Many of the former Cookham Workhouse buildings are
still very much around - they are part of St Mark's
Hospital, Maidenhead.
Maidenhead was divided into two parishes - Cookham
and Bray until the mid 19th century. The Union
Workhouse was situated on the North side of the
London Bath Road (A4) so was in the parish of Cookham.
It cost £4493 to build in 1835. It was
designed to cater for the needs of the poor in the
area but also provided accommodation for the many
poor travellers on the Bath Road. Even in the
1930s the Board of Governors was petitioning for more
funds due to the heavy burden placed on the Institute
by the great number of travellers using its
facilities.
Workshouses have received much condemnation down
the years and indeed a good deal of criticism was
deserved but I think some of the former Guardians
would be horrified to find that our modern state
provides no provision whatsoever for the tramps who
now have to sleep rough in the worst weather.
Casual wards were spartan but they did provide
shelter from the elements and workhouse diet - set
out by act of parliament - might have been stodgy and
unappetizing for modern people but prevent death from
malnutrition. Tramps were required to do chores
before moving on to the next workhouse. My
parents recalled hearing of how the vagrants used to
bury their goods on the outskirts of the town lest
they be taken off them by the workhouse staff (location:
Stamford, Lincolnshire on the A1 - no doubt
accommodating many casuals). However, workhouse
masters were not allowed to take away a workman's
tools as this would deprive him of a chance of future
employment.
"These (tramps and vagrants) were catered for
the Cookham Union workhouse which opened in 1835 on
the corner of Courthouse and St Marks Road. By
1840 they were taking in 180 vagrants per week and
some years over 10,000 were accommodated."
Luke Over: "The Story of Maidenhead"
This book contains some more information about the
Workhouse p44-45. Some more down to earth
recollections of it in the 1920s and 1930s are in a
limited publication book "Furze Platt Remembered"
by Ray Knibbs - copies are in Maidenhead Library.
Norman Longmate has written a history of Workhouses
but I cannot remember the exact title. It is
said that the workhouses were set up originally to
deter the able bodied from being idle and living on
parish relief rather than working but quickly became
the refuge of all sorts of people who were
unfortunate: elderly and infirm people, unmarried
mothers, people with learning difficulties and
children whose parents were admitted, orphans, sick
poor who couldn't be nursed at home but could not
afford a hospital.
In 1896 the workhouse was extended and renamed
Maidenhead Union. The words "Maidenhead Union"
are carved in stone over the Board Room building
erected at that time. A few years ago they were
once more revealed having been covered over during
the war lest they provide a clue to the town's name
for invading Germans. When the boards were
removed there was some correspondence in the "Maidenhead
Advertiser" suggesting that these shameful words
should be covered over. However, a family also
wrote to say that their mother had been very
devotedly nursed in the Union Infirmary just after
the first world war. They could not afford
hospital bills and had really appreciated the care
provided by the Union. On the other hand a
local man, who has since died, told me of how his
parents, through no fault of their own in his view,
ended up in Maidenhead Union (this would be in the
1920s). He and his brother were receiving
treatment for rickets at a hospital in Middlesex.
When his parents were admitted, the workhouse matron
came to the hospital and removed the boys and placed
them in the children's home, which is now the
Maidenhead Teachers Centre in Ray Mill Road. He
was then removed to another home in Cannon Court
Lane, Furze Platt. There are other stories good and
bad about Cookham / Maidenhead Union but the would
take too long to go into.
There is a workhouse website which contains some
pictures of St Mark's - www.workhouses.org.uk.
I also have an ancestor who ended his days in the
workhouse aged 65 in 1839 at Bourne Union, S.
Lincolnshire. He entered the Union and
then discharged himself, only to re-enter a short
while later. He was an agricultural labourer.
He was said in the admission register to be in good
health. He was a widower and had 4 sons and a
married daughter living locally but it would seem
that no one could take care of him. Perhaps
they were suffering hardship and an extra mouth to
feed was too much. In the old parish relief
system which had operated before, the parishes often
paid one pauper to look after another, but with the
coming of the new act Poor Law perhaps the workhouse
was the preferred solution (by the relieving officer
that is). I suppose that he was too old to find
paid work and not able to take care of himself so the
workhouse was the only answer. A little girl
with his surname and probably his granddaughter died
there two years later but as her family were not
admitted it would seem that she had been taken into
the infirmary.
You can walk around St Mark's hospital site.
The older buildings and St Mark's Church, which was
provided for the inmates of the workhouse and the
poor of Maidenhead, are easily identified. The
modern patients of St Mark's Hospital are cared for
in new buildings. The older part is used for
administrative and service activities. In July
the Hospital Garden Fete is held and guided tours of
the Church are usually available at that time.
The records of the workhouse are in Berkshire Record
Office.
