How 5 Shillings, Faith and Belief inspired the Beginning of the Probation Service
Did you know that the forerunner of the modern Probation Service was set up in the police courts of Victorian London with a donation of just five shillings?
Or how the concerns of Christian churches (including the Primitive Methodists) and their temperance societies for the men, women (and children) facing trial and imprisonment for offences often associated with alcohol lead to the legislation resulting in the foundation of the Probation Service in 1907?
Or how the ideas and principles behind the work of the Probation Service would go on to be rolled out across the world?
The Root and Branch Exhibition will tell you all this and more.
The exhibition, created in partnership with the Probation Service and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) through the Association of Independent Museums (AIM), was opened at Englesea Brook in August 2023. Since then it has toured England and Wales, its last stop being Sheffield Hallam University in October/November 2024.
You can find out more about the exhibition, events, history and today’s Probation Service at the dedicated Root and Branch Exhibition website.
The Root and Branch story will continue with a new project entitled Picking up a Lost Thread. From the many personal accounts of the effects of alcohol misuse upon finance, health and relationships that emerged out of research for the exhibition Englesea Brook, in partnership with Adelaide School Link (Sixth Form), will create three short films that explore these themes then and now. This project has been made possible through funding from NLHF and AIM.
