament took nearly fifteen years to act on the report, and in the end granted to the Charity Commission (the agency that emerged from it all) less ample powers of initiative and supervision than the more eager reformers had demanded. As a general thing, only when the administration of an endowment became so scandalous as to raise questions of breach of trust or when its objects were so antiquated as virtually to immobilize the charity was the state inclined to intervene.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of British Studies , Volume 1 , Issue 2 , May 1962 , pp. 115 - 135
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 1962

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References

1. Report of the Commissioners of Enquiry concerning the Charities of England and Wales, 1819-40. Officially the reports numbered thirty-two, but the final one appeared in eight parts.

2. As established by the Charitable Trusts Act of 1853, the Charity Commission was almost without authority. In 1860 (by 23 & 24 Viet. c. 136) the powers of the Commissioners were increased so that in dealing with small trusts—equipping them with new schemes, for example—they were similar to those of a Chancery judge. For trusts with less than £50 annual income, the Commission served as a kind of “poor charity's Chancery.” More substantial trusts could be revised only at the request of a majority of the trustees.

3. As, for example, the Mercers to St. Paul's and the Skinners to Tonbridge.

4. The Goldsmiths' Company, a case in point, has given generous support to educational undertakings of various sorts, such as endowing chairs at the universities and financing scholarships and exhibitions. It also purchased and presented to London University the collection of economic and social history materials now known as the Goldsmiths' Library. More recently the vast extension of state scholarships has permitted the Company to engage in a number of interesting experiments in educational philanthropy, notably in financing foreign study and travel for British schoolmasters, young university graduates and others.

5. 3 Sept. 1880.

6. As usually given, the number varies from 107 to 112, the precise figure depending, apparently, on how combined parishes are counted. Although originally the parish had been both an ecclesiastical and governmental unit, the lines were now badly blurred. For after the Great Fire there had been no attempt to rebuild all of the churches destroyed, with the result that only about sixty ecclesiastical parishes were reconstituted.

7. Royal Commission on the London Parochial Charities (C. 2522), 1880, I, 21–25Google Scholar.

8. For figures on Tudor-Stuart charities in London, see Jordan, W. K., The Charities of London, 1480-1660 (London and New York, 1960), p. 423Google Scholar.

9. 3 Hansard 261:1295Google Scholar; R. C. on the Parochial Charities, Q. 2285, 7574.

10. Ibid., Q. 1406, 267, 6176.

11. Scott, Benjamin, A Statistical Vindication of the City of London (London, 1867)Google Scholar.

12. In 1865 the figure was £66,550; in 1870, £83,570; and in 1876, £99,575. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, I, 20Google Scholar.

13. Ibid., I, 18-20.

14. Select Committee on the Parochial Charities Bill, 1882, Q. 1185.

15. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, Q. 4359.

16. SirTrevelyan, Charles, “The City Parochial Endowments”, Social Science, 1870–1871, p. 438Google Scholar. In early May, 1880, Sir Henry Peek, who was something of a reformer and who was guided by the Victorian's almost pathological respect for facts, took a survey of the attendance at City churches, exclusive of St. Paul's, the Temple, and the five largest parishes. The remaining fifty-five churches had congregations totalling 4837, but of these only 2784 could be called genuinely voluntary attendants. These churches had sittings for 27,500. Return of Objections to the Central Scheme, Parl. Pap., 1890, p. 23Google Scholar.

17. 3 Hansard 261:1295Google Scholar.

18. This trust probably ought not to be taken too seriously, though it was a serviceable weapon in the arsenal of reformers. Apparently the trust in question was Werk's Charity, an endowment of 6s. 8d. established in the parish of St. Anne and St. Agnes in the fifteenth century. It is not clear that the income was ever used for the purpose specified. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, Q. 262.

19. Estimates of the amount distributed in doles vary widely, running from £10,000 to as high as the £31,000 cited by the London School Board when it was casting covetous eyes at the City endowments. In the parish of St. Botolph, Aldgate, with a charity income of £10,000, some £2000 was for eleemosynary purposes, which, in fact, meant doles. Minutes of the London School Board, 23 July 1879; 3 Hansard 261:1293Google Scholar; Atkinson, A. G. B., St. Botolph Aldgate [London, 1898], p. 210Google Scholar.

20. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, Q. 7566.

21. Cy près (from the Norman French ’as near as possible”) is the legal formula governing the revision of charitable trusts. As Halsbury's Laws of England explains it, “Where a clear charitable intention is expressed, it will not be permitted to fail because the mode, if specified, cannot be executed, but the law will substitute another mode cy-près that is, as near as possible to the mode specified by the donor.” 2nd edition, IV, par. 323.

22. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, Q. 4805, 5064, 6388-92, 7401, 7247.

23. Ibid. Q. 540, 549-60.

24. Ibid., Q. 1303, 1978 ff.; 3 Hansard 261:1294Google Scholar.

25. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, III, 2Google Scholar.

26. Annual Reports of the Charity Commissioners, 11th, 1863, p. 5Google Scholar; 13th, 1865, p. 3.

27. When a charitable trust is revised, the document authorizing the new organization and prescribing the uses to which the income is to be put is called a “scheme”. The framing of a scheme cy près by Charity Commissioners or equity court is a laborious, complicated business, especially where trusts are ancient, founders' intentions obscure, or records scanty.

28. The Times, 17 June 1869, 26 June 1870; “The City Parochial Endowments”, Social Science, 1870–1871, pp. 437–51Google Scholar.

29. See, for example, the two volumes by Gilbert, William, Contrasts (London, 1873)Google Scholar and The City (London, 1877)Google Scholar.

30. No. 164 (1871) and No. 24 (1877); 24th Annual Report of the Charity Commissioners, 1876, pp. 5–6Google Scholar.

31. 3 Hansard 233:1665-66; 234:858; 235:594-595; 239:1694-1704; 241:327, 1244, 1852Google Scholar.

32. Other members were Canon Rogers, a liberal clergyman, who had gained something of a reputation as an educational and parochial reformer at St. Botolph's Bishopsgate; Albert Pell, whose reforming interests expressed his self-help social philosophy; and Farrer Herschell, a future Lord Chancellor. See The Reminiscences of William Rogers (London, 1888)Google Scholar, and Pell, Albert, Reminiscences (London, 1908)Google Scholar.

33. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, Q. 7751 ff.Google Scholar

34. The Times, 23 March 1880; Hadden, R. H., “City Parochial Charities”, Nineteenth Century, IX, 324–27Google Scholar.

35. R. C. on the Parochial Charities, 1880, I, 10–11Google Scholar.

36. 3 Hansard 261:1296–97Google Scholar.

37. The Times, 5 May 1881.

38. S. C. on the Parochial Charities Bill, 1882, App. 1-4; S. C., 1883, App.

39. 3 Hansard 261:1297Google Scholar.

40. S. C. on the Parochial Charities Bill, 1882, Q. 2928 ff.Google Scholar; Charity Record, 29 June 1882.

41. Charity Record, 4 Aug. 1882.

42. Bryce to Freshfield (solicitor to the churchwardens), 19 July 1883, in the office of the City Parochial Foundation.

43. The Times, 4 Aug. 1883.

44. In the case of mixed charities which combined ecclesiastical and nonecclesiastical elements the Commissioners were to assign to each of the two funds its proper share.

45. St. Andrew, Holborn; St. Botolph, Aldgate; St. Botolph, Bishopsgate; St. Bride, Fleet Street; St. Giles, Cripplegate.

46. 46 & 47 Viet. c. 36 cl. 14.

47. Two additional Commissioners were appointed to handle the work, Sir Francis Sandon, who had been Permanent Secretary of the Education Office, and James Anstie, Q.C., a Nonconformist barrister of some distinction, who proved to be the active member of the team.

48. Minute Book of the St. Sepulchre Special Committee, 20 July 1886, 7 May 1888, Guildhall Library MS. 7230.

49 .“Objections of the Open Space Societies”, Return of Certain Objections, (Parl. Pap.) 1890, p. 32Google Scholar.

50. Minutes of the London School Board, 23 July, 6 Aug., 22 Oct., 19 Nov. 1879.

51. The Kyrle Society, of which Octavia Hill's sister Miranda was the principal organizer (and which narrowly escaped being christened “The Society for the Diffusion of Beauty”) was named for Pope's Man of Ross, who had brought beauty to his own city. Although to modern eyes some of its projects appear almost whimsically romantic, one can only applaud the activities of its committee on open spaces. Bell, E. Moberly, Octavia Hill [London, 1942], p. 151Google Scholar; Maurice, C. E., Octavia Hill [London, 1913], pp. 316–17Google Scholar.

52. Charity Record, 17 Nov. 1887; Shaw-Lefevre, George (Eversley, Lord), English Commons and Forests (London, 1894), pp. 55–57Google Scholar. The Commissioners also contributed heavily toward the purchase of Clissold Park (Stoke Newington) and of the Lawn, Henry Fawcett's residence in Lambeth.

53. “Objections of the Open Space Societies”, Return of Certain Objections (Parl. Pap.), 1890, p. 30Google Scholar.

54. As evidenced by the Report of the Royal Commission on Technical Instruction (C. 3171, 3981), 1882-84.

55. Ward, C. H. and Spencer, C. B., The Unconventional Civil Servant (London, 1938)Google Scholar.

56. Quintin Hogg's enterprise had begun as a Ragged School in the slums near Charing Cross. He outgrew a succession of premises, finally settling in the old Polytechnic building in Regent Street, which had formerly been used for popular science lectures and exhibitions. Over the years Hogg, it is said, spent on the work something like £100,000 of his own funds. See Hogg, Ethel M., Quintin Hogg [2nd ed.; London, 1904]Google Scholar.

57. Ward, and Spencer, , Uncoventional Civil Servant, pp. 180–81Google Scholar.

58. SirBesant, Walter, Autobiography (London, 1902), p. 244Google Scholar.

59. In the early 1930's the original People's Palace was destroyed by fire. It was rebuilt and since 1954 has formed a part of Queen Mary College of London University.

60. The Drapers accepted special responsibility for the People's Palace, into which they poured large sums of money. The continuing interest of the Company in Queen Mary College is an outgrowth of the earlier connection with the People's Palace.

61. In addition, some £60,000 or £70,000 was taken from capital for repairing and restoring over half of the City churches, an outlay for which the fund would be reimbursed in ten annual installments. Altogether, it was a fair inference that in the immediate future no great increments would find their way to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners.

62. Minute Book of the St. Sepulchre Special Committee, 2 Feb. 1891, Guildhall Library MS 7230.

63. All of these documents appear in the Return of Certain Objections (Parl. Pap.), 1890, except the Charity Organisation Society's The City Parochial Scheme (London, 1889)Google Scholar.

64. Another consideration was that, by the Technical Instruction Act of 1889, such enterprises as the polytechnics had been accepted as a proper charge on local rates (though London had shown little inclination to draw on the rates for this purpose).

65. The benefaction from Parliament came in the form of “whisky money”, as it was popularly known. The Salisbury Government had proposed using about £½ million from a tax on spirits and beer to compensate publicans whose licenses were not being renewed. Violent opposition in Parliament and out led to the acceptance of an amendment proposing to use the proceeds for technical education—and the London County Council became the richer by £117,000. A good deal of this went to the polytechnics, whose prospects took a turn for the better, especially after the London Technical Education Committee, led by Sidney Webb, embarked on its work.

66. 3 Hansard 349:1111–27 (26 Jan. 1891)Google Scholar.

67. Evidence of Donald (now Sir Donald) Allen before the Nathan Committee (unpubl.), 1951, Q. 5994-95; Allen, Donald, “Charity”, Lon. Sch. Econ. Mag. July, 1953, p. 10Google Scholar.

68. Report of the Committee on the Law of Charitable Trusts (Nathan Committee) (Cmd. 8710), 1952, par. 555. The increase would certainly have been greater, had it not been for the wartime devastation in the City and the delay in launching a comprehensive rebuilding program.

69. Evidence of Donald Allen, Nathan Committee, 1951, Q. 5986.

70. Local authorities, it was realized, could not afford to model their housing undertakings on Isleden House. What was intended was to offer them an “ideal” unit, which would serve as a source of ideas for those who had to plan for the care of the aged. In 1953 the establishment was bought by the London Corporation.

71. Minutes of the Central Governing Body, 14 Dec. 1896, Guildhall Library MS. 8966.

72. Evidence of Donald Allen, Nathan Committee, 1951, Q. 6036.