Children and Foundlings Database

A Brief Historical Overview

The Boston Overseers of the Poor were founded in 1692 and incorporated in 1772. It consisted of twelve Boston selectmen (one for each ward), who were responsible for providing relief for “deserving persons.” This relief came in the form of food, housing, medicine, fuel, and sometimes money, and was (in many cases) reserved for Boston residents. If non-residents sought relief, they would often be “Warned Out” of the city, to assure the city’s residents were those receiving the welfare. The Overseers held authority to send individuals to the almshouse and workhouse at their discretion. The Boston Almshouse began at Beacon St until moving in 1801 to Leverett St, and finally to Deer Island in 1825. State almshouses in Bridgewater and Tewksbury opened in 1854. These spaces were to provide relief through food, housing, fuel, medicine and sometimes money to those in need.

In response to the influx of migrants to Boston, the Overseers opened The Temporary Home for Women and Children in 1857 at 36 Charles St. The home quickly became overcrowded, and disease became rampant in these spaces. The Overseers later built a larger shelter in 1869 in New Chardon St in Boston’s West End, named the Charity Building. It’s primary function was to provide food, shelter and healthcare for up to 100 women and children at a time. As reflected in the Records, the women and children who passed through these homes tell stories of heartbreak, joy, desperation, love, and abuse.

The Home was also responsible for taking in abandoned children, who were often left on nearby doorsteps and brought by police officers to the Home. When taken in, the matron or overseer of the Home would fill out an intake form that recorded their age, where they were found, health status, sex, and other distinguishing features. In some cases, overseers used this information to try and reconnect the child with the parent, or use it to verify qualifications for prospective adoptive parents. Children were found all across the city’s wards, though most were found on the doorsteps of homes in the West End, and close to the Home. Adults who sought to adopt abandoned children came mostly from New England, though some did reside in other areas of the United States, and one was recorded as being adopted to parents in London, England. Parents often were required to provide a recommendation before adopting. The Home cared for women and children of varied nationality, gender, age, and race.

This database has been created using the MHS Boston Overseers of the Poor Records, “Children and Foundlings Records, 1862-1868.” A link to the digital collection is here:

https://www.masshist.org/collection-guides/digitized/fa0144/b17-f01#1

Creation and Use of Database

Transcription

This database was created using the Boston Overseers of the Poor Records “Children and Foundlings Records, 1862-1868.” To preserve the integrity of the document, I chose to keep the same headings that were listed in the intake form as the headings for the database (i.e. name, color, remarks, etc.).

I have transcribed these records myself, and therefore there are some errors by default. Some of the pages are harder to read than others (perhaps they were running out of ink, or they were in a rush!), and therefore were harder to transcribe. Where transcription errors arise, I apologise. Please feel free to get in touch with me and I can revise and edit any issues.

Locations

Locations of where the child was found and where they were adopted have been included in both a text and coordinate format, to ensure the continuation of the language used in the document, and to allow for further geographical and network analysis using the database. (coming soon!)

To find coordinates of the locations listed in the documents required a time consuming effort of corroborating information with old maps of Boston. I relied most consistently on the “Plan of Boston” Map from 1863, as it was best suited to my time period, and the street names were most reliable and consistent to the time.

I used this map to find specific streets that children were left “on the doorsteps of,” and to locate streets of new adoptive parents. In most cases, the streets that required the most searching for were those in Boston’s West End, which no longer exist. The map also proved useful for identifying police officer stations, which, in most cases, aligned with the ward.

Boston (Mass.). Engineering Dept, Slade, James, Wightman, H. M., and C. A. (Cyrus A.) Swett. “Plan of Boston.” Map. Boston, Mass: Engineering Dept., 1863. Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center, https://collections.leventhalmap.org/search/commonwealth:3f463329b (accessed December 02, 2025).

Using the Database

This database is intended to be a resource for research, and is not yet complete. The database will benefit from further cleaning of data and editing, but is a useful tool to begin thinking about patterns and trends across welfare in Nineteenth century Boston.

Audience

This project is suited to a wide audience, and its aim is to be easily navigated. Information found through the database, however, requires supplementary reading to fully understand its meaning and significance. The database may be useful for undergraduate and graduate students, with appropriate further reading.

Current Work

An example of a geographic visualization using this database in Kepler is shown below. Here, I have attached several images that show where the child was found, its permanent residence, and any remarks made about the child. I chose this platform because it was beginner friendly, and allowed for nice visualizations of the geographic distribution of care. In particular, the significant amount of children who were placed in almshouses at Tewksbury and Bridgewater is illustrated effectively in Image No. 2, and the significant span of adoptions is shown in Image No. 1 and No. 3 (reaching San Francsico, Canada, and London). In Image No. 4, we can see the gender distribution of where children were found. If overlayed with the earlier Map of Boston from 1863, it is evident that most children were found in Wards 5, 6, and 7. Image No. 4 also shows the ability to select nodes to see each individual child’s journey and story.

note: the maps are currently for private use, but are available upon request.

Future Work

The creation of this database has generated many curiosities and questions for future research. These include:

• Comparing these years’ entries to other years
• Comparing the regional experiences of these children to the wider national (and even international) framework of welfare
• Investigating and tracing the individual journeys of children at a granular level.
• Statistical breakdowns of various demographics of the children, including age, race, and gender.

Project Goals:

• The project aims to make the Children and Foundlings Records from 1862-1868 accessible for researchers, and allows individuals to search, refine, and compare various experiences and journeys.
• This project is also a valuable resource and part of a larger personal investigation into the regional and national institutions of social welfare within the nineteenth century.
• The project aims to be public, maintainable, and developed in the future.

Data Source and Integrity:

• The database was built using the Boston Overseers of the Poor Records, Temporary Home Records, Children and Foundlings City Temporary Home, 1862-1868.
  • Children and Foundlings City Temporary Home, 1862-1868. Reel 14, Box 17, Folder 1. Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, Massachusetts.
• I chose this set of records because the time period of 1862-1868 features a vast amount of migration and displacement, especially after the Civil War.
• To preserve the integrity of the documents, I cross-referenced locations using old City Maps. When handwriting was ambiguous, I chose to type what I saw, and in some cases used parenthesis as options, for example:
  • “The mother Margaret Roach, 17 years of age, was at the Home October 22 with this child (umain?): expressed a desire to give it away”
• When faced with incomplete information, I chose to leave the entry blank.

Database Structure

• To maintain integrity of the information within the records, I chose to replicate the exact categories that were listed on the intake forms. I also included and created several new columns, such as coordinates of locations, and their age represented in years, to best serve future statistical and mapping endeavors.
• I chose to maintain the same language used in the original documents.
• I chose to include data in three main ways: date, text, and numerical, for uniformity across entries.
• While I tried my best, I am aware that errors may arise across the database due to misreading the documents, transcription errors, or lack of editing. I advise that the database is read slowly and with this in mind. For any concerns, please consult the original documents at MHS.

Technical implementation

• This database was created using Google Sheets. This format was chosen for its accessibility, flexibility, and beginner-friendly approach. Having some familiarity with this platform was a huge draw to this approach.
• The database was then downloaded as a .csv file, which allows the database to be used in countless ways (such as mapping, statistics). This .csv file was then uploaded to this website through TablePress plugin, to allow for searchability and filtering of information.
• This database was uploaded to a public wordpress site to allow access to information by all.

Ethics and Privacy

• These records were accessed through MHS’s public online digital collections.
• These records discuss sensitive and vulnerable experiences. This database aims not to discredit or divert from the sensitivity of these records, but instead hopes to inspire more discussion about these experiences as a whole.

Future maintenance and expansion

• This database will continue to be “cleaned” to fix any transcription errors. Where issues do arise, please consult the original MHS records.
• The database will be maintained over time by consistently checking its functionality.
• The database also holds the ability to grow, and its current structure allows for, and is designed for, growth and expansion. This expansion may be through including other years records.

Herndon, Ruth Wallis, Unwelcome Americans: Living on the Margin in Early New England. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002.

Salinger, Sharon V., Cornelia V. Dayton, Robert Love’s Warnings: Searching for Strangers in Colonial Boston. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014.

Holloran, Peter C., Boston’s Wayward Children: Social Services for Homeless Children, 1830-1930. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989.

Boston Redevelopment Authority. Tree of Life: Transitional Housing for Women and Children. Legare St Press, 2022.