Together Trust Archive

Today we tell a story from the Children’s Haven in regards to Thomas, a Refuge boy who ended up on the charity’s training ship, the Indefatigable . Thomas first came to the attention of the Manchester and Salford Refuge in 1896 when he turned up at midnight at the open-all-night shelter on Chatham Street, accompanied by a policeman. At the tender age of 12 years he had been sleeping on the streets of Manchester as he had nowhere else to go. Thomas on admittance

Today we dabble our feet in the water and move off dry land to the port of Birkenhead, following in the footsteps of hundreds of Manchester boys in the late 18th and early 19th century. Their destination? The Indefatigable ! A training ship moored in the River Mersey, which aimed to prepare boys for a life in the Merchant Navy.        Illustration from the Illustrated London News is of the training ship Indefatigable.