Workhouse Runs - Uckfield Almshouses and poor house

I am part of a group from work raising money for Shelter so I am running to places near Uckfield with historical associations with homelessness. Going back to medieval  times, churches and monasteries were responsible for supporting the poor. After the dissolution of the monasteries, individual parishes such as Buxted (which included Uckfield) and Framfield were responsible for people who could not support themselves.. 

Uckfield - Alm houses (now gone) and the Old Workhouse

Today I ran down the High Street from Browns Lane, passing the spot where Uckfield's alms houses once stood.  The first edition of Hindsight (1995) describes the alms houses. as "two groups of cottages on the East side of the London Road" and has a map showing where they once stood.   The smaller group was to the immediate south of Browns Lane and the other was a little to the south of  the bus stop now stands. This area is now thick with trees and, last week, a fox slipped into the undergrowth as I ran by.

According to the 1831 census. the small group was occupied by 15 people  and the larger by 34.  It seems incredible that so many people were crammed into two rather small buildings.

Uckfield - Old Workhouse (Poor House)

From the 1700s “paupers” deemed able to work were sent to workhouses. In 2021, the old workhouse, now known as Bell Farm, looks idyllic nestled behind a typical Sussex hedge. However, in 1831 35 poor people and the Beadle were living in what was then called the Poor House. The building is from the 17th Century.

Edward Summer's Hindsight article explains that the almshouses and old workhouse were disposed of by Samual Perigoe, the "Overseer of Parish Property and Churchwarden ... to assist in the financing of the Uckfield Union Workhouse."  "The larger group of almshouses were sold in 1839 for £355.

Sadly poverty and homelessness have not been left in the past, which is why I am running to raise money for Shelter.

Donate to Wendy's runs raising money in aid of Shelter

References

Edwards N, Summer 1995, The Uckfield Almshouses, Hindsight, Uckfield and District Preservation Society.

Higginbothem, P, http://www.workhouses.org.uk/Uckfield/

Transcribed by PBN publications (1988) 1831 census, Uckfield, Sussex.