The Foundling Hospital - Bloomsbury, London

Today was another cold but fun day.  Liz and I met our friend Ruth at the Foundling Museum.  This is a museum set up to feature the Foundling Hospital, the first orphanage established in London.  The “hospital” (a word used more generally at the time to indicate a place that was hospitable to the less fortunate) was established by Thomas Coram in 1741 for the "education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children."  The hospital operated continuously until 1953 when the emphasis for helping orphans changed from institutionalization to more family-oriented practices like adoption and foster families.  The hospital continues today as the Thomas Coram Foundation for Children or Coram, one of London’s largest children’s charities.

Interestingly, two of the original benefactors were William Hogarth and George Frideric Handel.  Primarily because of these two men, the hospital, and now the museum, holds a unique position in the history of the arts in England.

Hogarth was one of the great English painters of the time and became a founding Governor.  In addition to donating many of his own paintings to the hospital, he convinced many of the other famous painters to produce works for the hospital.  As such, Hogarth established the first permanent art exhibition in England at the hospital which in turn, lead to the establishment of the Royal Academy in 1768.

Handel was also an early Governor and offered to have a fund-raiser concert of his new oratorio Messiah in 1750 to mark the presentation of a new organ that he had donated to the hospital chapel.  At this point, the work was still mainly unknown.  The concert was a great success and lead to annual Messiah concerts until 1777.  These concerts not only helped to cement Messiah as a fixture of English performance repertoire, but also raised about £500,000 ($810, 000) in today’s money for the hospital.

The first floor of the museum is dedicated to the 25,000 "foundlings" and the hospital.  This was Liz’s favorite floor.  It is filled with displays about life in the hospital and the hospital’s history.  The most heart-wrenching displays showed some of the tokens and letters left by the mothers for the babies.  All of the tokens and letters were saved but never given to the children.  It’s hard to imagine the anguish that these mothers had knowing that they would never see their children again or have any idea of what happened to them when, or if, they grew up.  Tokens were also given to the mothers in the event that they could eventually reclaim their children.  Sadly, this almost never happened.

The second floor of the museum contains all of the art that was donated to the hospital.  There are some fascinating and well-known paintings displayed here.  This is the collection that was started and collected by Hogarth.

The third floor was my favorite.  Here was the Handel display.  Because of Handel’s close association to the Foundling Hospital, the museum contains a number of his original manuscripts.  On display are, among many other things, a first edition of the Messiah and the “fair copy” of the oratorio that Handel ordered to be made for the hospital in his will.  This score is a complete copy of every part and the director’s score so that the Messiah concerts could continue on after his death in 1759.  For any musician who has ever performed Handel’s Messiah, this is a special collection indeed!

Tom