STROOD (NORTH AYLESFORD) POOR LAW UNION OR BOARD OF GUARDIANS RECORDS

G/ST

1833-1937

fonds

The Poor Law Unions were established under the Poor Law Reform Act of 1834, to replace the administration of the ancient Poor Law system which had been undertaken by individual parishes. Under the new act, groups, or Unions, of parishes were created to increase cooperation in administering poor relief over a wider area, to create centralised Union workhouses and to remedy the uneven financial burdens which had fallen on parishes. The Poor Law Unions were abolished in 1930 and their work placed in the hands of district Guardians' Committees, whose records for Kent are held at the Kent History and Library Centre, Maidstone.

The records reflect the Poor Law Union Boards of Guardians' wide variety of tasks, including the care of "lunatics", children's education, the arranging of apprenticeships, vaccination, Public Health, the rating of inhabitants for the Poor Rate, accommodation of paupers in the workhouse and provision of out-relief including relief in kind and dole money.

Numerous record series in the collection are microfilmed.

For records of poor relief in the relevant parishes prior to 1835, and to a certain extent also between 1835 and 1920, during which period limited Poor Law tasks including rating were devolved to parish officers, reference should be made to the parish records.