The Testimony of the Victorian Poor, c1834 – 1900.

Would you like to be involved in a research project into the Victorian poor?

The authors, Paul Carter and Steven King, are currently working on the British Academy funded ‘The Testimony of the Victorian Poor, c1834-1900‘ and (with Steve Thompson, Aberystwyth) the Arts and Humanities Research Council- funded ‘A Century of GETTY IMAGES Struggle: Pauperism and the New Poor Law in Wales, 1834-1930‘. Both projects will feed into a wider project called ‘Voices of the Victorian Poor’.

Voices of the Victorian Poor is an AHRC funded project run by The National Archives and Nottingham Trent University which used letters from paupers and other poor people, as well as associated manuscript material such as petitions, sworn statements and advocate letters (those written on behalf of paupers), as the basis for a major educational resource to investigate the lives of the poor in the nineteenth century. These letters, petitions etc. were collected from an earlier AHRC project run by Nottingham Trent University and The National Archives called In Their Own Write.

“We work with a brilliant group of volunteer editors – Some work on the original records at The National Archives, and some on imaged materials at home. They are part of our team and have incredible knowledge of the archive, its creation and the historical uses it can be applied to.”

If you think you might want to work with Paul and Steven on this project as a volunteer editor, please contact Paul at poorlawprojects@nationalarchives.gov.uk