The million-peopled city
Garwood, John
1853
The Pensioners.
"The pensioners who are the objects of this charity must be seamen or marines, disabled by age, or maimed in the Queen's service. Foreigners, who have served two years in the , are also admitted; as also merchant- seamen, who have received wounds in defending or taking any ship, or in fight against a pirate. The widows of seamen are also provided for in the establishment, and enjoy exclusively the privilege of being appointed nurses. | |
"Probably few of our readers will be prepared to hear of the large number of pensioners who are now in . Every Saturday night all are expected to sleep within the building, and the gates then close on very nearly 4,000 individuals, 'as many (as an officer remarked to one | |
92 | of our missionaries) as would people a town, and yet enclosed, as you see, as it were, in a nut-shell.' There are about 2,700 pensioners, 800 boys, 103 nurses, 100 officers, and wives, families, and servants of officers, nearly make up the remaining 297." |