POORHOUSE

Poorhouse

In England, Wales and Ireland a poorhouse was more commonly known as a workhouse. In early Victorian times, poverty was seen as a dishonorable state. As depicted by Charles Dickens, a workhouse could resemble a reformatory, often housing whole families, or a penal labour regime giving manual work to the indigent and subjecting them to physical punishment. At a workhouse, men and women were split up with no communication between them. Workhouse internees could not leave until they had enough money to be out of poverty, and were paid so little that it was almost impossible to earn enough to reach such a level. As the 19th century progressed, conditions improved.

The above text is a snippet from Wikipedia: Poorhouse
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poorhouse

Noun

  1. A charitable institution where poor or homeless people are lodged
  2. A workhouse


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: poorhouse
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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