Foundling Homes

Foundling homes, institutions where foundlings and "illegitimate" children are admitted. It can be considered historically established that the first F. home was founded in Milan by Archbishop Dataeus in 787, and the second was opened in Bergamo in 982; subsequently, F. homes were opened one after another in various cities and countries. In 1198, Pope Innocent III opened an F. home in Rome and for the first time established a "turn" within it. Subsequently, F. homes were opened in Paris (1362), Munich (1489), Amsterdam (1594), London (1739), Stockholm and Copenhagen (1753), Moscow (1763), St. Petersburg (1770), Dublin (1775), Berlin (1777), Vienna (1784). At present, F. homes in their original form have survived only in some Catholic countries (Italy, Spain, Latin American states); in other states they were completely abolished or have significantly deviated in their activities from the original type (France). The founders of the first F. homes were guided by the thought that, by providing the mother with the opportunity to place the child in a shelter, they would thereby prevent her from committing infanticide, and preserve the child's life. Since, in their opinion, the feeling of shame and the desire to conceal the fact of extramarital birth could prevent the mother from bringing the child openly to the shelter, a "turn" was established in the F. home to facilitate the possibility of secretly bringing a child into it, i.e., a special cradle in the form of a rotating hollow half-cylinder in an opening in the wall. The mother placed the child in the turn, the turn automatically rotated, and the child found itself inside the F. home, while the mother remained unnoticed by anyone. However, centuries of experience showed that most mothers abandon their children not out of shame, but because of poverty. F. homes became overcrowded not only with extramarital children, but also with children born in wedlock by parents who could not support them. If in those places where F. homes were opened the number of infanticides decreased, on the other hand, the excessive overcrowding of the F. home itself was the cause of unusually high mortality among the children in care. For example, in the F. home in Dublin out of 10,272 children admitted over 20 years (1775-95), only 45 survived, i.e., the mortality rate was 99.6%. In most F. homes, mortality fluctuated between 60 and 90%. The more satisfactorily the F. home was organized and the lower the mortality rate in it, the more children were abandoned and brought to it, which inevitably led to overcrowding and the associated high mortality. This led F. homes in most countries gradually, first, to replace the secret admission of children with open admission, and second, to abandon the original intention to raise children within the walls of the F. home itself and to transfer them to foster families. The F. home paid the foster family a certain remuneration and retained the right to supervise the child's upbringing. Thus, for example, in France, where the installation of turns was prohibited by law in 1904, special open bureaus for receiving children were introduced. The transfer takes place in a room open day and night. The mother hands over the child to the person in charge of reception through a window, explaining to the mother that if she herself wishes to care for her child, she can be immediately given an allowance for initial needs, and subsequently she will receive the allowance established by law. She is warned that she does not have to answer questions that will be asked to her. She is simultaneously warned that once she gives up her child, she will never see him again and never know his fate, and that she will only be informed (no more than once every 3 months) whether he is alive or dead (and that only upon her personal statement each time). The ward is kept in the F. home, or shelter, only as long as his health condition requires. Subsequently, all without exception children are given for paid upbringing to families living in the countryside. The history of F. homes in Russia gives a typical picture of the evolution of F. homes in general. Until the beginning of the 18th century, the care of extramarital children in Russia was exclusively a matter of private charity. In 1706, the Novgorod Metropolitan Job among a number of charitable institutions founded a "home for foundlings," i.e., a special house for the care of "disgraceful" (extramarital) children. This home was maintained at his personal expense and from donations from the tsarina, great boyars and boyars. Peter I treated Job's undertaking with sympathy and in 1712-13 allocated the income from certain monastic estates for the maintenance of his institutions. By decree of January 31, 1712, Peter I orders "in all provinces to establish hospitals for the most maimed, those who cannot work either to guard and are very old; also for the discreet reception and feeding of infants who are not born from lawful wives, so that they do not commit a greater sin, that is, murder, following the example of the Novgorod archiereus." Under Peter I's successors, the "orphanages" established by him gradually closed, and the matter of caring for extramarital and abandoned children completely stagnated. In 1763, under Catherine II, an F. home was established in Moscow according to a plan developed by Betskoy. The F. home was declared a state institution and received a number of special privileges (it was not subordinate to any department, offenses by F. home staff were investigated within it itself, it was exempt from paying court fees, from all police duties and billeting). All children raised in the F. home of both sexes and their descendants became free by status. The following principles were laid at the foundation of the F. home's activities: 1) unhindered and secret admission of children, 2) care not only of extramarital, but also of legitimate children, and 3) the feeding and upbringing of children within the F. home itself until they entered working life. The incoming child was transferred to wet nursing by a wet nurse or nanny, with whom he remained until 2 years of age. Then he was placed under the supervision of matrons (governesses), with children of both sexes being brought up together until 6-7 years of age. From 7 to 11 years, children attended school, worked in the garden or did handicrafts. After 14 years, the wards were taught various crafts, and the most capable were sent to St. Petersburg, to the Academy of Arts. Betskoy dreamed of creating from the wards of the F. home a so-called "third estate," which did not exist in Russia at that time. In 1770, following the model of the Moscow F. home, an F. home was established in St. Petersburg. Due to the fact that children brought to the F. home were accepted without hindrance, the number of wards grew rapidly every year. Artificial feeding, infections, overcrowding and congestion were the cause of extremely high mortality among the wards. Mortality in the Moscow F. home in the first years of its existence was: 1764 - 81.0%, 1765 - 72.8%, 1766 - 76.5%, 1767 - 98.5%, 1768 - 61.7%. Mortality in the St. Petersburg F. home fluctuated between 78-94%. Such high mortality first of all forced to abandon the intention to raise all children within the F. home itself. It was necessary, following the example of foreign F. homes, to resort to placing children with peasant families first until 9 months of age, and then, with a large influx of children, until 5-7 years, after which the children were returned back to the F. home. The family that took the child for upbringing received a certain payment for this. Special traveling supervisors were appointed to supervise these children. Thanks to this measure, mortality within the F. home itself decreased to 45-50%, but in the villages it reached 75%. From 1807, mothers in cities were granted the right to raise their children at home, receiving a certain payment for this, which was issued until the child reached 7 years of age. This measure was intended 1) to limit the placement of children in F. homes and 2) to place the child in better conditions for development thanks to maternal feeding and care. In view of the fact that the influx of children into the F. home increased with the years, the F. home, which could accommodate only 500 children but accepted up to 20,000 per year, was forced to place an ever-increasing number of children in the villages, gradually turning into a distribution point for the temporary stay of children. The mass placement of children in the villages required the organization of special supervision over them. Settlements where the wards were located were divided into districts, and in the districts, instead of traveling supervisors, traveling doctors were appointed. This supervision was purely formal, and the supervisors were mainly engaged in distributing payment for upbringing. At the beginning of the 19th century, in addition to the F. homes in Moscow and St. Petersburg, there were also several F. homes in the provinces, which were under the jurisdiction of the public welfare departments (Tula, Voronezh, Kaluga, Pskov, Arkhangelsk, Grodno, Tyumen). Mortality in these provincial F. homes was very high; for example, in the Arkhangelsk F. home in 1815, the local department admitted 538 infants - all died; during the period from 1823 to 1827, 1,572 were admitted, of whom by the end of 1827 1,305 had died and 267 remained alive, i.e. 16%. The deplorable results of the activities of provincial F. homes led to the enactment of a law in 1828, which prohibited the establishment of F. homes under the jurisdiction of the public welfare department in the future.

In the event of a foundling child being discovered, the police were strictly required to conduct a thorough investigation to find those responsible, while the Public Welfare Order was to arrange for the child to be placed with private benefactors free of charge, or, in extreme cases, for a moderate fee. In 1837, it was ordered that all 'classes' at the Foundling Homes be abolished and converted into educational institutions for the orphans of non-commissioned officers; pupils from the villages were not to be returned but were to remain permanently in peasant families, where they were to be trained in agriculture and form a rural class attached to state villages. From 1864, the care for abandoned children in Russia was entrusted to two institutions: the department of Empress Maria retained the capital Foundling Homes and some of the provincial ones, while in 34 zemstvo provinces this matter passed to the zemstvo. The system of secret admission, which formed the basis of the care for orphans and abandoned children, led the Foundling Homes into a dead end. The number of children entering the Foundling Homes grew at an incredible rate. Thanks to secret admission, many legitimate children, along with illegitimate ones, were admitted to the Foundling Homes. All attempts to limit the number of children admitted and reduce mortality among those accepted did not yield tangible results, as the system was fundamentally flawed and required radical change. Therefore, in 1884-91, the basic principles of the Foundling Homes' activities were reviewed, and the following changes were introduced: 1) open admission was established instead of secret admission; 2) not all children without exception were admitted to the Foundling Homes, but only certain categories, namely: a) illegitimate children under 1 year of age whose mothers had died or were unable to care for them due to their helplessness, b) abandoned children not taken in for upbringing by anyone, c) legitimate children not older than 10 months for temporary nursing when the mother, due to illness, could not breastfeed them herself; 3) mothers were to enter the Foundling Homes to breastfeed their own children; 4) children admitted to the Foundling Homes remained there for 2-4 months, after which they were either returned to their mothers in the capitals or sent to the villages for upbringing. The situation of homeless mothers who came to the Foundling Homes with their child was such that mothers came there to 'sit,' as in prison; and this expression 'to sit,' which characterized the entire stay in the Foundling Homes, persisted until the very last years, and even after the revolution, unmarried mothers often turned to the departments for the protection of motherhood and infancy with requests to allow them to 'sit' in the Foundling Homes. The 1891 reform and the development of pediatric knowledge somewhat contributed to reducing child mortality in the Foundling Homes, but it still remained very high. Thus, according to official statistics, mortality in the infant departments of the Moscow Foundling Home was in 1907-41.6%, 1908-38.1%, 1909-29.5%, 1910-29.0%; in the infant departments of the St. Petersburg Foundling Home in 1910-22.6%, in 1911-20.3%, in 1912-14.6%. Mortality among children sent to the villages for nursing—in the rural districts of the St. Petersburg Foundling Home for the period 1908-12, according to official data, ranged from 23 to 28%. In reality, mortality in the Foundling Homes was much higher, as analysis of old reports showed that it was calculated from the total number of children who passed through the Foundling Homes, not those being raised in them; children who died in hospitals were not counted, those who died in the first days were not counted, etc. In general, throughout their existence, the Foundling Homes did not live up to expectations; they were unable to cope with their main task—to save the life of the abandoned and illegitimate child. The reason was the incorrect principles underlying their activities: secret admission, lack of trained personnel for child care, raising children in the Foundling Homes themselves, and after the 1891 reform, when the Foundling Homes were turned into distribution centers—lack of medical supervision of children sent to uncultured peasant families for upbringing. After the October Revolution, the Foundling Homes and the placement of children in 'districts' were abolished; the St. Petersburg Foundling Home was closed, the Moscow Foundling Home was reorganized and served as the main core in the organization of the State Institute for the Protection of Motherhood and Infancy.