FORTUNE TO HELP POOR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22356, 29 February 1936, Page 2 (Supplement)

FORTUNE TO HELP POOR

RICH WOMAN'S SACRIFICE

GREAT WORK FOR HUMANITY "I LOVE THE SLUM DWELLERS" Bequeathed a fortune and large estate, a 33-year-old woman decided to devote her whole life to helping the poor. Now she is 76, having spent 43 years in the slums of Bethnal Green, London. She is white-haired Miss Mary James. In her humble little home in Paradise Row she was recently induced to reveal to a press representative the story of her career of charitv. "I have been working in Bethnal Green for 43 years," said Miss James, "and have lived in this little house for 41 years. My father, the Rev. W. R. J. James, of Newton-on-Trent, died when I was only 16. Ho and other members of the family left me farms and cottages in Herefordshire, and to-day I have a beautiful country house in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire. I was also left a considerable amount of money. "As a child I loved church work, and one day after a visit to the East End of London I was so distracted that I made up my mind to devote my life to relieving the needs of the sick and poor. This has always been on open house, and these walls have looked down on tragedy and suffering that I could never relate. I was among the Becond batch of women J.P.'s in the division of Bethnal Green, and it was a great day for me when three years ago I received the M.B.E. for my work. "I am never able to take any holidays at Christmas, as I have always made it a rule to have Christmas dinner in either the workhouse or the local hospital. After the holiday is over 1 rush off to the country for two or three days, to be on my own in the open fields and fresh air which I love.

"Things have changed in Bethnal Green since I came here. Drunkenness

is practically unknown here to-day. In their backvards the slum dwellers keep beautiful flower beds. My only regret is that they are not allowed to take their pet animals to the new homes which are being built for them. To many of the women here, who are on their own all day, this is a tragedy.

"Only recently a deaf-and-dumb boy had to have his pet cat taken away from him forcibly before he was allowed to go into one of the new houses. The authorities need have no fear that people are not clean. In the old days I have known workhouse boys leave here and compete with and beat publicschool men for thousands-a-year positions.

"The old boys have come back to see 'Miss James,' and to me it has been wonderful. I love the slum dwellers of Bethnal Green and would never leave them. I have spent most of a fortune to try to help those in need."

A friend of Mist James said: "During the many years I have known her I have never once come in here without finding her giving away either money or food to someone in need. People knock her up at all hours, and often she has returned home to see down-and-outs or coloured men waiting in this room for her.

"She has allowed them to sleep here, and has fed and 'mothered' them until they could find a job, and even to-day she is keeping someone whom she took pity on some months ago."