Page 136 - The Secret Museum

THE NIGHT THE FOUNDLING HOSPITAL opened its doors for the first time, on

Wednesday, 25 March 1741 at eight o’clock, all the lamps and candles in the
temporary building in Hatton Garden were blown out. The Foundling Hospital
wanted the mothers who were unable to care for their babies to be able to slip
unnoticed through the doors and deposit their tiny, warm bundles in secret.

By midnight the hospital was full. Many mothers were turned away. The
Foundling Hospital committee minutes describe how ‘on this Occasion the
Expressions of Grief of the Women whose Children could Not be admitted were
Scarcely more observable than those of some of the Women who parted with their

Children, so that a more moving Scene can’t well be imagined.’ The Foundling
Hospital had adopted 30 tiny foundlings; 18 baby boys and 12 tiny girls, all sleeping,
feeding and squawking.

Two of the original foundlings died before they could be baptized. This was quite
usual in London at a time when half of all babies born died in infancy. The first two
foundlings who made it to baptism were named Thomas Coram and Eunice Coram,
after the founder of the Foundling Hospital and his wife.

The Corams met in the American colonies. Thomas Coram cared for ex-soldiers
and campaigned both for the rights of the Mohawk people and the rights of the

daughters of colonists. When he returned to England he went to the City of London for
business and saw children ‘exposed, sometimes alive, sometimes dead, and
sometimes dying’ in the street. In the early eighteenth century, around a thousand
babies a year were abandoned in the city and, sometimes, if a baby couldn’t be taken
care of, it would be quietly killed. Coram decided to do something about this. It took
him 17 years to gather the support he needed to open the Foundling Hospital. Still
running today, it is the oldest children’s charity in England.

The Foundling Hospital was an instant success. Coram moved his foundlings out

of Hatton Garden into a big building in Bloomsbury surrounded by rich pasture, full
of green trees and fresh air.

The rich and well to do flocked to support the hospital, and artists, musicians and
composers of the time lent a creative hand. Handel gave his first performance of the
Messiah to a packed crowd in the Foundling Chapel, on an organ he had donated to
it. It was such a hit he gave another performance two weeks later, and every year
until he was too frail to conduct. Even then, he came and watched from a pew.

Hogarth donated paintings and encouraged other artists to do the same. The first
indoor public exhibition was held at the Foundling Hospital, and it became clear that
there was a public demand for art galleries. This led directly to the opening of the

Royal Academy of Arts. Charity balls, charity concerts, charity albums, charity art
shows – all these have their origins in the Foundling Hospital built by Thomas
Coram.

Charles Dickens lived in Doughty Street, very near by. He was a fan, renting a