Born in Birmingham: Maternity, Midwives & Infant Welfare 1914-1924 is a project run by the Friends of Birmingham Archives & Heritage (FoBAH) and funded through the National Lottery Heritage Fund. It follows on from an earlier project: Birmingham Children of War which looked at the lives of children in Birmingham throughout WW1.

That project looked briefly at aspects of children’s health but we wanted to delve deeper into this topic. This project will allow volunteers to focus on both the health of new-born babies and infants, but also their mothers and at the changing role of midwives and growth in the numbers of health visitors. Birmingham was one of the pioneers of maternity care and infant welfare provision prior to the War, when health and infant welfare were delivered through a combination of voluntary and municipal schemes. But how did the City respond to issues arising during the war against a background of legislative changes, including the Midwives Act, and the Maternity and Child Welfare Act, acts passed in 1918? 

We will be looking at the journey from conception, through birth to infanthood.  We know from our earlier project that there was a growing emphasis during the war and post-war period on health and welfare as the nation looked to invest in the next generation – “Nations are Gathered out of Nurseries”.  How were these ideas put into practice through the development of a network of infant welfare centres across the city? 

As before we will be encouraging our volunteer researchers to share their findings via this blog in addition to producing a booklet and exhibition for launch in 2020. Feel free to follow us for regular updates, comment on our posts and if you are local to Birmingham check out our events or even join us for research sessions in the archives.