I shall be very pleased if this letter will be any help to you.
Personally I am quite in sympathy with the new Maternity Scheme. I
do feel I cannot express my feelings enough by letter to say what a
great help it would have been to me, for no one but a mother knows the
struggle and hardships we working women have to go through. I do hope
I shall never see the young women of to-day have to go through what I
did. I am a mother of eleven children--six girls and five boys. I was
only nineteen years old when my first baby was born. My husband was one
of the best and a good father. His earnings was £1 a week; every penny
was given to me, and after paying house rent, firing, and light, and
clubs, that left me 11s. to keep the house going on; and as my little
ones began to come, they wanted providing for and saving up to pay a
nurse, and instead of getting nourishment for myself which we need
at those times, I was obliged to go without. So I had no strength to
stand against it, and instead of being able to rest in bed afterwards,
I was glad to get up and get about again before I was able, because I
could not afford to pay a woman to look after me. I kept on like that
till the sixth little one was expected, and then I had all the other
little ones to see after. The oldest one was only ten years old, so
you see they all wanted a mother’s care. About two months before my
confinement the two youngest fell ill with measles, so I was obliged
to nurse them, and the strain on my nerves brought on brain-fever. All
that the doctor could do for me was to place ice-bags on my head. Oh,
the misery I endured! My poor old mother did what she could for me, and
she was seventy years old, and I could not afford to pay a woman to see
after my home and little ones; but the Lord spared me to get over my
trouble, but I was ill for weeks and was obliged to work before I was
able. Then in another eighteen months I was expecting another. After
that confinement, being so weak, I took a chill, and was laid up for
six months, and neighbours came in and done what they could for me.
Then there was my home and little ones and husband to look after, as he
was obliged to work. It was the worry that kept me from getting better;
if I could have had someone to look after me I should not have been so
ill. After this I had a miscarriage and another babe in one year and
four months. I got on fairly well with the next one, and then the next
one, which was the eighth, I had two down with measles, one two years
old with his collar-bone out, and a little girl thirteen with her arm
broke. That was at the same time as I was expecting my eighth little
one, and my dear husband worried out of life, as you see with all this
trouble I was only having the £1 a week and everything to get out of
it. What a blessing it would have been if this Maternity Scheme was
in go then! It would have saved me a lot of illness and worry, for my
life was a complete misery. For twenty years I was nursing or expecting
babies. No doubt there are others fixed the same way as I have been.
This is only a short account of how I suffered; I could fill sheets of
paper with what I have gone through at confinements and before, and
there are others, no doubt, have felt the pinch as well as myself. If
there is anything else you would like to know and I could tell you, I
should be glad, for the benefit of my sisters.
_Wages 17s. to 25s.; eleven children, two miscarriages._