ABSTRACT
In November 1834 the Poor Law Commissioners issued instructions that the only remedy which can be entirely depended on for the mitigation and ultimate extinction of the various evils which have been generated by the faulty administration of the poor laws is The Workhouse System. The iconic significance of the new workhouses was not lost on the working class, particularly outside London. In East Anglia and elsewhere attacks on workhouses and assaults on officers were only the most obvious indication of antipathy towards the new poor law. Building a new workhouse was not the only way of expanding indoor provision, especially where economies of scale made it possible to support specialist institutions for different categories of pauper. The mixed institutional provision for lunatic paupers continued in the early years of the new poor law, although the relative importance of different arrangements shifted.
