Following the industrial revolution and certainly by the 1850’s pauperism in Victorian Great Britain was at an alarming level. By 1875 one person in six was designated a pauper.
From the 1840’s onwards populations of British cities had swollen to an alarming level as thousands left the traditional agricultural life to find a new life and hopefully work in the industrial and business cities. The cost was estimated at seven and three-quarter million pounds which the media calculated was 6 shillings and 6 pence ‘per head’. This article, published in October 1875 looks at the human, financial and political cost of this, the most infamous and long-term Victorian crisis (please click the article to read it clearly).
