Elizabeth Gilbert and Her Work for the Blind

by Frances Martin

Mr. Walker, who invented a life-belt, offered the benefit of its manufacture to the Association, and a new trade, corkcutting, was set on foot.

In the course of the year the "Association of Blind Musicians" applied, through Mr. Swanson, blind organist of Blackheath Park Church, to be admitted to union with Bessie's influential society. She was warmly interested in the appeal, and willing to grant such help, pecuniary and other, as the greater Association could render to the less. The aim of Mr. Levy, Mr. James Lea Summers, Mr. Swanson, and other blind musicians was to give a thorough musical training to, and to obtain employment as organists and teachers for, blind men with a talent for music.

The petition was courteously received, and after much discussion by the Committee and consideration by Bessie, the prayer for union, but without pecuniary aid, was granted. The Musical Association, however, had neither sufficient funds nor enough influence for the undertaking. But the promotors acted as pioneers, and a few years later Bessie saw that the efforts of Dr. Campbell and the establishment of the Normal College for the Blind at Norwood, would satisfactorily accomplish all that the Blind Musicians had attempted.

The trades hitherto taught to women had been leather and bead work, and the making of nosebags for horses. These were found to be unremunerative, and it was necessary to substitute others for them. There was at that time a great demand for fine baskets imported from France, and it occurred to Bessie that if they could procure the blocks upon which these baskets were made and the tools used, she might learn the art of basket-making and teach the workwomen.

But there was a difficulty in the way. The manufacture of these baskets was a monopoly, and the firm to which they were consigned would give no information as to the locality whence they came. Some one must go to France and find out. Who could go except Levy!

It was to prepare him for this journey that for more than a year Bessie had been at every spare moment "embossing French words for L.," as the diary informs us, or dictating a vocabulary. In the autumn of 1858 he and his wife set out on their journey of discovery. Bessie had applied for a grant in aid of Levy's expenses, but the Committee did not accede to her request, so that funds were provided from her private purse.

The blind man and his wife took the wrong train at Calais, and for some time did not discover their mistake. However, they retraced their steps, and after many adventures learnt that the baskets arrived in large crates at Calais from the north of France, and were shipped for England. No one knew exactly whence they came. Levy commenced a search which threatened to be fruitless, when one day at St. Quentin he met a comis-voyageur, who told him that the village in which these baskets were made was Oigny, about eight miles distant.

On the following day Levy and his wife stood at the door of the very man who supplied baskets to the Institution, and found that their appearance caused surprise and alarm. But when Levy explained the object of his visit he met with a cordial reception. The manufacturer showed and allowed him to purchase blocks and tools; taught him the ingenious contrivance by which the blocks could be taken to pieces and removed when the baskets were completed, and gave him all the information in his power as to the method and cost of production. He also took him to the village where the workpeople lived; but it is a cider-growing country, and many were away at the apple harvest. Levy and his wife were kindly received in the cottages, and he wrote to Miss Gilbert that a canary was singing in every house, and that many of the villagers grew their own osiers.

The result of this journey was very encouraging, although Bessie did not learn the trade or become a teacher of basket making. She had other work to do. Levy himself taught the blind women, and says that he found them apt pupils. When Bessie visited London in November she reports that she "felt A. at the basket work, and was shown the use of all the tools and the blocks. The English ones are made much better than the French, but after French patterns. Found from all I saw and heard that a great advance has been made, but there are seventy-six more applicants for work. Saw and talked to H. to encourage him."