To find out more about workhouses in general, click on the image above.
In
1834 the government introduced an
entirely new system for looking after the poor. The country was divided
into areas to provide care through local Poor Law Unions. At this time
there was no town of Llandrindod Wells so these parishes of central Radnorshire
came under various Unions. Each Union was run by a Board
of Guardians chosen from across the area. The old records of
the Guardians tell us something about how the poor of the area were cared
for.
The new system looked after the poor by locking them away in workhouses
and making them work for the care they received. It was a system designed
to make poor people ashamed of needing help.
Llandrindod Wells itself was a good source of employment for local people. There were new hotels and guest houses, the new railway, and many new shops which all required people to work in them. For farm labourers in the surrounding countryside there were many building sites in the growing town which they could work on if times got hard on the land.
