A cautionary tale told to children, the poorhouse in myth was as bad in life. Nineteenth century poorhouses were all too real and their repression all too common. Dotting the American landscape, poorhouses were run by counties or townships. In Rhode Island, as in most of New England, strong, deep-rooted townships, and lack of will to collectively share cost burdens, yielded many poorhouses run by towns.

The town of Portsmouth, situated at the northern end of the Island of Aquidneck (once called Rhode Island), was settled in 1638 by Anne and William Hutchinson and William Coddington, refugees from religious suppression in Boston. The town thrived and became widely settled. Support for the poor typically took the form of auctioning off the poor to the lowest bidder, or outdoor relief, where funds were provided by the town to allow the poor to remain in their residences or paid friends or relatives to care for them. The funding for relief was through a separate poor tax, and good-will had a high water mark.

Origins of the Asylum
The early nineteenth century brought sweeping changes to New England. Industrialization placed skilled, well-paid, artisons in direct competition with masses of low-paid, semi-skilled, factory laborers. Improved transportation brought mass-produced goods from coal-choked cities to the smallest of towns. Apprenticeship, an economic staple of New England life, became less important, being either shortened or eliminated.¹ The scourge of industrialization extended from cities to towns, as mechanical threshers eliminated winter work for many a farmworker.¹ Long-settled areas, such as Portsmouth, exhibited subdivision of properties to children, to the extent that many were no longer self-sustainable. The work force, not able to sustain itself at home, was on the move, and with nineteenth century commuting limited primarily to walking distances, many had to resettle in other towns to find work. Extended families and the economic protection they provide were, in many cases, lost.

With poor relief rolls swelling, the poor tax rates began to rise precipitously. Resentment built between haves and have-nots and the poor were more and more viewed as a problem to be solved. The law in Rhode Island in support of welfare of the poor, at this time, was based on English law "43 Elizabeth",² where the parish was established as the administrative unit responsible for poor relief, with churchwardens or parish overseers collecting poor-rates and allocating relief. This law also directed the provision of materials such as flax, hemp and wool to provide work for the able-bodied poor and the setting to work and apprenticeship of children. This 1601 law set out responsibilities for the overseers of the poor to create taxes "to set the Poor on Work"² and also sufficient funding "for and towards the necessary Relief of the Lame, Impotent, Old, Blind, and such other among them being Poor, and not able to work".² Reacting to the mounting tax burden, and the general impression of leniency on the able poor, the Town of Portsmouth, in 1832, set forth an act ³ to create the Portsmouth Asylum to commit those who require assistance "by their evil courses"³. Those taking in a friend or relative on Outdoor Relief, now had to care for them with their own funds or give them up to the overseer of the poor for commitment to the Asylum. As with other poorhouses of that period, deterrence was a large factor. The logic was to make poor farms so uncomfortable, that no able person would want to stay. This would reduce the number of poor chargeable to the town and hence lower poor taxes. Requiring the able to work was only one of the deterrences. It was the whole concept of deterrence and the way this concept was woven into the fabric of rules, regulations, and ultimately treatment of all inmates that not only made it disagreeable and uncomfortable for the able poor, it became oppressive for all inmates and deadly for some.

Insane In Their Midst
The plight of inmates was a grim, depressing existence with oppressive rules and regulations ⁴ and severe punishments which treated them like criminals. But it was not only the Asylum and its management which oppressed inmates. The insane and elderly poor were mixed together in the same residence, causing many to fear for their lives. This fear was well justified, with many documented abuses by the insane on the other inmates in Portsmouth. As mentioned in Thomas Hazard's Report on the Poor and Insane in Rhode Island⁵, Caroline Albro, an elderly inmate complained:

"I have suffered much for fear of the insane, and sometimes cannot sleep, for fear of being attacked by them."⁵

"She beat her with a broom stick on the head, back, and arm, and bruised her arm badly and hurt the bone - so that she could never after that, dress or undress herself."⁵

". . . a raving maniac, and not only chained at the Portsmouth Asylum, but absolutely baled, as it were, in sack-cloth. I remember, whilst he lay in this situation, putting an apple beside him, which he eat after the manner of a brute, by gnawing it as well as he could as it rolled about on the floor."⁵

"For some years great efforts have occasionally been made by the more humane portion of the people of the town of Portsmouth, to relieve their insane poor, but without effect. They have not only been uniformly out voted in their town meetings, but it has been too evident that their exertions in behalf of the poor maniacs have only tended to rivit more firmly their chains. However divided on other subjects, all parties seem there to unite under the banner of oppression. It was on one of these occasions, when the question of relieving the insane poor was under discussion, that I heard a former Commissioner of the poor, in a town meeting in Portsmouth, declare in a loud and boasting voice, that he had himself once severely flogged an insane person at their Asylum; and to all appearances, the shamless avowal of his brutish exploit, excited the approbation rather than the disgust of the majority of the assembly."⁵

"You will observe that in one short section of the laws passed by the town of Portsmouth for the government of their Asylum for the poor, there are thirteen offences enumerated, for the commission of any one of which, it is made the imperative duty of the commissioner to sentence the criminal to solitary confinement in a dungeon, there to be kept on bread and water during his pleasure. So completely are all the safeguards that have been reared for the protection of the rights and liberties of American citizens, annulled in this unmitigated despotism, that the keeper of the Asylum frequently becomes in his own person, accuser, witness, and executioner of the law."⁵

"I fear that there are instances where keepers are allowed to understand that the more labor they can get performed by the poor, the better satisfaction they will give their employers. It seems no more than just that such of the poor as are able to work, should be employed in labor according to their ability; but if inconsiderate young men are placed over them and encouraged to over work the poor, great oppression may be caused by it. When the spirit is broken, as in the case of most of the elderly inmates of poor houses, labor is hard to perform, and it is unreasonable to require as much service of such, as of laborers of the same apparent physical ability, who work for hire."⁵

"That corporal punishment, and all imprisonment or confinement in dark rooms, or in dungeons, be totally prohibited at Asylums for the poor, in Rhode-Island, by Statute law."⁵

"That the use of chains in Asylums for the poor, or bonds intended to confine the limbs, be positively prohibited; excepting in instances where they may be absolutely necessary to effect the removal of an insane person to a curative Hospital, or to transfer a pauper, charged with the commission of a crime, to the officers of the state."⁵

"That after the passage of this act, all persons who may become insane and chargeable to the public shall be placed at the Butler Hospital, provided they may be received there at a rate not exceeding that which is now charged that institution for the maintenance and treatment of Insane paupers."⁵

The Fall of the Asylum
Toward the end of the nineteenth century, poorhouses, in general had suffered a big decline. As groups were identified and moved off to specialized institutions, poorhouse roles waned. Blind and Deaf inmates were sent to special schools, the Insane were sent to special hospitals such as Butler, children were sent to orphanages, and the poor to flophouses. The Portsmouth Asylum fared no better, closing its doors by the turn of the century and being sold to the public in 1929.

Copyright © 2002, William Saslow

[1] Michael B. Katz, In the Shadow of the Poorhouse, a Social History of Welfare in America, BasicBooks, Tenth Anniversary Edition, 1996.
[2] An Acte for Reliefe of the Poore, 43 Elizabeth, I. Cap. II, 1601.
[3] An Act Relating to the Overseer of the Poor and to the Asylum in the Town of Portsmouth: June 21 1832, the Portmouth Asylum Book of Registry, 1849-1882 from the Rhode Island Historical Society.
[4] John T. Pierce Sr., Historical Tracts of the Town of Portsmouth, Rhode Island, 1991: Portsmouth, Rhode Island, Hamilton Printing Company.
[5] Thomas R. Hazard, Report on The Poor and Insane in Rhode Island; Made to the General Assembly at its January Session, 1851, Providence: Joseph Knowles, State Printer, 1851.
[6] The Portmouth Asylum Book of Registry, 1849-1882 from the Rhode Island Historical Society.