What is it about?
The London Foundling Hospital, established in the eighteenth century was unique in how it allowed children to be admitted. Notes, fabrics, coins and pieces of jewellery were often left as identifiers in case a child was reclaimed but they were supposed to be kept secret. This paper questions why secrecy was important but also how exposing the objects symbolic of those secrets to public view was also of value to the Hospital.
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Why is it important?
The admission process of the London Foundling Hospital has often been misunderstood. This paper tries to explain what was a sometimes convoluted system and why this institution needed to be different to other institutions across Europe of a similar nature.
Perspectives
Writing this article made me have to think very carefully about why the systems set in place more than 200 years ago were necessary. It helped me understand more about the governors who ran the Hospital as well as the desperate parents who wanted to be heard as to why they had to give up their child.
Janette Bright
University of London School of Advanced Study
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Foundling Tokens, May 2024, De Gruyter,
DOI: 10.1163/9789004694729_014.
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