ochial life if
England was to be saved from its own children, who, living a
parasitical life, were eating away the vitals of that upon which they
thrived. Salvation from within the parish was now well-nigh
impossible. So the new Poor-law of 1834 swept away the parish as a
unit of Poor-law administration--the Churchwardens and Overseers were
no longer to meet after service in Church to consider applications for
relief or the apprenticing of pauper children. The new order provided
for grouping a score, more or less, of such parishes into a Union, with
some uniform system of administration which should be less dependent
upon the circumstances and prejudices of an individual parish.

The Royston Union was formed in 1835, consisting of 29 parishes in
Herts., Cambs., and Essex, as at present.

The first chairman was John Bendyshe, Esq., J.P., of Kneesworth, and
John George Fordham, Esq., was vice-chairman. Mr. Henry Thurnall was
appointed Clerk (an office he continued to hold for forty years), Mr.
Thomas Wortham, auditor, and Mr. J. E. Fordham, of Melbourn Bury,
treasurer.

{170}

For the purposes of the administration of relief, the Union was at
first divided into three districts, or divisions as they were called,
and a relieving officer for each was appointed at L80 a year salary.
This arrangement, however, only lasted a short time, and a
re-arrangement was made dividing the Union into two districts as at
present, with a Relieving Officer for each at a salary of L120 a year.

Previous to the erection of the "Central Workhouse," as it was at first
called, the Guardians held their meetings weekly at the Red Lion Inn,
on Fridays, and the first meeting held on 3rd July, 1835, lasted, we
are told, from ten o'clock in the morning to four o'clock in the
afternoon.

One of the first acts of the new Authority was to secure a suitable
site for the erection of a Workhouse upon, and having secured of Mr.
Luke his meadow in Baldock Street, plans were drawn up by Mr. William
Thomas Nash for a building to accommodate 350 inmates; the contract for
the building was obtained, and carried out by Mr. Gray, of Litlington,
and a loan of L7,700 was obtained from the Loan Commissioners.

Before the new order of things had gone far, and ere the walls of the
Workhouse were up, the paupers of the old school set up a sort of
vested interest in the old order, became dangerously discontented at
the prospect of having to work, and the ill-ad