have recently stirred up a great agitation, which has been widely
reported in the Press, against the Hanbury Street Workshop, because
the Army does not pay the Union rate of wages. As a result the Army
now declines all outside contracts, and confines its operations to the
work of erecting, repairing, or furnishing its own buildings.
Here it may be stated that these complaints seem to be unreasonable.
The men employed have almost without exception been taken off the
streets to save them from starvation or the poorhouse. Often enough
they are by no means competent at their work, while some of them have
for the time being been rendered practically useless through the
effects of drink or other debaucheries. Yet it is argued with violence
that to such people, whom no business firm would employ upon any
terms, the Army ought to pay the full Trade Union rate of wages. When
every allowance is made for the great and urgent problems connected
with the cruel practice of 'sweating,' surely this attitude throws a
strange light upon some of the methods of the Trade Unions?
The inference seems to be that they would prefer that these derelicts
should come on the rates or starve rather than that the Army should
house and feed them, giving them, in addition, such wage as their
labour may be worth. Further comment seems to be needless, especially
when I repeat that, as I am assured, this Hanbury Street Institution
never has earned, and does not now earn, the cost of its upkeep.
It is situated in the heart of a very poor district, and is rather a
ramshackle place to look at, but still quite suitable to its purposes.
I have observed that one of the characteristics of the Salvation Army
is that it never spends unnecessary money upon buildings. If it can
buy a good house or other suitable structure cheap it does so. If it
cannot, it makes use of what it can get at a price within its means,
provided that the place will satisfy the requirements of the sanitary
and other Authorities.
All the machines at Hanbury Street are driven by electric power that
is supplied by the Stepney Council at a cost of 1_d_. per unit for
power and 3_d_. per unit for lighting.
An elderly man whom I saw there attending to this machinery, was
dismissed by one of the great railway companies when they were
reducing their hands. He had been in the employ of the Salvation Army
for seven years and received the use of a house rent free and a wage
of 30_s_. a week, which probably he would find it quite impossible to
earn anywhere else.
The hours of employment are from 6.30 a.m. to 5.30 p.m. if the man is
engaged on outside work, or to 6 p.m. if he labours in the workshop,
and the men are paid at various rates according to the value of their
work, and whether they are boarded and lodged, or live outside. Thus
one to whom I spoke, who was the son of a former mayor of an important
town, was allowed 3_s._ a week plus food and lodging, while another
received 9_s._ a week, 5_s._ of which was sent to his wife, from whom
he was separated. Another man, after living on the Army for about two
years, made charges against it to the Carpenters' and Joiners' Union.
He returned and apologized, but had practically to be kept under
restraint on account of his drinking habits.
Another man spent twenty years in jail and then walked the streets. He
is now a very respectable person, earns 27_s._ 6_d._ a week, and lives
outside with his wife and family. Another was once convicted of
cruelty to his children, whom he placed under the boards of the
flooring while he went out to drink. These children are now restored
to him, and he lives with them. Another among those with whom I
happened to speak, was robbed by a relative of £4,000 which his father
left to him. He was taken on by the Army in a state of destitution,
but I forget what he earned. Another, the youngest man in the Works,
came to them without any trade at all and in a destitute condition,
but when I saw him was in charge of a morticing machine. He had
married, lived out, and had been in the employ of the Army for five
years. His wage was 27_s._ 6_d._ a week. Two others drew as much as £2
5_s._ 11_d._ each, living out; but, on the other hand, some received
as little as 3_s._ a week with board and lodging.
Amongst this latter class was a young Mormon from Salt Lake City, who
earned 4_s._ 6_d._ a week and his board and lodging. He had been in
the Elevator about three months, having got drunk in London and missed
his ship. Although he attended the Salvation Army meetings, he
remained a Mormon.
In these Works all sorts of articles are manufactured to be used by
other branches of the Salvation Army. Thus I saw poultry-houses being
made for the Boxted Small Holdings; these cost from £4 5_s._ to £4
10_s._ net, and were excellent structures designed to hold about two
dozen fowls. Further on large numbers of seats of different patterns
were in process of manufacture, some of them for children, and other
longer ones, with reversible backs, to be used in the numerous Army
halls. Next I visited a room in which mattresses and mattress covers
are made for the various Shelters, also the waterproof bunk bedding,
which costs 7_s._ 9_d._ per cover. Further on, in a separate
compartment, was a flock-tearing machine, at which the Mormon I have
mentioned was employed. This is a very dusty job whereat a man does
not work for more than one day in ten.
Then there were the painting and polishing-room, the joinery room, and
the room where doors, window frames, and articles of furniture are
constructed; also special garden benches, cleverly planned so that the
seat can be protected from rain. These were designed by a young lady
whom I chance to know in private life, and who, as I now discovered
for the first time, is also a member of the Salvation Army.
Such is the Hanbury Street Workshop, where the Army makes the best use
it can of rather indifferent human materials, and, as I have said,
loses money at the business.
STURGE HOUSE, BOW ROAD
This branch of the Men's Social Work of the Salvation Army is a home
for poor and destitute boys. The house, which once belonged to the
late Dr. Barnardo, has been recently hired on a short lease. One of
the features of the Army work is the reclamation of lads, of whom
about 2,400 have passed through its hands in London during the course
of the last eight years.
Sturge House has been fitted up for this special purpose, and
accommodates about fifty boys. The Officer in charge informed me that
some boys apply to them for assistance when they are out of work,
while others come from bad homes, and yet others through the Shelters,
which pass on suitable lads. Each case is strictly investigated when
it arrives, with the result that about one-third of their number are
restored to their parents, from whom often enough they have run away,
sometimes upon the most flimsy pretexts.
Not unfrequently these boys are bad characters, who tell false tales
of their past. Thus, recently, two who arrived at the Headquarters at
Whitechapel, alleged that they were farm-labourers from Norfolk. As
they did not in the least look the part, inquiries were made, when it
was found that they had never been nearer to Norfolk than Hampstead,
where both of them had been concerned in the stealing of £10 from a
business firm. The matter was patched up with the intervention of the
Army, and the boys were restored to their parents.
Occasionally, too, lads are brought here by kind folk, who find them
starving. They are taken in, kept for a while, taught and fed, and
when their characters are re-established--for many of them have none
left--put out into the world. Some of them, indeed, work daily at
various employments in London, and pay 5s. a week for their board and
lodging at the Home. A good proportion of these lads also are sent to
the collieries in Wales, where, after a few years, they earn good
wages.
In these collieries a man and a boy generally work together. A while
ago such a man applied to the Army for a boy, and the applicant,
proving respectable, the boy was sent, and turned out extremely well.
In due course he became a collier himself, and, in his turn, sent for
a boy. So the thing spread, till up to the present time the Army has
supplied fifty or sixty lads to colliers in South Wales, all of whom
seem to be satisfactory and prosperous.
As the Manager explained, it is not difficult to place out a lad as
soon as his character can be more or less guaranteed. The difficulty
comes with a man who is middle-aged or old. He added that this Home
does not in any sense compete with those of Dr. Barnardo; in fact, in
certain ways they work hand in hand. The Barnardo Homes will not
receive lads who are over sixteen, whereas the Army takes them up to
eighteen. So it comes about that Barnardo's sometimes send on cases
which are over their age limit to Sturge House.
I saw the boys at their dinner, and although many of them had a bad
record, certainly they looked very respectable, and likely to make
good and useful men. The experience of the Army is that most of them
are quite capable of reformation, and that, when once their hearts
have been changed, they seldom fall back into the ways of dishonesty.
This Home, like all those managed by the Salvation Army, is spotlessly
clean, and the dormitories are very pleasant rooms. Also, there is a
garden, and in it I saw a number of pots of flowers, which had just
been sent as a present by a boy whom the Army helped three years ago,
and who is now, I understand, a gardener.
Sturge House struck me as a most useful Institution; and as there is
about it none of the depressing air of the adult Shelters, my visit
here was a pleasant change. The reclamation or the helping of a lad is
a very different business from that of restoring the adult or the old
man to a station in life which he seems to have lost for ever.
THE CENTRAL LABOUR BUREAU
This Bureau is established in the Social Headquarters at Whitechapel,
a large building acquired as long ago as 1878. Here is to be seen the
room in which General Booth used to hold some of his first prayer
meetings, and a little chamber where he took counsel with those
Officers who were the fathers of the Army. Also there is a place where
he could sit unseen and listen to the preaching of his subordinates,
so that he might judge of their ability.
The large hall is now part of yet another Shelter, which contains 232
beds and bunks. I inspected this place, but as it differs in no
important detail from others, I will not describe it.
The Officer who is in charge of the Labour Bureau informed me that
hundreds of men apply there for work every week, of whom a great many
are sent into the various Elevators and Shelters. The Army finds it
extremely difficult to procure outside employment for these men, for
the simple reason that there is very little available. Moreover, now
that the Government Labour Bureaux are open, this trouble is not
lessened. Of these Bureaux, the Manager said that they are most
useful, but fail to find employment for many who apply to them.
Indeed, numbers of men come on from them to the Salvation Army.
The hard fact is that there are more idle hands than there is work for
them to do, even where honest and capable folk are concerned. Thus, in
the majority of instances, the Army is obliged to rely upon its own
Institutions and the Hadleigh Land Colony to provide some sort of job
for out-of-works. Of course, of such jobs there are not enough to go
round, so many poor folk must be sent empty away or supported by
charity.
I suggested that it might be worth while to establish a school of
chauffeurs, and the Officers present said that they would consider the
matter. Unfortunately, however, such an experiment must be costly at
the present price of motor-vehicles.
I annex the Labour Bureau Statistics for May, 1910:--
LONDON
Applicants for temporary employment 479
Sent to temporary employment 183
Applicants for Elevators 864
Sent to Elevators 260
Sent to Shelters 32
PROVINCES
Applicants for temporary employment 461
Sent to temporary employment 160
Applicants for Elevators 417
Sent to Elevators 202
Sent to Shelters 20
Sent to permanent situations 35
THE INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATION DEPARTMENT
This is a curious and interesting branch of the work of the Salvation
Army. About two thousand times a year it receives letters or personal
applications, asking it to find some missing relative or friend of the
writer or applicant. In reply, a form is posted or given, which must
be filled up with the necessary particulars. Then, if it be a London
case, the Officer in charge sends out a skilled man to work up clues.
If, on the other hand, it be a country case, the Officer in charge of
the Corps nearest to where it has occurred, is instructed to initiate
the inquiry. Also, advertisements are inserted in the Army papers,
known as 'The War Cry' and 'The Social Gazette,' both in Great Britain
and other countries, if the lost person is supposed to be on the
Continent or in some distant part of the world.
The result is that a large percentage of the individuals sought for
are discovered, alive or dead, for in such work the Salvation Army has
advantages denied to any other body, scarcely excepting the Police.
Its representatives are everywhere, and to whatever land they may
belong or whatever tongue they may speak, all of them obey an order
sent out from Headquarters wholeheartedly and uninfluenced by the
question of regard. The usual fee charged for this work is 10_s_.
6_d_.; but when this cannot be paid, a large number of cases are
undertaken free. The Army goes to as much trouble in these unpaid
cases as in any others, only then it is not able to flood the country
with printed bills. Of course, where well-to-do people are concerned,
it expects that its out-of-pocket costs will be met.
The cases with which it has to deal are of all kinds. Often those who
have disappeared are found to have done so purposely, perhaps leaving
behind them manufactured evidence, such as coats or letters on a
river-bank, suggesting that they have committed suicide. Generally,
these people are involved in some fraud or other trouble. Again,
husbands desert their wives, or wives their husbands, and vanish, in
which instances they are probably living with somebody else under
another name. Or children are kidnapped, or girls are lured away, or
individuals emigrate to far lands and neglect to write. Or, perhaps,
they simply sink out of all knowledge, and vanish effectually enough
into a paupers grave.
But the oddest cases of all are those of a complete loss of memory, a
thing that is by no means so infrequent as is generally supposed. The
experience of the Army is that the majority of these cases happen
among those who lead a studious life. The victim goes out in his usual
health and suddenly forgets everything. His mind becomes a total
blank. Yet certain instincts remain, such as that of earning a living.
Thus, to take a single recent example, the son of a large bookseller
in a country town left the house one day, saying that he would not be
away for long, and disappeared. At the invitation of his father, the
Army took up the case, and ultimately found that the man had been
working in its Spa Road Elevator under another name. Afterwards he
went away, became destitute, and sold matches in the streets.
Ultimately he was found in a Church Army Home. He recovered his
memory, and subsequently lost it again to the extent that he could
recall nothing which happened to him during the period of its first
lapse. All that time vanished into total darkness.
This business of the hunting out of the missing through the agency of
the Salvation Army is one which increases every day. It is not unusual
for the Army to discover individuals who have been missing for thirty
years and upwards.
THE EMIGRATION DEPARTMENT
Some years ago I was present one night in the Board-room at Euston
Station and addressed a shipload of emigrants who were departing to
Canada under the auspices of the Salvation Army. I forget their exact
number, but I think it was not less than 500. What I do not forget,
however, is the sorrow that I felt at seeing so many men in the prime
of life leaving the shores of their country for ever, especially as
most of them were not married. This meant, amongst other things, that
an equal number of women who remained behind were deprived of the
possibility of obtaining a husband in a country in which the females
already outnumber the males by more than a million. I said as much in
the little speech I made on this occasion, and I think that some one
answered me with the pertinent remark that if there was no work at
home, it must be sought abroad.
[Illustration: INMATES OF A MEN'S INDUSTRIAL HOME.]
There lies the whole problem in a nutshell--men must live. As for the
aged and the incompetent and the sick and the unattached women, these
are left behind for the community to support, while young and active
men of energy move off to endow new lands with their capacities and
strength. The results of this movement, carried out upon a great
scale, can be seen in the remoter parts of Ireland, which, as the
visitor will observe, appear to be largely populated by very young
children and by persons getting on in years. Whether or no this is a
satisfactory state of affairs is not for me to say, although the
matter, too large to discuss here, is one upon which I may have my own
opinion.
Colonel Lamb, the head of the Salvation Army Emigration Department,
informed me that during the past seven years the Army has emigrated
about 50,000 souls, of whom 10,000 were assisted out of its funds, the
rest paying their own way or being paid for from one source or
another. From 8,000 to 10,000 people have been sent during the present
year, 1910, most of them to Canada, which is the Mecca of the
Salvation Army Emigration policy. So carefully have all these people
been selected, that not 1 per cent have ever been returned to this
country by the Canadian Authorities as undesirable. The truth is that
those Authorities have the greatest confidence in the discretion of
the Army, and in its ability to handle this matter to the advantage of
all concerned.
That this is true I know from personal experience, since when, some
years ago, I was a Commissioner from the British Government and had
authority to formulate a scheme of Colonial land-settlement, the Prime
Minister of Canada, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, told me so himself in the
plainest language. Indeed, he did more, formally offering a huge block
of territory to be selected anywhere I might choose in the Dominion,
with the aid of its Officers, for the purposes of settlement by poor
folk and their children under the auspices of the Salvation Army.
Also, he added the promise of as much more land as might be required
in the future for the same purpose.[3]
Most unhappily, as I hold, that offer was not accepted by the British
Government. If this had been done, by now hundreds of English families
would have been transferred from conditions of want at home in the
English towns, into those of peace and plenty upon the land abroad.
Moreover, the recent rise in the value of Canadian land has been so
great that the scheme would not have cost the British taxpayer a
halfpenny, or so I most firmly believe.
Unfortunately, however, my scheme was too novel in its character to
appeal to the official mind, especially as its working would have
involved a loan repayable by instalments, the administration of which
must have been entrusted to the Salvation Army or to other charitable
Organizations. So this priceless opportunity was lost, probably for
ever, as the new and stricter emigration regulations adopted by
Canada, as I understand, would make it extremely difficult to emigrate
the class I hoped to help, namely, indigent people of good character,
resident in English cities, with growing families of children.
Young men, especially if they have been bred on the land, and young
marriageable women are eagerly desired in the Colonies, including
Australia; but at families, as we have read in recent correspondence
in the newspapers, they look askance.
'Why do they not want families in Australia? I asked Colonel Lamb.
'Because the trouble of housing comes in. It is the same thing in
Canada, it is the same thing all through the Colonies. They do not
want too much trouble,' he answered.
These words define the position very accurately. 'Give us your best,'
say the Colonies. 'Give us your adult, healthy men and women whom you
have paid to rear and educate, but don't bother us with families of
children whom we have to house. Above all send us no damaged articles.
You are welcome to keep those at home.'
To my mind this attitude, natural as it may be, creates a serious
problem so far as Great Britain and Ireland are concerned, for the
question will arise, Can we afford to go on parting with the good and
retaining the less desirable?
On this subject I had a long argument with Colonel Lamb, and his
answer to the question was in the affirmative, although I must admit
that his reasons did not at all convince me. He seemed to believe that
we could send out 250,000 people, chosen people, per annum for the
next ten years without harm to ourselves. Well, it may be so, and, as
he added, 'we are in their (that is, the Colonies') hands, and have to
do what they choose to allow.'
Also his opinion was that 'the best thing possible for this country is
wholesale emigration,' of course of those whom the Colonies will
accept. He said, 'People here are dissatisfied with their present
condition and want a change. If we had money to assist them, there is
practically no limit to the number who want to go. There are tens of
thousands who would conform to the Canadian regulations. One of the
things we advise the man who has been forced out of the country is
that rather than come into the town he should go to the Colonies.'
On the matter of the complaints which have been made in Canada of the
emigrant from London, Colonel Lamb said, 'The Londoner, it is alleged,
is not wanted. The Canadian is full of self-assertiveness, and the
Cockney has some of that too; he does not hesitate to express his
views, and you have conflicting spirits at once. The Cockney will
arrive at the conclusion in about twenty-four hours that he could run
Canada better than it is now being run. The Scotchman will take a week
to arrive at the same conclusion, and holds his tongue about it. The
Cockney says what he thinks on the first day of arrival, and the
result is--fireworks. He and the Canadians do not agree to begin with;
but when they get over the first passage of arms they settle down
amicably. The Cockney is finally appreciated, and, being industrious
and amenable to law and order, if he has got a bit of humour he gets
on all right, but not at first.'
Colonel Lamb informed me that in Australia the Labour Party is afraid
of the Army because it believes 'we will send in people to bring down
wages.' Therefore, the Labour Party has sidetracked General Booth's
proposals. Now, however, it alleges that it is not opposed to
emigration, if not on too large a scale. 'They don't mind a few girls;
but they say the condition that must precede emigration is the
breaking up of the land.'
Colonel Lamb appeared to desire that an Emigration Board should be
appointed in England, with power and funds to deal with the
distribution of the population of the Empire and to systematize
emigration. To this Imperial Board, individuals or Societies, such as
the Salvation Army, should, he thought, be able to submit their
schemes, which schemes would receive assistance according to their
merits under such limitations as the Board might see fit to impose. To
such a Board he would even give power to carry out land-settlement
schemes in the British Isles.
This is a great proposal, but one wonders whence the money is to come.
Also how long will it be before the Labour Parties in the various
Colonies, including Canada, gain so much power that they will refuse
to accept emigrants at all, except young women, or agriculturalists
who bring capital with them?