By Maureen Fahey, historian at Stockport Heritage Trust

It's Christmas day in the workhouse, and the cold, bare walls are bright.

The workhouse is an infamous part of Victorian social history, and Stockport was no exception. These buildings offered support - such as food and shelter - to those who couldn't provide for themselves.

The story of workhouses begins in 1601, with the Poor Relief Act of 1601. This bill placed responsibility for the support of the impoverished, elderly and sick upon individual parishes. Any rooms in large houses, religious institutions and factories were henceforth used to give aid and shelter to the most needy.

In Stockport, the Millgate town house of the affluent Bamford family was one of the earliest examples of such a workhouse, in use from the 1730s. However, it wasn't long before a burgeoning population rendered this building inadequate. It was for this reason that a new workhouse was created on a plot of land at Daw Bank. Funded by a combination of local rates and the sale of common land, it aimed to provide a new 'House of Industry'.

This rather grand building, with its impressive portico entrance, and gardens to the rear, opened in 1812. It housed 170 people.

All that remains of the Daw Bank workhouse, demolished in 1935. This spot marks the site of the entrance (Image - Stockport Heritage Trust)

A landmark historical change came in 1834, when the Poor Law Amendment Act reorganised the administration of poor relief by amalgamating parishes and townships into poor law unions, each union being governed by an elected Board of Guardians. Under this new legislation, support came in the form of either 'out relief' (comprising cash, tokens or food given to those living in poverty outside the workhouse) or admission to the workhouse itself.

The legislation decreed that the able-bodied poor would be given assistance only if they entered the workhouse. However, a condition of entering the workhouse was that men, women, children, the elderly and the infirm were immediately segregated - the principle being that only the most desperate would venture to cross its portals so as to avoid being separated from their loved ones, and to avoid the stigma and ignominy of 'living on the parish'.

In reality however, many unions continued to administer out relief on a regular basis. The Stockport Poor Law Union comprised sixteen townships and by 1837, it was clear that bigger premises were needed to cater for the number of people in need of assistance.

One Henry Bowman therefore designed a new workhouse, capable of housing some 670 people, at Shaw Heath.

The Shaw Heath Workhouse (Image - Stockport Heritage Trust)

The Daw Bank House of Industry was sold to Lord Vernon and became a coal depot, then an electrical instrument works, before being demolished in 1935. Today, only the wall and part of the drive remain and the land is used as a scrap yard. On Christmas day in 1841, the Shaw Heath Union Workhouse opened its doors.

This imposing, if somewhat austere, red brick building had separate wards for men and women, children's quarters, school rooms, exercise yards, kitchens, a bakery, wash house, smithy and pig sties.

An infirmary originally catered only for the sick inmates but from the 1880s, admission was increasingly extended to those who, although far from wealthy, did not qualify for poor relief.

Shaw Heath workhouse as seen from another angle (Image - Stockport Heritage Trust)

This system was the precursor to the National Health Service, established in 1948, in that it provided medical treatment for those unable to pay for it. Economic depression and unemployment led to a huge increase in those needing assistance and in 1894, the British Medical Journal decried the Shaw Heath workhouse for being 'over crowded to the point of danger in the event of a fire'.

The staff toiled in the face of impossible odds but despite their best efforts, the standard of care was compromised and the BMJ concluded that a new infirmary must be provided. As a result, Stepping Hill Hospital was built at Poplar Grove, to the south of the town centre.

Opening in December 1905, it provided accommodation for 340 patients and is still operational today, considerably extended and modernised but currently in need of further refurbishment. Shaw Heath Workhouse later became Shaw Heath Hospital, then St Thomas's Hospital, providing psychiatric treatment, and care facilities for older people.

Older generations variously referred to the building as the spike, the grubber, the bastille, or simply 'the house'. But whichever term was used, to them, it would always be the workhouse.