{"id":6182,"date":"2019-01-05T14:11:33","date_gmt":"2019-01-05T14:11:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=6182"},"modified":"2019-01-05T14:14:27","modified_gmt":"2019-01-05T14:14:27","slug":"ladies-of-quality-and-distinction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=6182","title":{"rendered":"Ladies of Quality and Distinction"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Nurse at summer camp for Foundling Hospital children\/damesnet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Quite. I don\u2019t see how I could sum it up any better; this is exactly what damesnet is all about.  We celebrate ladies of quality and distinction. The particular example featured in this blog is a wonderful exhibition currently on at the equally marvellous Foundling Museum in London.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have to confess that until a mere 2 months ago I had never\nvisited this institution; The Foundling Museum explores the history of the\nFoundling Hospital, the UK\u2019s first children\u2019s charity and, intriguingly, the\nfirst public art gallery. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hospital was established in 1739 by the philanthropist\nThomas Coram to care for babies at risk of abandonment. Coram had campaigned\nfor 17 years until he was issued with a Royal Charter from King George II to\nset up the charity. The first babies were admitted in 1741, and around 25,000 children\nwere cared for and educated up until 1954, when the last residential pupil was\nplaced in foster care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now a museum, the exhibits chart the extraordinary story of the Foundling Hospital, from its origins in the 18th<\/sup> century to life at the institution in the 20th<\/sup> century.   <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ladies of Quality and Distinction <\/strong>is a special exhibition at the Museum that considers the remarkable contribution that women have made to British society, culture and philanthropy.  It is divided into parts; upstairs in the Picture Gallery there are portraits of the 21 ladies who signed Thomas Coram\u2019s first petition, presented to King George II in 1735, calling for the establishment of the Foundling Hospital.  The support of these women was crucial in overcoming moral concerns about the project; these were the children of \u2018fallen women\u2019, and the prevailing attitude in society was not one that cared about such progeny.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Frances Flint with Foundling Hospital children she fostered\/damesnet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Reflecting the difference in status, the exhibits in the gallery\ndownstairs tell the stories of the women who supported the day-to-day running\nof the institution. They were matrons, cooks, laundresses and scullery\nmaids.  Even more unseen was the small\narmy of wet nurses who lived outside the hospital and who fostered the children\nin their infancy, returning them to the Hospital when they were around five\nyears old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of these nurses were mothers who supplemented the\nfamily income by taking an extra child into the family. Nursing the foundlings\nwas not without risk; the transmission of diseases such as scabies, smallpox\nand other conditions from the child could have a serious impact on the nurse\nand her family. Wet nurse Elizabeth Newman was treated and received compensation\nfrom the Governors after contracting a \u2018venereal disease\u2019, probably syphilis,\nfrom the child she was breastfeeding. \nEqually critical to the functioning of the institution was the role of\ninspector; women and men supervised the wet nurses to ensure standards were\nmaintained in their homes. The female inspectors were often the wives or\nrelatives of Governors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The portraits in the upper gallery are very fine indeed, but for me the real story lies in the depictions of the lives of those downstairs. The role of Matron was the most important one in this stratum of the Foundling Hospital society; she managed all the female staff and the girls\u2019 wing. Other senior posts included the Chief Infirmary Nurse, the Schoolmistress and the Cook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Cook carving\/damesnet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I mentioned that this was the first public art gallery; William Hogarth and George Frideric Handel were both key to helping Coram realise his vision; Hogarth encouraged leading artists of the day to donate works, which were the foundations of the new gallery, and Handel conducted annual concerts of his Messiah<\/em> in the Hospital\u2019s chapel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The exhibition runs until January 20th<\/sup>; we hope\nyou can catch it by then, but if not the permanent exhibition is a delight in\nitself, in particular the oral history recordings by former pupils.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We celebrate ladies of quality and distinction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":6195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,70,132,58,59],"tags":[78,82],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6182"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6182"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6182\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6223,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6182\/revisions\/6223"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}