Christmas Charity at Benham in 1802

Speen Church, close to Benham.

When Elizabeth Craven moved back to Benham in Berkshire with her second husband, the retired Margrave of Anspach, they were determined to be good landowners and popular with the local community.  Christmas charity on a lavish scale was part of this. At Christmas 1802 they donated food, drink and warm clothing to no less than fifty-six poor families in the neighbourhood. The stockings must have been warm because "worsted" is a high quality woollen fabric. And apparently they did this every year.

From the  The Gentleman's Monthly Miscellany, Volume 1, Issues 1-5 1803

This must have been all the more welcome since the prolonged wars of the Napoleonic period had caused shortages, price inflation and hardship for the poor. 

Such gifts were often distributed at the local church, providing an incentive for going out to a service in the cold.

Benham is just outside the village of Speen near Newbury which is where where the so-called Speenhamland system of Poor Relief was established in 1795. It was a way of supplementing low wages in line with the price of bread and the number of children in a family. The wealthier residents of the parish contributed as much as the magistrates thought necessary to bridge the gap between earnings and subsistence. The system spread rapidly to other areas and in Speen the Margrave must have been contributing significant amounts all the year round, but this did not stop him from adding a bit more at Christmas. 

The Cravens - Elizabeth and her son, who was now Lord Craven - must have played a significant part in establishing this system, as the landowners appointed the magistrates, who met at the Pelican Inn at Newbury when they set it up.

The Pelican Inn, Newbury, c.1880.