We are nearing the end of the Hidden Lives Remembered project and we are still discovering new things. We have recently discovered that some people travelled very long distances to live at Hampton Manor. Some even came from different countries. We have been gathering data on maps to show how far people travelled to Hampton Manor.
Some of the places that the ladies came from, from nearest to furthest away, are:
A map showing the places in the UK people moved from (made in Scribble Maps)
Coventry
Walsall
Newark
Harpenden
Cambridge
Manchester
Leeds
Yorkshire
Norfolk
Newcastle
Scotland
Ireland
Brazil – there was a lady that came from Brazil that only knew Portuguese. As well as moving to a different country she had to learn a new language, which she managed to do at the Manor.
Zimbabwe
Even where people came from English-speaking places, they may have found different accents and ways of speaking difficult to understand. This can be especially difficult if you have a hearing impairment as well as a Learning Disability or if you simply find speech difficult to understand.
Brazil and Zimbabwe to Hampton Manor (made in Scribble Maps)
Travelling with a Learning Disability can be quite scary and challenging if you have to travel miles from your home to surroundings that you are not familiar with. I imagine it must have been quite a scary time. When the Manor closed, some of the residents went back to where they originally came from all those years ago. They have lost contact with the people that they lived with at the Manor. One resident, Caroline, said how she missed Marie, who went back to Leeds to live with her family.
Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) from Wikipedia
In the early days, students from Steiner schools also travelled long distances to help out at the Manor. The Manor was set up with the ideas of Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), who started a way of thinking called anthroposophy.
The first school set up following Steiner’s ideas was in 1919, in Germany.
The first staff and residents at Hampton Manor came from the Steiner-inspired ‘learning community’ called Sunfield, near Stourbridge.
Sunfield still exists today, but it is now a residential special school that is not as closely linked to Steiner’s ideas.
The crest of Sunfield (from their website)