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Providing district nurses for rural areas was in its infancy when the
Sandbeck Nursing Association (SNA) was founded in 1902 by the
Countess of Scarbrough. Intended for the ‘poorer classes’, the
SNA appointed hospital-trained nurses to help recovery in
people’s homes, especially nursing bread-winners back to health
to prevent the home from being broken up, and assisting with
childbirth. Some 12 villages were included in the SNA reaching
from Loversall to Letwell, with Tickhill one of the largest of
the communities served. By July 1903 Nurse Wasteneys was at
work in Tickhill and a few weeks later Nurse Mangham took up her
appointment in Maltby. In all, four permanent nurses were
appointed (two based in Tickhill, one in Wadworth and one in
Maltby).
The scheme was funded by annual subscriptions according to the wealth of
the contributor. The breakdown of subscription payments throws
light on the social divisions at the time.
Class 1 Labourers earning less than £1 a week 2/-
(10p)
Class 2 Artisans, gentlemen’s servants 3/-
(15p)
Class 3 Farmers and Trades people 5/-
(25p)
Class 4 Gentry
10/- (50p)
Various fund raising efforts also contributed to the scheme such as a
Garden Fete held at Wadworth Hall, home of the Rev J C Ross and
family, on 3 September
1903. The Countess’s opening remarks were followed by two
performances of a ‘Pastoral Play’, two indoor concerts, then
dancing on the lawn during the evening. Just over £18 was raised
for the fund. The event was reported in The British Journal
of Nursing Sept 12, 1903, page 209:
‘The Countess of Scarbrough last week gave a garden party in the grounds
of Wadworth Hall on behalf of the Sandbeck Nursing Association.
In opening the proceedings the Countess said that the Sandbeck
Nursing Association was begun a year ago, and, considering the
difficulties which always occurred when something new was
started in a country district, they might well be satisfied with
what had been accomplished. They had decided to have nurses of
their own trained, and having selected three suitable candidates
they sent them up for training, and two of them had completed
their course and were now nursing. She thanked the Hon. Sec. Mrs
White, and hoped the Committee would not be discouraged if the
scheme was not taken up keenly at first.’
The Journal then adds ‘The training given to the candidates
selected must have been a remarkably short one if, as was
stated, the Association was only started a year ago and two of
the candidates have already finished their training and are at
work!’ The standard period of training for a hospital nurse at
that time was two years, hence the Journal’s rather critical
tone, but the nurses’ training was not unduly brief for work in
rural areas. Village nurses needed only one year’s training for
hospital work, 3 months for midwifery and 3-6 months for
district work, as determined by the Queen Victoria Jubilee
Institute for Nurses founded in 1887.
The SNA nurses were each provided
with a chair-bed and a hamper containing among other things a
bed-rest, spirit lamp and a thermometer. Subscribers had to pay
for the conveyance of the nurse if all these accoutrements were
needed, otherwise the nurses would travel round their district
on bicycle. Between 1903 and 1910 the number of times per year
the nurse was employed in Tickhill ranged from seven times to
thirty times.
The type of ailments suffered by patients attended by the nurses across
the SNA was listed in one
annual report and included typhoid, scarlet fever, consumption,
rupture, broken arm, paralysis and acute indigestion.
A subscription list has survived for Tickhill from 1904 in the Lumley
Archive showing that, in fact, less well off people did not join
the scheme in any great numbers. The 1904 Tickhill subscribers
were: Class 1: 3, Class 2: 3, Class 3: 4, Class 4: 6. In its
eight years’ existence the scheme only attracted, at the most,
51 subscribers in Tickhill. Expense might have been one
reason for the modest number of subscribers. Apart from the
subscription, a weekly fee was payable when the nurse was in
attendance ranging from 3/- (15p) for Class 1 to 15/- (75p) for
Class 4 scheme members. The fee was doubled for ‘infectious
disorders’ and illnesses lasting more than six weeks.
It was resolved to wind up the SNA at the end of 1910. The number of subscribers was falling, fewer
donations were made and the scheme was less necessary after
district nurses were ‘best suited to meet the needs of the
neighbourhood’, according to the 1910 annual report of the
Association. Fortunately for Tickhill there were perhaps fewer
causes of ill health, ranging from contaminated water supplies
to pollution, than in some areas. The Medical Officer of Health,
employed by Tickhill Urban District Council, in one of his
quarterly reports to the Council at the end of the 19th
Century noted that there were far more people in Tickhill
surviving beyond age 65 than in other districts.
For copies of nursing journals see website http://rcn.archive.rcn.org.uk/
For Prof. Michael Warren’s A chronology of state medicine, public
health, welfare and related services in
Britain 1066-1999
see website
http://www.chronology.org.uk
Thanks are due to Lord Scarbrough for use of the Lumley Archive and to
Hon Archivist Mrs Alice Rodgers
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