a history
“The Church Quarterly Review”: … (contributions) … There is an admirable article by Mrs. Pinsent on “The Social Results of Mental Defect”.
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
Permanent Care of Feeble-Minded Girls: Miss Agatha Stacey’s Work: New Home at the Lickey: In 1892, Miss Agatha Stacey, a well-known Birmingham philanthropic lady, was one of the first of the pioneers who labored for the establishment of homes for the permanent care of feeble-minded young women. She initiated the movement which led to the establishment of a home at Arrowfield Top, Alvechurch, and here for nearly twenty years a charitable and beneficent work has been carried on. … (continues) … (rebuilt) … The opening ceremony was performed on Wednesday by Lady Scott-Moncrieff, the wife of Sir Colin Scott-Moncrieff. It took place in the workroom of the institution around the walls of which were hung numbers of beautiful rigs and other articles, the work of the young people for whom the home is provided. Mrs. John Gibbins presided, and those present included … long list including … Mrs. Pinsent … Mrs. Hume Pinsent also spoke. She regarded Mr. Wilson’s difficulties as paper and politician’s difficulties and said after they had had the feebleminded children in their schools, for seven years they knew those who needed to be taken care of for life. She pointed out that the families among the feeble-minded averaged seven, compared with three among ordinary, careful, healthy, and capable persons, and the nation which first realized what that meant and took steps to prevent the increase of that class in society would be the first among the strong and governing nations of the future. (Applause.) … continues …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
The First Married Woman on a Municipal Council: It is interesting to note (says the “Anti-Suffrage Review” that Mrs. Hume Pinsent who got in at Birmingham, is the first married woman to be elected to serve on a municipal council. This is owing to the decision in October 1909, of Mr. Brookes, the revising barrister for Birmingham, which enabled the overseers to place duly qualified married women on the burgess roll without further question, in virtue of the Qualifications of Women Act of 1907. Mr. Brookes held that, as none, but electors are eligible to county and town councils the enabling Act must have been intended to remove the electoral disability of married women. All revising barristers do not, however, take this view.
[see similar Nuneaton Observer; Friday 5th January 1912]
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
Municipal Notes: City Council Committees; The Committees of the City Council are as follows, the first name being the chairman, and the asterisk indicated the reappointment of the chairman of the old committee: … (list includes) … Special Schools Sub. – Councillor Mrs. Pinsent …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
The Feeble-Minded: Scheme for their care and control: Association formed for five South Western counties. … … … Colonel Clayton (Bath) proposed a resolution approving the formation of an Association the Western Counties for the permanent care and welfare of the feeble-minded. The Bishop of Exeter seconded, and the resolution was supported by Mrs. Hume Pinsent (member of the Royal Commission on the Care of the Feeble Minded). In an able address she pointed out the failure of the provisions under the Epileptic and Idiots Act which only took cognisance of the feeble minded children until they were 16 years of age, when they were left to their own resources. She quoted statistics showing what had happened in the case of over 250 children in Liverpool, who had been trained in special institutions until they were sixteen and then set free. There was only a very small percentage of those who had developed into wage-earners or partial wage-earners, whilst the very large majority relapsed into insanity or drifted into crime, and many of the females paid frequent return visits to the maternity wards. She gave illustrations by means of charts of the results of heredity in the case of feeble-minded or mentally defective persons, and pleaded strongly, on national and economic grounds, for preventive measures pending legislation in the direction of compulsory institutional treatment and detention permanently if necessary, so that these people should not be sent adrift into society the most critical and dangerous periods of their lives. … …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
Birmingham Education Committee: The Control of the Uffculme Open-Air School: A meeting of the Birmingham Education Committee was held this afternoon in the Council Chamber, Alderman Sir G. H. Kenrick presiding. The standing orders were suspended to enable the report of the Selection Sub-committee to be presented … (continues) … A discussion also took place on the recommendation of the Select Sub-committee that the control and management of the Open-Air school at Uffculme should be transferred from the Elementary Education Subcommittee to the Special Schools Sub-committee. … … Mrs. Pinsent pointed out that there were nearly 300 children under the Special Schools Committee, who were not mentally defective, and in not a single case had a parent objected to sending a child to these schools on account of the Special Schools Committee. Mrs. Pinsent did not anticipate that there would be one objection to sending a child to Uffculme on that score. The prejudice against Special Schools was greatly exaggerated.
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
The Problem of the Feeble Minded: A New Scheme Adopted: Farm Colony to be Established: … (long discussion) … Mrs. Hume Pinsent of Birmingham (member of the late Royal Commission on the Care of the Feeble Minded) supported in a striking address in which she gave some remarkable figures showing the failure of the provisions for dealing with Feeble minded … (continues) …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
Expenses of Candidates: In addition to the list published yesterday, the following returns of expenses of candidates at the Greater Birmingham Council elections have been made: … (includes) … Edgbaston: – Councillor Mrs. Hume Pinsent, £65 3s 3d. … …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
The Problem of the Feeble-Minded: The heightened interest which is everywhere being taken in social problems was shown by yesterday’s influential meeting at Exeter to discuss so apparently “dry” and uninviting a topic as the care and control of the feeble-minded. A movement is on foot, as our readers are aware, to group the five southwestern Counties – Devon, Cornwall, Dorset, Somerset and Wilts – into one area and to form an Association which would take in hand systematically the care and control of this unfortunate class of the population … Mrs. Hume Pinsent, who was a member of the Royal Commission on the Feeble-Minded, and who, at Bristol and other meetings, has shown herself an “expert” on the whole problem, explained how lamentably defective the present provisions of the law are with regard to the too-numerous souls who, while they are not certified lunatics, yet are sadly below the normal in mind. … (discussion continues) …
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949
Women’s Conference on the Insurance Bill: Sir – With reference to the announcement of the above in your columns on Saturday. I beg to inform you that Mrs. Hume Pinsent has reconsidered her decision to take the chair, as she thinks that her doing so at our request might mislead the public as to her attitude upon the controversial question of woman suffrage. I should, however, like to make it clear that the committee approached Mrs. Hume Pinsent in the first place because her publics position and abilities clearly indicated her as best fitted to preside, and in the second place because we knew that she had always consistently refused to take either side upon the suffrage question, and had absolutely declined repeated invitations from both parties to join their ranks. In justice to my committee, I finally add that we are simply taking the initiative in summoning the conference, and we naturally wished secure a chairman before the preliminary announcement of the meeting, but the arrangements, the resolutions to be submitted to the meeting, and the whole of the details are to be left to the committee which will be formed by each society taking part in the conference nominating a delegate for that purpose. Had our circular to the various other societies which have the interests of women at heart been published in full no possible misunderstanding on this point could have arisen. Maria Lakin-Smith, Chairman. The National League for Opposing Women’s Suffrage (Birmingham and District Branch), 109, Colmore, Row, Birmingham, Nov. 27.
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GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949