Living in the past the history of Women and Alcohol misuse in Eary Victorian Times
Women idiots, women of unsound mind and pauper lunatic’s in mid Victorian Middlesbrough
Visit to the Dorman Museum Middlesbrough Archives Wednesday November 15th 2023
Permission to use material and data from Middlesbrough Archives
Session facilitated by Lara Moon Archivist
Internet, historic_uk.com accessed 21/11/23
Blog written by Annalice Argyle Recoverist , TRAC UK – www.tracuk.uk
As a charity leader and women in abstinent long term recovery, passionate about accelerating gender recovery , I was interested in how women who abused substances were treat and to see if society’s stigma and methods had changed over the years. There was tax on alcohol at this time so there where hooch sellers and the black market, a smuggler might use women and children to hide liquor to fool boarder control.
Upon reading the different cases I think you will notice there is not much difference in todays society regarding stigma especially in women drinkers, neglect of children, co-existing mental health issues, drinking to escape pain. Today if children can’t be brought up buy the family, they go into care back then they went into a workhouse.
In the late 18,000s the Temperance movement fought to reduce consumption of alcohol, and this was led by women volunteers. Women drank at home and not in the public spaces. At this time women shamefully entered public houses through the back alley and were classed as ‘low women’ many baring tattoos and scars Alcohol abuse we see is decades old , In 1902 a law came out and drunken women’s mug shots put on a blacklist so vendors did not sell them alcohol.
4 CASE STUDIES
The following Victorian women were admitted to the Middlesbrough Asylum under the Lunacy act 1890 . I talk about the case and give my comments underneath in bold. For the short time I was researching I found only 1 women from Middlesbrough , the other three case studies were admitted to Middlesbrough Asylum from elsewhere.
Margaret Hopkins a 3o yr old female , married char women from Chester. For 2 days she had been drinking . On the 16th August 1907 where a complaint was made about a pauper lunatic wandering at large. Observations indicating sanity were the things she was saying for example ‘there is the devil’ There is truth in the observations from the certificate from the medical practioner , drink can make you delusional and there may have been mental health issues . She was from the city of Chester but as there was no asylum/hospital house or no room there so she was transferred to Middlesbrough.
The drink of the time was wine. Women were not allowed in pubs unless helping husband most incarcerated women would be from poverty and not part of a familial or neighbouring network. At this time female drunkenness was still seen a immoral and not a disease to be treated. there was little to be found about females going to prison I found they went to workhouses and asylums. What happened to the women I write about in this blog is unknown but during this time medical interventions such as cold water dunking, lobotomy, electric shock and drugs were an integral part.
Laura Pollard a 45years old female from York, wife of a cobbler and church of England religion. Over a 5 week duration she was seen potentially drinking and having fits potentially epileptic. She was not suicidal and nobody else was afflicted by her insanity. She has a husband called Samuel Pollard. On the 28th of November 1905 she was charged . A medical practitioner said she was of unsound mind , the Doctor notably a male .
We know today that the fits may have been caused because of alcohol withdrawal.
Mary Parry a 38 year old female house wife, widow again from Chester and church of England . She was observed again by a male medical practitioner.
What I have noticed is that there were no female doctors or members of the criminal justice system. She had been drinking for four days and was saying things like she is to go to Ireland as she is too good for England , that a man came through her bedroom window and broke all her plates which she did herself. A male witness told the doctor she said she was the Queen of England and that her husband had been poisoned. She was committed to the lunatic asylum on 15th August 1903 age 37 and moved to another in 1904.
It seems Mary died within the year of consumption and a notice sent to her brother Joseph stating a visit from him was urgent as she was very ill.
We know there was a lot of infectious diseases
Margaret Chalton from Union street Middlesbrough, a 64 year old widow was housewife admitted to the Middlesbrough Lunatic Asylum on 1st of October 1903 as a person of unsound mind. She had suicidal tendencies especially after drinking opium and had been doing this for the last 3 months.
Opium is a purer form of heroin and although illegal people would turn a blind eye unless it affected others. There was a pub on every corner and was the main social outlet for the community. She drinks alcohol as well, holds a knife to her throat and threatens to kill herself. There is an old scar from before where she tried to cut her throat. She is unemployed and won’t work and cant sleep at night. Her first ‘attack’ was when she was 58 years old when she drank her first beer in 1897 and admitted to York asylum the transferred and eventually, discharged from Cleveland Asylum 4 years later and that this recent attack was her second. Her next of kin was her daughter Jane from Feltham street Middlesbrough.
Sounds like the women is suffering from grief. From the 1950s an Opioid similar to Opium is used in our commissioned local drug services today but its called methadone, this is drinkable too and helps the opiod dependent patient withdraw and reduces cravings.
Newspaper article
Annie Proctor from Middlesbrough was seen as a” Hopeless Case “
Crime Coolum in the Stockton, Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser 16th March 1907
Exhibit below.
Sounds like the women is suffering from grief.
General observation, if a women had a child or children and there was no one to look after him or her , maybe she was a single parent then if not already in a workhouse aka Death House, her child would be sent there to work and be educated by often cruel teachers . Women were kept separate from men and they slept on wooden beds in dormitories.
Taboo subjects, not talked about, did you know it was illegal to show a women in an advert drinking in the USA until the 50s. why because it was seen as immoral behaviour. Women who drank were kept hidden , we were described as overly emotional and prescribed sedatives and people recoiled at the thought of a drunk women and Betty Fords admission in the media was seen as shameful.
Historical Stigma persists today too and abusing substances is still frowned upon. Denial by families and amongst the professional communities. In some cultures, they tell you their women do not drink but they find other acceptable ways to consume mind altering substances whilst their addictions remain invisible.
Language used lunatic, hopeless case, research was mostly based on men’s experiences not women, in the 1930s AA formed but women often attended to make tea and coffee but not invited to raise issues unique to women. Read about the; Jellinek Curve.
The women’s movement 1970s Women’s addictions were recognised for the first time the foundations were laid.
If society acknowledged women’s addictions, they would have to acknowledge causes such as domestic violence, oppression, sexual abuse and discrimination, incest, rape and violence. Women used to numb their pain and so pressure was put on alcohol with decades of services tailoring to women’s needs .
Addiction is a complex social and health problem affecting millions of women and girls, many experiment, many die from alcohol related causes . Addiction affects women in other ways such as shopping, gambling, food but non get the attention like alcohol and other drugs. Today there are many reasons why women still do not reach out for help. Her is still stigma but we are seeing significant changes, and we realise that women’s treatment must be trauma informed and trauma responsive encompassing all aspects of her life. We are seen as bad mothers, unfeminine, the shame and stigma threatening to the family unit. We know now that ACES and how a women scores makes her more at risk for addictive behaviour and we know women experience more adverse physical effects then men , report drugs and alcohol affects women’s and men’s brains differently as well as the psychological effects of shame and guilt, fear and despair and know that if they fail to recover or manage their behaviour they may lose there children and many barriers to treatment, family culture, economic factors , if they are pregnant , have childcare issues, caring for elderly parents, menopause
Resources The demon Drink in Mid Victorian Middlesbrough by Norman Moorsom
“I looked upon the man, and then upon the child” taken from the 1978 cover illustration The British Workman of 1878 Published by the Middlesbrough Temperance Society 2020
Women tend to be much more supportive of other women in same gender groups than mixed and preferred it whereas men preferred mixed. We challenge one another pretences, we don’t compete for male attention. Betty ford conducted research and found that the women treated in a same sex programme where significantly more likely to be sober after 1 year.
Helping Women Recover
Stephanine Covington Recovering Alcoholic and Professor in Addiction
Published by Hazeldon