Baby Farming
As you'll be aware, I often include some real Victorian crimes in my books, including ones which have long been 'lost' in the midst of time. Pagan Rite will feature a number of real criminal cases as will the sixth novel (if I finish it).
I'm now at the stage where I know everything that Chard won't encounter. As a result, every so often I'll delve into my research notes and pull out a case which otherwise would remain 'lost.'
Let's start with a well-known topic - Baby Farming.
This is where unmarried women would try and hide their 'fall from grace' by answering newspaper ads where a baby farmer would look to raise their child and find them a good home. Full notoriety hit home in June 1896 when the 'Reading Ogre' Amelia Dyer was finally caught and hanged. (That's her in the picture) Her story is a long one, and features in the historical talks I occasionally give. Suffice it to say that after her execution Baby Farmers and their premises had to be registered. But was Dyer an exception? Were children really in that much danger from being 'farmed out'? The following is a case which took place four months after Dyer's execution. whi ch I got from an old newspaper of that year.
SIX WEEKS FOR BABY-FARMING Mary Ann Stevens, married, living at Olić Cottages, Isleworth, and Caroline Davis, same address, appeared at the South-Western police Court to answer an adjourned summons for being concerned in keeping more than two infants for hire in a house at Amies-street, Battersea, unregistered for that purpose. The prosecution was instituted by the London County Council. The facts, as given at the last hearing by Miss Smith, a lady inspector under the Infant Life Protection Act, went to show that) defendants had kept 14 children in the house, of whom eight died, two were removed ill. and one was removed dirty. At an inquest on the death of one child a coroner's jury found that the child's death was accelerated by neglect. The house was registered for a year, but defendants took in children at the (oxpimllon????) of the year, and besides concealed some of the infanta from the inspector.—Mr Francis said the prosecution was a very proper one, and be had no hesitation in concluding that defendants wilfully broke the law. At first he thought a penalty would meet the case, but on consideration be felt that the circumstances of the case were so bad that the conduct of defendants merited imprisonment. They would be sentenced to six weeks' hard labour each.
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