The Foundling Museum

The Foundling Museum

40, Brunswick Square, WC1.

Hogarth's House

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The Foundling Museum tells the extaordinary tale of one man’s mission to establish London’s first home for abandoned children. It is a story which starts in harder times, when unwanted infants were readily left in the gutter to die. The sight, so commonplace on city streets in the 18th century that no-one gave it a thought, cut Thomas Coram to the quick. Perhaps because he was childless himself. Perhaps for some memory left on a foreign shore. Whatever spurred the old sea captain into action, it not only rocked society in his own day but positively benefited the lives of 27,000 youngsters over two centuries. His legacy still bears fruit to this day.
As a campaigner, Coram was a force to be reckoned with. He quickly won backers for his philanthropic adventure, up to and including King George II. When the ‘Hospital for the Maintenance and Education of Exposed and Deserted Children’ opened its doors in 1739, it was established by Royal Charter. Very soon, it boasted two reknowned figures, the composer George Frederic Handel and artist William Hogarth, amongst its governers. These two were great benefactors of the Hospital. Handel stipulated that annual performances of his famous Messiah should be given to raise donations and, at his death, generously bequeathed the score to the Hospital. Hogarth, for his part, gave some of his works and encouraged other leading artists to do the same, so that a gallery - the first public art gallery in London - could be set up to attract wealthy visitors and possible patrons. That collaboration and the success of the resulting exhibitions lead to the inauguration of the Royal Acadamy of Arts in 1768.
The Foundling Museum pays enormous tribute to these founding fathers, Coram, Handel and Hogarth, oddly enough, none of whom were fathers in their own right. Thomas Coram, with his genial face, is remembered in a glorious Hogarth portrait, resplendent in a scarlet coat. Handel’s many scores, manuscripts and items of memorabilia, lovingly collected by Gerald Coke and willed to the institute, are displayed in a special gallery. Important paintings from the hands of Hogarth, Reynolds, a 21-year-old Gainsborough, Wilson, Roubillac and the like are also to be seen, all housed in rooms restored to resemble those of the original Hospital, which was on a site adjacent to the present museum building.
But this is the happy side. More sobering is the tribute to the lives of the many children who passed through these portals. Though all who survived infancy were found work or apprenticeships and some even grew to be men of social stature, it is hard to walk through this exhibition without an outside lump in the throat. The collection of momentoes - little tags of marked metal, sometimes painted with figures or a name - which were the last items left by desperate mothers in the hope, one day, of being able to reclaim their babes, is a finisher. Few, in reality, must ever have had the money or opportunity, despite Hogarth’s sentimental rendition of such a reunion scene.

· The Gerald Coke collection of materials relating to Handel and his contemporaries, including manuscripts, books and libretti is available to researchers Wednesday to Friday. For appointments Tel: 020-7841-3603 or Email: handel@foundlingmuseum.org.uk

The Foundling Museum is open Tuesday to Saturday 10am–6pm, Sunday 12–6pm. Also open Good Friday and Easter Monday 12-6pm
Admission: £5 Concessions £4 Children up to 16 years free.
Special rates for school parties and groups.
Nearest tube: Russell Square (Piccadilly line)

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