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104
The Committee have grounds for believing that
supervision acts as a deterrent on those too easily led
away into evil courses, and on those who give trouble to
their employers, and too easily throw up their jobs for
no particular reason, or for a fancied grievance. A small
minority try to escape away from supervision altogether
and leave the neighbourhood. An endeavour is always
made to trace them. This is done not only for the sake
of the mental defective himself, but in the interest of the
community as well.
The majority of the parents have shown that they
are glad there is a body to whom an appeal can be made
in times of difficulty, and who will see to it that their
children are not left stranded when they, the parents, are
no longer here to protect them.
The Board of Control, continuing their investigations
into the mental and physical condition of children of
defectives, require now a yearly return through the local
authority of particulars of those defectives who have
married during the preceding year, and of those
defectives who have given birth to children during the
same period (a) after marriage; (b) while unmarried.
Two of our defectives were married in 1933. Three
married, and one unmarried, defectives have had
children.
The total number of married defectives on our 1933
list is seventeen. The number of children born to them
twenty-eight.
Three defectives, each suffering from distressing
physical disabilities in addition to their mental infirmities,
were removed during the year to the Farnborough
Institution, to await places in Institutions more specially
equipped to deal with such cases than an ordinary Poor
Law Institution can be. Of these three, one has recently
died; one has been removed to Eastney; the third, a case
needing a great deal of attention, is still at Farnborough.
The unmarried mother mentioned above was in
Farnborough Institution for her confinement. For her
and her baby, Sister Morgan has secured places in a
Church Army Home.