The Liverpool Vestry had previously made considerable efforts to improve
the workhouse infirmaries. The medical men had been encouraged to make
requisition for every material appliance that could facilitate the cure
of the sick; and paid female officers were appointed at the rate of one
to each 150 or 200 beds, to superintend the giving of medicines and
stimulants, and so forth: but of course so small a number, even had they
been trained nurses, could do no real nursing, and could exercise little
supervision over the twenty drunken or unreliable[1] pauper nurses who
were under the nominal direction of each paid officer. An appeal was
made to the Vestry to consummate the good work they had thus partially
commenced, and it was urged that Liverpool should assume the lead in the
task of workhouse reform. The following considerations were submitted to
the Select Vestry:—
“That Liverpool could commence this movement with great effect, and
with the certainty that her example would be widely followed.
“That she had in times past taken a leading part in such reform. The
introduction of the New Poor Law produced little change in Liverpool;
so many of its wisest provisions were already in operation there, some
of them for twenty or thirty years.
“That she had already established a system of attention to the sick
poor in their own houses, which, if only by restoring heads of
families to health and work, saved the parish many times the sum that
it cost to private benevolence.
“That, lastly and especially, the proposed reform ought to commence in
Liverpool, because in her workhouse the guardians had already, by
their liberality, provided the sick with everything in the shape of
diet and medical comforts that could conduce to recovery; and what was
now wanting to give effect to their wise benevolence was, that their
system should be administered and their intentions carried out by
efficient and reliable nurses, in the stead of unreliable paupers.”