The Workhouse Girl - Tapa dura

Circumstances force eight-year-old Sarah Scrase and her widowed mother Ellen to enter the notorious St Giles and St George's Workhouse.

When Ellen dies in childbirth, the independent-minded Sarah falls foul of the workhouse master, Trigg and his cruel wife.

Sarah's ordeal seems to be over when philanthropist and sugar mill owner James Arbuthnot takes her into his home.

But her wealthy benefactor reports Trigg and his wife. And blaming Sarah for their misfortune, in a fit of revenge the couple decide to take the law into their own hands.

Sarah was trembling violently and a feeling of faintness almost overcame her, but she struggled to keep calm. She had already experienced the Tickler, Mr Trigg's much used method of corporal punishment, at least twice and she had only been an inmate at the workhouse for a few hours.

The Tickler had punished her for clinging to her mother's skirts when they were first separated, and had beaten her soundly for refusing to abandon her own clothes for the grey workhouse uniform. And now she was likely to endure another assault with the fearsome instrument of torture.

She glanced nervously at Matron's bulldog jaw set in a harsh line despite her flabby jowls, but she was not going to give in. 'I'm Sarah Scrase,' she whispered, 'and I want my ma.'