By Lesley Hulonce ‘All we ever get is gruel’, sang the workhouse lads in the 1968 film Oliver! But were workhouse boys like Oliver Twist really forced to bravely step forward and beg for more food? Certainly, in some poor law unions in Britain poor diets generated widely reported scandals. At Andover workhouse the diet was found to be extremely meagre in quantity, resulting partly from the ‘dishonesty’ of the workhouse master. In consequence, inmates who were employed in bone crushing ‘ate the gristle … Continue reading Workhouse Diets: Paucity or Plenty? [Part I]
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