The sins of the fathers’

None at all, then three come along at once. In the space of a few years, three novels based around babies left at The Foundling Hospital in Coram’s Fields. All very different, but each one, centred around an infant left at the hospital. The Foundling by Stacey Halls tells the story from the perspective of the mother and another women, each holding a secret that involves the child. That Bonesetter Woman by Frances Quinn takes the story and gives the greater part to the aunt. A young woman is seduced by a much richer man, who rejects her. So the two sisters go to live with an aunt in London and the child is taken to The Foundling Hospital.

But Lily is a different story all together. An abandoned baby is found at the gates of Victoria Park by a young policemen, who in spite of the weather carries her to The Hospital, she is fostered out to a farm in Suffolk for six years, and returned, by law to The Hospital to be trained to a better life. In this novel, by Rose Tremain, the story is that of the child. A novel full of love and hope as well as bitter despair, brutality, cruelty and vengeance.

The circumstances of illegitimacy were pitiless. For a society lady there were exigencies that could be managed; for the middle classes avenues of secrecy could be made available, the pregnancy concealed and dealt with. For the indigent poor there was little anyone could do. Thomas Coram thought that there was something to be said for offering all these mothers a way out of their difficulty. Babies could be brought to the hospital, sometimes with a token so that should the situation be changed after six years, they could be reclaimed. The babies were then farmed out for a sum to foster-parents, but they had to return them after six years, at which point they were trained for work.

The Foundling Hospital still exists, but as a museum and it is a poignant place to visit. Many of the tokens are still there and can be viewed, tokens that represent the hope of a change of circumstance which clearly never came.

Rose Tremain has a perfected historical sensibility, it breathes life into her work, so that the textures and smells, even the taste of food, sour yellow apples or marmalade pudding, inject an authenticity into the narrative that is hard to shake off, even after you have put the book down.

An unusual occupation for a woman

A phrase that starts “that woman” is frequently a negative follow through. It can apply to a politician, a musician, a chef or, in this case a bonesetter.

Set in Georgian England, and based on two real-life characters, Frances Quinn has chosen the strange life of a large, ungainly girl, Endurance Proudfoot. Durie’s sister, Lucinda is pretty, blond, winsome and delicate (also slightly air-headed to be honest) while Durie is clumsy, large, ugly and determined.

She is determined to take up her father’s profession, she is strong enough and after witnessing his resetting of a dislocated shoulder, she is convinced that this is the profession that she was made for. Reluctant at first, her father is impressed by her skill, but the place is not for a woman, the skill passes from father to son; there is a son so Durie is likely to be passed over.

Just as she thinks she has a foot in the door, Lucinda goes and spoils it all.

That Bonesetter Woman describes precisely the difficulties that women had in any profession, but especially one in which men had undue influence. Durie finds her way through this maze with dignity and courage, but it turns to ashes in her mouth. The lives of women at that time amounted to little more than chattel, from father to husband, they were bound hand and foot, whatever they had passed to a husband, and that was the law.

Georgiana

Described as “The new Hilary Mantel”, Stacey Halls‘ new novel is a melodrama set in 1794 around Thomas Coram’s Foundling Hospital in London.

It is not widely understood now, that the hospital was set up for unfortunate women who could not for various reasons support their own children. This was, obviously, more often a case of illegitimacy, but sometimes simply a case of poverty; the token and descriptions which accompanied each child, which can still be seen at the Foundling Hospital (now a museum) were there in case a mother was ever able to reclaim her child. In many cases, even though they were not realised, this was the intention.

The Foundling is based on just such a circumstance. Bess Bright fully intends to save up enough money to reclaim her child as soon as she is in a position to do so; the fact that she intends to do this as soon as the girl has reached an age, six years in this case, when she can be usefully earning money is rather glossed over.

However, when Bess has scraped up the fee (payment in retrospect for the cost of keeping the child) she returns to the hospital where she is faced with a problem, seemingly inexplicable and insurmountable.

The book jacket promises much. This is an enjoyable read, but Hilary Mantel it is not. An historical novel is not just a story sprinkled with historical facts, a skimming of the top of the milk. The Foundling has plenty of apposite references: Handel’s Messiah, silk weavers in Spitalfield, the printed cotton dresses, laudanum, carriages, coffee houses and street calls and it has a story upon which to hang these details, but they are superficial, we do not get the grime under the fingernails, the feel of the pavement slick with filth, the endless stink of London; we do not get the sense of being there in the street or in the room with these characters.

This is not to say I didn’t enjoy this book, but it is, sadly, the sort of historical novel that gives the genre a bad reputation. It is a rattlingly good yarn, but Georgian England it is not.