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Adoptions and The Salvation Army
It was in the early 1880s that the problem of street children came to the notice of the Salvation Army. The solution they offered was long term fostering, which in time evolved in to formal legal adoptions. Before the 1926 Adoption Act, legal adoptions took place in a solicitors office rather than in a court. A document of conveyance was drawn up and in cases where the Salvation Army was involved, a copy of the document was kept. Some of these still survive in our Archives.
In 1882, the first adoption book (Book 1) commenced. However, by August of 1885, only sixteen pages had been filled. The last of these entries, a boy R. G., was adopted by Miss Emma Booth, as an example to others.
Adoption advert from 1887 War Cry
Adoption Book 2 was begun in 1889 and was initially used in conjunction with Adoption Book 1. An Adoption Board was set up along with an Adoption Department which absorbed the 'children's department'. Salvationists were given priority when wanting to adopt whilst other evangelical Christians were given second priority.
When Adoption Book 3 was started, just before the First World War, procedures became increasingly more formal. After the 1926 Act was passed, the Army did not register as an adoption society but acted as one until 1933. After that date, no one was adopted through The Salvation Army. We continued to be involved with adoptions as introduction agents, guardian ad litem and generally giving advice and acting as natural mother's 'friend' in legal terms.
In 1946, the law was changed again and from then until 1958 we were introduction agents. Only in exceptional circumstances were we otherwise involved. Adoption Book 4 was commenced under these rules in 1947 but only a few pages have been used. After 1958 the Army has only been involved when the adoptive parents were Salvation army officers - the last case being in 1963.
Individual matrons of our mother and baby homes were sometimes approached by members of the general public searching for a child to adopt and after making a few general enquiries, they would introduce the enquirer to one of their girls who had already indicated that she wanted her baby adopted. These cases subsequently proceeded as private adoptions. When this happened, they should have informed Headquarters and mostly they did.
The Army’s official policy was that every encouragement was given to the girls to keep their babies, and if adoption was desired then a proper adoption society was brought in. Some of our Wardens/Matrons had their favourites in adoption societies and these got a preference. Mother and baby work, (which started in 1896 in an annexe of our girls rescue home in Chelsea and closed in 1982 in Clapton, E5), was not the only source of babies for adoption. Nor did we seek to make it so.
At the beginning, adoptions of older children other than babies were conducted, such as A. G. aged six, in 1885, and in 1895, adverts appeared regularly for children, such as a girl aged seven, to be adopted until the age of sixteen at least. The family must be Salvationists. During the war, it was not unusual for children aged three, four or five, to have lost parents in air-raids or killed in action. Children badly placed by harassed welfare officers were sometimes taken by the Army and re-fostered by people who later adopted the child privately.
When The Salvation Army was involved in the adoption some letters have been filed under the adoption book page number ie 3/79a, 3/45, 4/22, etc. Some of these letters tell us very little apart from who had the baby’s ration book (a typical wartime enquiry), or what the adoptive father’s profession was.
Under the current legislation in England and Wales, an adopted person over the age of eighteen who was adopted before 12 November 1975 may obtain a copy of their original bith certificate through the General Register Office, after attending an informal meeting with an adoption advisor. A birth relative wishing to make contact with an adopted person can apply to an approved Intermediary Agency for assistance. [Note: The legislation on access to records will be different in other countries.]
There is some controversy over siblings. The phrase ‘I am looking for my brother that I did not know I had until my mother died’, always presents us with some problems. Various social work agencies have a different policy on such cases.
 There are several reasons why an adoption is sometimes thought to have been a 'Salvation Army adoption' when it was not:
Contact Captain Kevin Pooley (the Social Services Historian at the Salvation Army International Heritage Centre) for further information - Tel: 020 7737 4071
e-mail: heritage@salvationarmy.org
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