Workhouse Lives V: ‘Investigating Complaints of Sexual Impropriety under the English and Welsh Poor Law: Staff vs Paupers', Dr Paul Carter, The National Archives

Nottingham Trent University, in partnership with The National Archives invite you to participate in an online seminar series: ‘Workhouse Lives V’.
- When: Tuesday 4 February 2025, 5 pm
- Booking deadline: Monday 3 February 2025, 12.00 pm
- Download this event to your calendar
Event details
In this fifth annual series of seminars on the lives of those experiencing or threatened with Old and New Poor Law workhouses, convened jointly by Nottingham Trent University and The National Archives, we deal with the (potentially) interrelated themes of violence, sex, and abuse. These issues have long exercised historians of institutional care, containment, and incarceration more generally. In this comprehensive programme of seminars, stretching from the 1750s to the 1930s, we have a core of papers that deal with violence against children but also contributions dealing with sexual abuse, weaponry (look out for the use of stinging nettles), immigration, and the agency of paupers meting out violence on the staff and fabric of institutions.
Seminars are online on the first Tuesday of each month, beginning in November 2024. They start at 5 pm and with questions from the audience might go on until 6.15 pm.
The full series is:
- 5 November: “The Abused Pauper Body: Sexual Abuse and Punishment in the Workhouse”, Professor Elizabeth Hurren (University of Leicester).
- 3 December: “Weapons in the workhouse”, Professor Steve King (Nottingham Trent University).
- 7 January 2025: “Striking her child's head against the wall: Physical Violence in Lincolnshire's Workhouses, 1853-1914”, Dr Matthew Bayly (University of Lincoln).
- 4 February: “Investigating Complaints of Sexual Impropriety under the English and Welsh Poor Law: Staff vs Paupers”, Dr Paul Carter (The National Archives).
- 4 March: “Smashing windows: The spectacle of resistance in the New Poor Law workhouse”, Dr Samantha Shave (The University of Lincoln).
- 1 April: “Control, Violence and Agency in Workhouses of the Old Poor Law, c. 1750-1834”, Dr Joe Harley (Anglia Ruskin University).
- 6 May: “'A Monstrous attack upon a poor helpless girl' - Workhouse children and the punishment continuum”, Dr Jeff James (Independent Scholar).
- 3 June: “’No Redeeming Feature’: Pauperism, Workhouses, and the Aliens Acts, 1906-1939”, Professor Ginger Frost (Samford University, USA).
- 1 July: “Social control through fear and violence: Children and the New Poor Law workhouse”, Dr Carol Beardmore (The Open University).
Search and sign up for other Workhouse Lives events
Registration
You must register separately for each session you are interested in. The link to join the event will be sent to your email the day before the event. If you have any problems with the link please contact steven.king@ntu.ac.uk
Programme
All events start at 5 pm and are expected to be around 40 - 45 minute, followed by questions.