Destitution c1900

there they are
captured in sepia shades
outside a closed front door

a young mother evicted
from a damp terraced slum
a toddler in her arms and
her three year old son
staring into a camera lens

an indelible memory of
bewildered misery accompanies
two broken kitchen chairs an oil lamp
and a sack of old rags
left in the gutter

Horace Warner the photographer
teaches the present generation
the truth of hardship and
Victorian living

the east end of London
portrays poverty of the have nots
and the small boy what future
for him should he survive
childhood disease

a fair chance he found himself
in the trenches of the Somme
where he died fighting for
king and country in a land
so very far from home

Reviews

[1809 Black Plague Decem..]

hellos, Chris Shaw, I remember you mentioning Queen Elizabeth of Britain and England. I never got to research, but I'm so motivated by your poem, the Somme Battle in Germany, stood, where front was barraqated against Germany, and it was won, love the incite, :)
----Maynard

[Chris Shaw]

Thank you Maynard for your visit. Yes, you are right, I have written about the Late Queen Elizabeth. Very much loved and missed by many but not everyone. I thought she was amazing.

Chris

[1809 Black Plague December]

Yeah, you inspired me to get a book on her,
:)

[jacob erin-cilberto]

to survive a tough childhood and then find himself fighting for a king and country that let him be so poor.
Lots of that going on here as well.
this is quite powerful in its scope, Chris.
j.

[Chris Shaw]

Many thanks Jacob. Times were really tough back then. There are degrees of poverty.

Chris

[W. Barrett Munn]

Well, that was certainly up lifting. Where do you hide the gin around here? I have my own tonic.

Winston

[Chris Shaw]

I have plenty of gin Winston. Did you know that they drank lots of gin back in those dark days because the water was so polluted? London was floating in gin at the time of Hogarth. Many thank yous for your review.

Chris

[John the Baptist]

Yes, a small boy in 1900 would have been the right age to put him on the Somme in 1916. It is ironic that Victorian London, the capital of the British Empire, would also contain some of the worst slums in the world. The East End, as I recall, was also the hunting ground of Jack the Ripper.

[Chris Shaw]

Thank you John. Yes you are right on both counts. Wealth and poverty, side by side. Nothing much changes. I appreciate your visit.

Chris

[Neville]

I am delighted to be the very first to leave a mark here our Chris .. I just want to say Horace Warner/Walker did a fine job of capturing those Spittlefields Nippers of the old East End .. and between both you & he you provide both written B&W and sepia toned testaments to the sufferings of not that long ago in real terms but a lifetime ago in others .. much respect to both you and your pen .. Neville

[Chris Shaw]

Thank you Neville for such a warm and encouraging review. Thank you especially for the correction. I will amend. You know Horace Walker was an early British Mountaineer as opposed to Horace Warner, the amazing photographer of children in Victorian times. My mistake, but I do have a thing about British Mountaineers as well:) Mallory was one of them. Pleased you looked the photographer up. His work is so fascinating. Well worth spending some time perusing.

Chris

[Neville]

Small world Chris, I have a thing about old photographs and photographers .. Neville