It began with a single census entry. A boy of thirteen listed as an inmate in the Oswestry Union Workhouse at Morda.
George Parry was one of ten children born to John and Mary Parry of Tilley Green near Wem. John, a gamekeeper, also had an older son from his first marriage. The Parry children came to my attention because they were cousins of my great-grandmother, Lizzie Parry.
Illness changed everything. John Parry died in September 1876 at Lee near Ellesmere, aged forty-nine, his occupation recorded as keeper, the cause of death phthisis. Less than two years later, in March 1878, his widow Mary died at the same place, aged forty-eight, the cause recorded as intestinal obstruction. Their deaths left ten children without parents.
By 1881, the family had been scattered. Some of the older children were in service, one had married, and the two youngest girls were living together in another household as nurse children. Only George, aged thirteen, was recorded inside the workhouse at Morda.
The term nurse child was used for children placed with another family to be cared for, what we would now call fostered.
The contrast is striking. While his brothers and sisters were placed in homes or in service, George alone appears in the workhouse records.
The Oswestry Union Workhouse at Morda was built to house the poor of the surrounding area, including orphaned and destitute children. Conditions were basic, and families were separated.
The 1881 census shows the scale of the institution. Ten members of staff were responsible for 215 inmates, whose ages ranged from ninety-one-year-old agricultural labourer Samuel Brown of Kinnerley to a baby, Sarah Evans of Oswestry, aged just one month.
As well as long-term inmates, vagrants could be admitted for a night. They were given a wash, a bed, and food, but in return were required to work. One of the tasks described at Morda was stone-breaking. Men were locked into the labour ward and set to break large stones into smaller pieces, a repetitive and physically demanding job carried out under supervision before they could leave.
By 1881, this was where thirteen-year-old George Parry was living, not with his siblings, but among other inmates of the workhouse system.
Recently, I went with my mum to try to find the site of the workhouse at Morda, but discovered it had been destroyed by fire in 1982. Wanting to understand more about what George’s life might have been like, we visited another workhouse nearby at Llanfyllin, which is now open to the public.
Walking through the building gave a sense of how life was organised, separate spaces, simple rooms, and a strict routine for those who lived there.
While we were there, we listened to a recorded account of a woman named Rita. She had left an abusive husband with two young children and was pregnant. When she asked for help, welfare services contacted her husband and told her he wanted her back. She refused to return, and instead was admitted to Llanfyllin Workhouse.
What shocked us was not just her story, but the date.
This was in 1969.
I was four years old at the time, and my brother was born that same year. Rita could easily have been my mother’s age. It was a stark reminder that what we think of as Victorian hardship was, in some places, still part of living memory.
George did not remain in the workhouse. By 1891, he was working and lodging in Cefn-bychan, and that same year he married Hannah Meacham in Llanfyllin. On his marriage record, he was described as a labourer.
Together they had eight children before Hannah’s death in 1903. Three years later, George married Mary Elizabeth Davies, and they went on to have a further six children.
In the 1911 census, George was recorded as a general carrier working on his own account. By 1921, he was living in Waverton, Cheshire, working as a building trader, and later described as a retired labourer.
George Parry died in 1940, having raised a large family and spent most of his life in work. He left effects of £249 11s 8d. While not a large sum, it represented savings built over a lifetime of work. In today’s terms, that is roughly equivalent to around £17,500
What began as a single census entry became something much more. A boy in a workhouse went on to build a life, raise a family, and support himself through work. Standing in Llanfyllin, hearing a story from 1969, brought it closer than expected. It is a reminder that the lives we uncover are not as distant as they first appear.
Linda
EYEonthePAST
