2-888-028 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Design for a Self-Supporting Village, 1850. Church of England village, '...designed by Mr. J. Minter Morgan...intended to "promote the religious, moral, and general improvement of the working classes, by forming establishments of three hundred families, and combining agricultural and manufacturing employment for their own benefit"...we cannot say that it looks well, even on paper. It resembles a prison, rather than a village...It looks more like a lunatic asylum, than the ordinary abodes of rational men. It reminds us of Bridewell, or some contrivance for central inspection...the scheme is not calculated to improve the condition of our peasantry; it is not intended to increase their wages; it is rather to take the supposed destitute from the towns and plant them in colonies on the land, to the still further deterioration, if possible, of the condition of those who now dwell there'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.