Jennifer Worth - Call The Midwife - A True Story Of The East End In The 1950S

The sound echoed through the stone building, and the door was opened by a thin, grey man who demanded, “What do you want?”

“Shelter, and food for the little ones.”

“You’ll have to come to the Reception Room. You can sleep there till morning, unless, of course, you’re ‘casuals’ and go to the Casual Centre. There’s no food until morning.”

“No, we are not casuals,” she said wearily.

They were the only people in the reception room that night. The sleeping platform, a raised wooden construction, was covered with fresh straw and looked inviting. They cuddled up together in the sweet-smelling hay, and the children fell asleep at once. Only the mother lay awake, her arms around her children, until dawn. Her heart was breaking. She knew it would be the last time she would be allowed to sleep with her children.

Morning sounds, keys clanking, and doors opening, were heard long before anyone unlocked the door of the reception room. Finally, the Mistress entered. She was a resolute looking woman, not unkind, but one who had seen too many paupers to be swayed by emotion. She took their names, and briefly told them to follow her to the washhouse, where they were stripped, and made to wash all over with cold water in shallow stone troughs. Their clothes, such as they were, were removed, and workhouse uniforms provided. These were of coarse grey serge, cut to fit almost any size of person. There were a variety of odd shoes. No undergarments were provided, but that did not matter, because none of them were accustomed to vests or pants, even in the coldest weather. Then their heads were shaved. The boys thought this was great fun, and giggled and pointed at the girls, cramming their fists into their mouths to stop themselves from laughing aloud. Mrs Jenkins did not have to be shaved because she had no hair, having sold it some weeks previously; she was given a bonnet to cover her bare head. She timidly asked if there would be any food for the little ones, and was told that it was too late for breakfast, but that lunch would be served at 12 noon.

They were taken to the Master’s office for segregation. Everyone dreaded this moment, including the Master and Mistress, and four strong pauper inmates were brought in to take the children away. Mrs Jenkins had persuaded herself that it would not be too bad for the younger ones, because they would all be with Rosie, who had looked after them while she was at work. But this was not to be.

The Master looked at the little ones. “Ages?” he demanded.

“Two, four, and five,” she whispered.

“Take them to the children’s ward. And the older boy? What age is he?”

“Nine.”

“He’ll go to the boys’ ward. The girl?” he demanded, pointing at Rosie.

“Ten.”

“Take her to the girls’ ward,” he ordered.

Rough hands were laid on the children. The Master turned and walked out. He was not going to stay to watch the scene. As he left, he barked to the helpers, “Mind you do as you are bidden. You know the rules.”

Mrs Jenkins could not give Sister Evangelina or me the details of the parting. It was too terrible to talk about. The children were dragged away screaming, and she was pushed into the women’s quarters. Great doors were shut behind her, and keys were turned. She heard the sounds of screaming children and doors banging. Then she heard no more. She was told much later by a friendly woman who worked in the kitchens that there was a little boy who cried all the time, and whose eyes never left the great door of the children’s quarters, watching every person who came in. He never said a single word except “mummy” from the day he entered to the day he died. Was it her little boy? She never knew, but it might have been.

I asked Sister Evangelina about this segregation, which seemed so utterly inhuman that it could not be true, but she assured me that it was. Segregation was the first rule of all workhouses throughout the country, and the one most rigorously applied. Husbands and wives were separated, parents and children, brothers and sisters. Usually, they never saw each other again.

If Mrs Jenkins was odd, it was not surprising.

One evening I visited her quite late. It was dark and, down the side passage leading to her back door, I heard a strange, subdued human voice that was chanting in a rhythmic way. I peered through the window and saw Mrs Jenkins on her hands and knees on the floor, scrubbing. An oil-lamp stood beside her, throwing a huge and ghostly shadow of her small figure on to the wall. She had a pail of water beside her, and a scrubbing brush, and she was scrubbing the same square of floor obsessively. All the while she seemed to be repeating a rythmic pattern of words that I could not distinguish but she did not change her position.

I rapped on the door and entered. She lifted her head, but did not turn round.

“Rosie? Come ’ere, Rosie. Look a’ this, girl. Look ’ow clean it is. Master’ll be pleased when ’e sees how clean I scrubbed it.”

She looked up at the great shadow of herself on the wall.

“Come an’ see here, Master. It’s so clean, an’ I done it all. It’s clean, an’ I done it to please you, Master. They says I can see my li’l ones if I please you, Master. Can I? Can I? Oh, let me, just once.”

Her cry lifted, and her tiny body fell forwards. Her head hit the bucket, and she gave a whimper of pain. I went over to her.

“It’s me, the nurse. I’m just doing my evening visit. Are you all right, Mrs Jenkins?”

She looked up at me, but didn’t say a word. She sucked her lips, and gazed at me steadily as I helped her to her feet and led her to the armchair.

On the bare table was a cooked lunch, left for her by the Meals on Wheels ladies. It was untouched, and quite cold.

I moved the plate, and said, “Didn’t you fancy your lunch, then?”

She grabbed my wrist with unexpected strength and pushed my arm away. “For Rosie,” she said in a hoarse whisper.

I checked her physical condition, and asked a few questions, none of which she replied to. She just gazed at me unblinkingly, and continued sucking her lips.

On another occasion when I called, she was chuckling to herself as she played with a piece of elastic. She was stretching and releasing it and twisting it round her fingers. She said to me, as I entered, “My Rosie brought me a bit of elastic las’ night. Look ’ow it stretches. It’s good an’ strong. She’s a clever girl, my Rose. She can always get hold of a bi’ of elastic for you, if you wants it.”

I was beginning to get irritated with Rosie. She wasn’t much help to her old mother. A bit of elastic, indeed! Was that the best she could do?

But then I saw the tenderness and happiness on the old face, and the warmth and love in her voice as she fiddled with the elastic. “My Rosie give it me, she did. She go’ it fer me, she did. She’s a dear girl, my Rose.”

My heart softened. Perhaps Rosie was as simple as her mother, her mind also unhinged by her early life in the workhouse. I wondered how long she had spent there, and what had happened to her brothers and sisters.

Life in the workhouse was terrible. All inmates were locked into their quarters, which consisted of a day room, a sleeping room and an airing yard. They were confined to the dormitory from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., and there was a drain or channel running down the centre, into which they relieved themselves at night. The day room was their dining room, where they sat at long benches to eat. All windows were above eye level so that no one could see out of them, and the window sills sloped downwards, so that no one could climb up and sit on them. The airing yard was an enclosed gravel square, from which no door or gate issued. It was, effectively, a prison.