Labouring Children: British Immigrant Apprentices to Canada, 1869-1924
https://archives.anglican.ca/link/article39038
- Author
- Parr, Joy, 1949-
- Reviewer
- Adams, Bradley
- Material Type
- Book review
- Journal
- Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society
- Date
- 1983 April
- Author
- Parr, Joy, 1949-
- Reviewer
- Adams, Bradley
- Material Type
- Book review
- Date
- 1983 April
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 1
- Page
- 37-
- Notes
- Joint review of two titles: 'Labouring Children' by Joy Parr and 'The Little Immigrants' by Keith Bagnell. "Between 1868 and 1925 eighty thousand waifs from the slums of England were sent across the ocean to serve as labourers and servants in rural Canada. It was a curious episode in the history of emigration to Canada, and even then the debate swirled around the fate of the children. Historians of religion may find the study of child emigration especially interesting because it dramatizes the relationship of religious ideas and motivation to reality. In both books under review, the motives, myths and expectations of the child emigrant promoters are contrasted with the sad and often painful reality of the children's experiences in Canada. These are of course very different books. 'The Little Immigrants' is a fine piece of popular history, and Bagnell spins a good story. Serious scholars and students will want to turn to Joy Parr's excellent monograph, 'Labouring Children'. Parr ably demonstrates how the child emigration movement was grounded in the rhetoric and concerns of a particular strand of Victorian protestantism" (p. 37). "But then we turn to the reality of child emigration, and this is the substance of 'Labouring Children'. At almost every step, the actual experience of the children departed from the imaginary blueprint of the promoters. .... This awesome gap between the ideal and the reality of child emigration is really the focal point of 'Labouring Children'. In a far more impressionistic and chatty way, it is Bagnell's message as well" (p. 38). "We can only admire the sensitivity and shrewdness of research and judgment in 'Labouring Children'. But many of her conclusions beg more detailed comparisons to the wider society of late nineteenth century rural Canada" (p. 39). "As a case study of the relation of protestant reform and social action to the experiences and culture of ordinary folk, 'Labouring Children' is a skilful and challenging piece of historical writing. It deserves a wide audience" (p. 40).
- Subjects
- Indentured servants - Canada - History - Book reviews
- Child labor - Canada - History - Book reviews
- Canada - Emigration and immigration - History - Book reviews
- Location
- General Synod Archives