Poor Relief in Elizabethan Ipswich

This database contains a collection of documents relating to poor relief in the city of Ipswich during the Elizabethan period. As stated in the preface, the intent of this work is to show how the upper class of a leading provincial town undertook solving the poverty problem before the passing of the Poor Law Act in 1598. Documents used in this work include those of the Tooley Foundation, Christ's Hospital, and Outdoor Relief. It also includes a register of the poor from 1569 to 1583 and a census of the poor taken in 1597. This database is a valuable source for researchers because of both the historical and specific individual information that it provides. Researchers with ancestors from Ipswich will especially find this database helpful.