I am really not a delicate woman, but having a large family, and so
fast, pulled me down very much. I used to suffer very much with bad
legs; and my husband was laid out of work most winters, so I had a
great deal of poverty to deal with.
Nearly all my children were delicate, and being badly off, very often
I could not get or do what I would like to for them. I lost four out
of the ten, and had a very great difficulty in rearing some of the
others. They were nearly all two years before they ran; my eldest girl
was three years before she ran; I never thought she could live, but,
thank God, she has lived, and is nearly twenty-two. If something could
be done for poor women with large families, I think it would be a good
thing; for a woman’s life is not much when she is in poverty and got
sickly children, and never knows what an hour’s liberty is. It is keep
on work with no rest days, and not much nights very often. Of course,
during pregnancy one never feels well, what with one thing and the
other. That was my experience; and after confinement I used to be so
weak, and by the time I began to regain my strength a little I was in
trouble again. So you can’t wonder poor delicate women break down and
very often die. It would be good if something could be done for them,
so as to give them a change and a little rest. And when you have got an
unkind husband it is a terrible life. I very often think that is why
my poor children have to suffer so much now they are grown up, as they
are not any of them strong, and very often ailing with one thing or
the other. You may depend on it there is a good many women got unkind
husbands that make it a great deal worse for women.
My husband used to lose his work through drink. I couldn’t tell you
exactly what my wages were, but I feel almost sure, to take the years
through, they never amounted to £1 a week. I was in hopes, as soon
as my boys started work, I should have got on better, but the more I
got off my boys the less I got off my husband, for mine has been a
miserable experience.
For a good many years I kept account of what he gave me, and to take
the year through it used to amount to about 15s. a week.
_Wages unknown, wife’s allowance 15s. to £1; ten children, two
miscarriages._