Eastville Workhouse

The Eastville Workhouse project was launched in 2012 after some members of Bristol Radical History Group (BRHG) had studied an old ordnance survey map of Ashley Down and Eastville (1902). They noticed that the burial ground for the Barton Regis workhouse at 100 Fishponds Rd, Eastville, marked as ‘disused’ in 1902, made up part of present-day Rosemary Green just round the corner from where they lived. After two years of research, BRHG members had not only gathered significant evidence that suggested the remains of the paupers were present at the site, but from the Bristol Record Office, details of over 4,000 men, women and children from the workhouse who were buried in the unmarked graves.

A number of articles were published by BRHG about the project in the summer of 2014, especially after the Galway babies scandal in June, which demonstrated that unmarked graveyards of the ‘forgotten’ paupers including many babies were commonplace in the UK. As a result the Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group (EWMG) was set up after a successful public meeting with local residents. The aim of the group is to raise funds for a permanent memorial to those who lived and died in Eastville Workhouse. Since the launch of EWMG, a number of people studying their family history have discovered from BRHG data that their ancestors lie in the unmarked graveyard at Rosemary Green.

Rosemary Green Burial Ground Data Sheets

The data sheets that contain the names of those who died in Eastville Workhouse and buried in unmarked graves can be found listed in “Rosemary Green Burial Ground Data“.

The Book

The book 100 Fishponds Rd. Life and Death in a Victorian Workhouse uses a combination of quantitative and qualitative evidence and looks at what life in the Victorian workhouse was like, who the inmates were and how they were treated. It considers their life chances once they entered the institution and what happened to them after they passed away.

The Memorials

Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group raised £10,000 to manufacture and install two memorials to mark the burial sites of the more than 4,000 paupers who were inmates of Eastville Workhouse at 100 Fishponds Road. The first, a Welsh slate standing stone, was unveiled at the site of the workhouse burial ground at Rosemary Green, Eastville in November 2015. In 1972 the Eastville Workhouse buildings were demolished in preparation for the construction of the East Park housing estate. During this process the burial ground at Rosemary green was crudely disinterred and some of the remains were re-interred in unmarked common graves at Avonview Cemetery in nearby St George.  The second memorial, a gravestone, was installed at the site of these common graves at Avonview Cemetery in May 2019. Both memorials were manufactured and installed by local stone mason Matthew Billington.

The Plaque

In December 2016, as part of the Eastville Workhouse history project, a cast aluminium, painted plaque by local artist Mike Baker was unveiled on the surviving gates to the workhouse at 100 Fishponds Rd. The plaque shows a relief of Eastville Workhouse and Fishponds Rd in the late Victorian period and marks the location of the institution which remains a dark, but important, symbol in the history of East Bristol.

Stuff linked to this project...

Articles

Bath Workhouse Burial Ground Project

Trees will grow and a wildflower meadow bloom at Bath’s Union Workhouse Burial Ground. A place of memory and reflection is emerging thanks to the work of local residents, artists and descendants of those buried there, unmemorialised, in unmarked […] Read More =>

New pauper burial research at Greenbank cemetery

Introduction From 2014-2019 Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group (EWMG) studied Rosemary Green, a piece of land consecrated and used as a pauper burial ground soon after the new workhouse was built at 100 Fishponds Road in 1847. Eastville workhouse was […] Read More =>

The last piece of the jigsaw

Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them Introduction One evening in 2010 some members of Bristol Radical History Group (BRHG) were poring over some old maps of Eastville and discovered a forgotten burial ground at Rosemary Green, […] Read More =>

The Eastville Workhouse Memorials

Where am I? You are on the site of Eastville Workhouse, which opened its doors in 1847. In the 1930s it became an old people's home and was finally demolished in 1972. This page is about the three memorials which are part of the Eastville Workhouse […] Read More =>

100 Fishponds Road

In 2015, the Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group unveiled a memorial for the 4,084 paupers buried in a mass grave at Rosemary Green. We follow them and the Bristol Radical History Group's efforts to correct this historical wrong, and to bring light […] Read More =>

The Rosemary Green Memorial

On this site over 4000 men, women and children who died in Eastville Workhouse, known as 100 Fishponds Road, were buried in unmarked graves. A further 118 were given to the medical school. This memorial stands in regognition of all who lived and died […] Read More =>

Eastville Workhouse memorial unveiling programme

This is a copy of the programme handed out at the Eastville Workhouse burail ground memorial unveiling 16/11/2015. Download the programme here... Read More =>

Rosemary Green Burial Ground Data

The files listed on this page contain data by decade of the burials at Rosemary Green (marked "Burial Ground (Disused)" on the map below). These are people who died in Eastville Workhouse and were buried in unmarked graves at the site. The files are […] Read More =>

Victims of the Poor law

A woman before the courts in 1882 said that she preferred the gaol to Eastville workhouse as ‘in the latter she was three quarter starved and worked to death’ Before the end of the Second World War and the creation of the Welfare state and the […] Read More =>

Eastville Workhouse and the unmarked graves of paupers at Rosemary Green

Bristol Radical History group (BRHG) is making progress on the project to record and respect the paupers buried in unmarked ground behind the old Eastville workhouse (100 Fishponds Rd), now called Rosemary Green. A key marker of disrespect is burying […] Read More =>

Publications

‘No Cure, no Pay, Boarding excepted’

Long before the NHS, those who did not fit ‘the norm’ were consigned to workhouses or to private lunatic asylums. The latter provided a profitable business opportunity, as the wealthy were only too keen to offload family members whose behaviour was […] Read More =>

The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire

During the year of 1855 rumours of murder and cover up were circulating in the small north Somerset village of Walton-in-Gordano. An epileptic destitute country girl had died in the local institution known as the Bedminster Union Workhouse. Her death […] Read More =>

100 Fishponds Rd.

In 2012, radical historians poring over old maps of east Bristol discovered a disused burial ground at Rosemary Green, close to the site of Eastville Workhouse. Over the following years, a team of local researchers revealed that in the nineteenth […] Read More =>

Event Series

Remembering Eastville Workhouse

A series of events linked to the Eastville Workhouse. For more details about the Eastville Workhouse project visit the project page. Read More =>

Events

Eastville Workhouse, the mentally ill and systemic murder mysteries

The 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act aimed to prevent the mentally afflicted from being incarcerated in workhouses for long periods. However, studies across the country have demonstrated that large numbers of people with mental health issues were being […] Read More =>

The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire: Bedminster Union Workhouse and Victorian social attitudes to Epilepsy

In 1855 rumours of murder and a cover up were circulating in the small north Somerset village of Walton-in-Gordano. An epileptic destitute country girl, Hannah Wiltshire, had died in the Bedminster Union Workhouse at Flax Bourton. The Board of […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Bedminster Union Workhouse – The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire

'The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire' Accusations of murder and cover up in the Bedminster Union Workhouse were reported in the press during 1855 Thursday, 7th March 2024 at 19:30 This talk by Rosemary Caldicott is based on her popular booklet […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

No Cure, No Fee, Boarding Excepted: Mason’s Madhouses In Old Fishponds

People's University of Fishponds - Sun 28 Jan 2024 - 7:00om - The Nissen Hut, Eastville Park, Bristol. Journalist, Fishponds Voice History columnist and Bristol Radical History Group author Mike Jempson will reveal some of the fascinating facts his […] Read More =>

Pauper burials in Greenbank Cemetery – new research

Monday 16 October – 7.30pm-9.00pm - Friends of Eastville Park Community Hub (Nissen Hut), Eastville Park, Near Park Avenue car park, Bristol BS5 6QG In 2015, to great public interest, Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group released details of more than […] Read More =>

Bedminster Poor Law Union Workhouse

Bedminster Poor Law Union Workhouse

Pill Library and Children's Centre, Crockerne House, Underbanks, Pill BS20 0AT For more details and booking see here. North Somerset Libraries are excited to host a series of talks by Bristol Radical History pamphleteers. Visit www.brh.org.uk to find […] Read More =>

Bedminster Workhouse: The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire

  In 1855 rumours of murder and a cover up were circulating in the small north Somerset village of Walton-in-Gordano. An epileptic destitute country girl, Hannah Wiltshire, had died in the Bedminster Union Workhouse at Flax Bourton. The Board of […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Clevedon Literary Festival

A Celebration of the Book - Sat 11th June St Andrews Church Centre, Old Church Rd, Clevedon BS21 7UE Funded by Clevedon Community Bookshop Cooperative, Bookbinders, book artists, paper-makers, book makers, independent publishers and pamphleteers come […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Bedminster Union Workhouse

Clevedon Library, 37, Old Church Rd, Clevedon BS21 6NN Author Rosemary Caldicott focuses on the draconian workhouse system that housed the vulnerable poor, and in particular women and children. Rosemary will be examining the history of the workhouse […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

‘Buried like Dogs?’

Elaborate funeral ceremonies became very important to middle-class Victorians, with increasingly meticulous rituals designed to mark the passing of family members. However, for the Victorian poor, things were very different. After the introduction of […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Bedminster Union Workhouse

As part of their History Week, Bedminster Library (Bedminster Parade, Bedminster, Bristol BS3 4AQ) have a talk by Rosemary Caldicott, author of The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire: A Case Study of Bedminster Union Workhouse. Rosemary will tell the […] Read More =>

Pauper Graves Memorial Unveiling

In 2012 Bristol Radical History Group launched a project to research into the thousands of unmarked graves of paupers from the Eastville workhouse (at 100 Fishponds Road) who were buried in nearby Rosemary Green. In 2014 the Eastville Workhouse […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Life and death in two Bristol Victorian workhouses

Congresbury History Group, Congresbury Methodist Hall, 2 High St, Congresbury, Bristol BS49 5JA Roger Ball, co-author of 100 Fishponds Rd: Life and death in a Victorian workhouse explains how a team of local researchers revealed that more than 4,000 […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Life and death in two Bristol Victorian workhouses

Clevedon Civic Society, St Andrew’s Church Centre, Old Church Road, Clevedon, BS21 7UE Rosemary Caldicott, author of The Life and Death of Hannah Wiltshire: A Case Study of Bedminster Union Workhouse tells the true story of how in 1850s the local […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Life and Death in two Victorian Workhouses

Downed Local History Society. Downend Folk House, Lincombe Barn, Overndale Road, Downend, Bristol, BS16 2RW Bedminster: the true story of how the local community pulled together to uncover murder in the workhouse. Eastville: The history of life death […] Read More =>

Plaque to mark Eastville Workhouse at 100 Fishponds Rd

100 Fishponds Rd, Pedestrian Entrance to East Trees Health Centre, Bristol BS5 6BF As part of the ongoing Eastville Workhouse history project a cast aluminium, painted plaque by local artist Mike Baker will be unveiled on the surviving gates to the […] Read More =>

Opening the archive

Members of the Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group have used death registers at Bristol Record Office to identify the people given pauper's burials at Rosemary Green adjacent to the site of Eastville Workhouse. They found the names of over 4,000 men, […] Read More =>

Eastville Workhouse Burial Ground: Memorial Unveiling Ceremony

On Rosemary Green, Eastville, BS5 6LB. Residents of East Park Estate are to unveil a memorial to more than 4,000 men, women and children who died in Eastville’s notorious Workhouse between 1851 and 1895 and were buried in unmarked paupers’ graves in […] Read More =>

Not A BRHG Event

Pauper deaths and burials in Victorian England

Funeral ceremonies were very important to middle class Victorians, with detailed and often elaborate rituals to mark the passing of cherished family members and those deemed ‘important’. But for paupers who died in the workhouses, things were very […] Read More =>

Eastville Workhouse Planning Meeting

Planning meeting regarding Eastville Workhouse and remembering the paupers buried in Rosemary Green. Thursday 9th October 7.00pm-9.00pm. St Anne's Church, St Leonards Road, Greenbank, Bristol, BS5 6JN It has been over a month since we first met to […] Read More =>

Remembering Eastville Workhouse

Public meeting St Anne's Church, St Leonards Road, Greenbank, Bristol, BS5 6JN Over the last two years local historians from Bristol Radical History Group (BRHG) have been researching an old burial ground that lies on Rosemary Green (BS5 6LB) between […] Read More =>

Book Reviews

Imperial Intimacies

This is an eloquent and angry account of Professor Hazel Carby’s family history linked to the shameful history of the British Empire. She is painfully honest about the relationship of her own parents - her mother born in Wales, her father from […] Read More =>

Blog

Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group – Final Accounts

Eastville Workhouse Memorial Group (EWMG) was formed in 2014 after a public meeting with residents of Eastville and Greenbank in East Bristol. The primary aim of the group was to research and publish the names and details of the inmates from […] Read More =>

Mike Baker – an Easton legend

It is with great sadness that we heard of the death of Mike Baker on 12th March 2020 at the BRI. I first met Mike Baker around twenty years ago when he was leading a local history walk around Easton with fellow historian Jim McNeil. Mike and Jim were […] Read More =>