Thomas Holmes
Pictures and Problems from London Police Courts
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4064066215125
Table of Contents
PICTURES AND PROBLEMS FROM LONDON POLICE COURTS
CHAPTER I HOW I BECAME A POLICE COURT MISSIONARY
CHAPTER II IN LAMBETH POLICE COURT
CHAPTER III A CHANGE FOR THE BETTER
‘ A Scene in a Police Court—A Painful Case. ’
CHAPTER V PARENTS AND CHILDREN
CHAPTER VI RECORD-BREAKERS: JANE CAKEBREAD
CHAPTER VII RECORD-BREAKERS: KATE HENESSEY
CHAPTER VIII AMONG DIPSOMANIACS
CHAPTER XI THE ARCADIANS AND SOME ACCOUNT OF THE ‘GUBBINS’
CHAPTER XII HOW THE POOR LIVE—AND DIE
CHAPTER XIII THE PROBLEM OF HOME WORKERS
PREFACE
In the various chapters that make up this volume I have made no attempt to deal with the whole of the humanity that finds its way into London Police Courts: I have but selected a few individuals who strikingly illustrate human or social problems. Each of those individuals was well known to me, and many of them have cost me anxious thought and prolonged care. It is in the sincere hope that the knowledge I have slowly gained of these individuals, of their characteristics and environments, may lead more influential persons to inquiry and study that I have written of them.
I am also exceedingly glad to have an opportunity of expressing publicly the debt of gratitude I owe to many; for surely no one has received greater kindness than myself. First, to the various magistrates under whom I have been privileged to work I tender my sincere and warmest thanks for the consideration and kindness which they, without exception, have shown to me. To the chief clerks and police-court officials also my thanks are due for their unvarying courtesy and kindness. To the police generally I owe many thanks for the confidence they have so liberally accorded me.
To the representatives of the Press in the North London Police Court I owe much for the publicity they have freely given to the many cases in which I have been interested, and with which I should have been unable to deal without their aid.
To the unknown friends at home and abroad who have cheered me with kind letters, and sometimes with liberal assistance, I tender also my grateful thanks. But to one lady—Mrs. Perry Herrick—more than thanks are due. Without her kind help much that I have done I could not have done, and much that I have learned I could not have learned. For a long period of years she has supported me in my work, and in her the poor and the unfortunate, the demented and the outcast, have had a sympathizing and liberal friend.
To Mrs. Perry Herrick, then, I beg respectfully to dedicate this imperfect account of my work among the poor and the outcasts of London.
Thomas Holmes.
12, Bedford Road,
Tottenham.
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION
It would ill become me to allow a new edition of this book to go forth without expressing my grateful thanks to the public for the kind manner in which the book has been received.
Public and Press seem to have vied with each other in showing kindness to me and gentleness to the book, while to its faults they have been more than a little blind. If I judge rightly, this is not because the book has of itself any excellence, but because of the particular work in which I am engaged—a work that appeals to the oneness of the human heart. I have received many letters filled through and through with sympathy; and while I rejoice to know that the book has been of interest, I rejoice still more to know and feel that it has in some degree helped to draw the human family nearer together. This was my hope and my aim; that it may still continue to do so is my heartfelt desire.
I have been compelled to add a new chapter, for so many have written to me on the subject with which the chapter deals that no choice was left to me. By the kindness of the Council of the London Police Court Mission of the Church of England Temperance Society I am henceforward to devote a portion of my time to special work among the poorest of all London’s toilers—the home workers. For them I have hopes and aims. If I can bring some rest and joy into their lives, if in some small degree I can forward the day when a much better state of things shall prevail, then indeed my joy will be great.
Thomas Holmes.
12, Bedford Road, Tottenham,
March, 1902.
PICTURES AND PROBLEMS FROM LONDON POLICE COURTS
CHAPTER I
HOW I BECAME A POLICE COURT MISSIONARY
‘You have missed your vocation in life; you ought to have been an actor, or a writer for the Daily Telegraph,’ so I was assured by an eminent professor of phrenology. The professor had expressed a wish to meet all the London police court missionaries, with a view of ascertaining their fitness or unfitness