Why was Gertrude Platts in this Institution?

[LizzieB]

Gertrude Platts b. 1894 Hugglescote, Leicestershire was an inmate at the Diocesan Home, (reading from the 1911 census): London Road, Skirbeck Qtr, Boston. County: Lincolnshire. All the inmates are female aged 15-26, occ.'s are all "formerly" something (all lowly positions such as servants, factory workers etc.). They appear to be from all over. A home for unmarried mothers-to-be maybe? Thank you in anticipation ........ Lizzie

[Ultramum]

Diocesan Home for Fallen Women!!!! although that appears to be on High Street according to websites below but a bit too co-incidental otherwise.

According to Heritage Lincolnshire ... http://www.
lincsheritage.org/bpt/projects/details.php?key=116_High_Street_Boston

Also on a blog here http://bostonpast.blogspot.com/2010/...et-boston.html

[Pam Downes]

Eh, it's amazing what you learn. Thanks ultramum for that info, and the blog.

Lizzie, I can't find any information about the home in the 1913 Kelly's Lincolnshire directory - though to be fair I did doubt that I would.
Re the home for unmarried mothers-to-be possibility, I looked on FreeBMD for some of the more unusual names of the women in the home but there doesn't seem to be any births for those names in Boston registration district 1910-1913.
Pam

[LizzieB]

Ultramum and Pam, Diocesan home for fallen women? Why not? Charles Dickens opened a house for fallen women in 1847 called Urania Cottage in Shepherd's Bush. Funnily enough the book, by Jenny Hartley, is called Charles Dickens and the House of Fallen Women. Anyway .... and isn't this so much fun ..... I'd found a birth for a Lilian A Platts, mother Platts 1911, Doncaster (Lincolnshire/Nottinghamshire/W.R. Yorkshire). Does this seem the right area? VERY tempted to get the b/c if this area is right. Just about to have a look at bostonpast.blogspot and the lincsheritage.org. Thanks girls ..... Lizzie

[Pam Downes]

Hi Lizzie,
Doncaster is in Yorkshire, not far from where the (sort-of) south-west corner of that county joins the (sort-of) north-west corner of Lincolnshire.
Boston is in the south of Lincolnshire, about 73 miles from Doncaster. Not far by Aussie standards, but an hour and a half travelling time (on a good day) by UK standards.
Therefore I would say not the right area.

I looked in the 1911 census for unmarried, female, Platts, aged between 20 and 40, living in the Doncaster registration district. Got five results, so some possibilities for Lilian's mother there.

Who exactly are you looking for - Lilian or Gertrude? Either way, a few more details more help set us on the right track.

Added: Re-reading your original post I presume you're looking for Gertrude.
Pam

[arthurk]

A few thoughts on this - though I defer to Pam as much more of an expert on Boston than I will ever be.

The building described and pictured on the sites mentioned in post #2 is close to the point where High Street becomes London Road, so could there have been some uncertainty as to which building was in which road?

The demographic of the residents in 1911 would certainly support the idea of a fallen women's home - but why were there apparently no corresponding births? The answer might be found in the home's records, if they still exist, but I wondered if any of the following might apply, some of which would have involved bending the rules:
Could it have been not so much a maternity home as a place of recuperation and rehabilitation after giving birth elsewhere?
If babies were adopted soon after birth, might they have been registered under the adoptive surname?
Or might the women have been told to register the births themselves when they returned home?

Just questions, I'm afraid, and no answers, but as I pass the building occasionally it's a topic that caught my eye.

Arthur

[Jeuel]

"Fallen women" implies they were working as prostitutes, not that they were pregnant. I'd say this was a reform home, rather than a maternity unit. A bit like a rehab centre for drug addicts, but with the emphasis on morally reeducating the women and providing them with an alternative way of earning money.

And a birth has to be registered in the district where it occurred.

[Peter Goodey]

Anyone seen the film The Magdalene Sisters? Although the film was set in 20th century Ireland, not 19th century Lincolnshire, it does serve as a reminder that the phrase "fallen women" could be subject to a very broad definition.

I almost said that the term covered a multitude of sins but that might be misleading

[Kerrywood]

And a birth has to be registered in the district where it occurred.

Just for the record (though I'm not suggesting it applies in this case), a birth can be registered 'by declaration' in a different district from the one where it took place.

[Pam Downes]

High Street on the left-hand side of the road going south out of town goes up to about 160-170 (just after St Ann's Lane) before it becomes High Street. (Arthur, if you can remember on the right where the goods yard entrance used to be, almost opposite where the garage is now, immediately past it there's a terrace of 3 or 4 houses and then what always used to be a white house, Ferry House - those houses mark the start of London Road.)
The link ultramum gave for the currently boarded-up building has the address as 116 High Street, so well within the High Street. And having seen the link I never thought to query anything further. But.....
Something made me look at the enumerator's list for 1911 and it shows Wyberton West Road, and London Road. Even more pertinent it shows the railway gatehouse, the Railway Tavern and St Thomas' church, so in 1911 the Diocesan Home certainly wasn't at 116 High Street. It's not immediately obvious which side of the road it was on, so I'll have to do a bit more digging. I do wonder whether it was in what was once Norton House which if I remember correctly became/was part of London Road hospital.
Give me twenty-four hours.....

And a p.s. to Arthur - I'm not that much of an expert on Boston. Take me out of Skirbeck Quarter and I can get lost within about five minutes.
Pam