3-071-143 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Home for Orphan Boys at Swanley, opened by the Prince and Princess of Wales, 1883. 'We present an Illustration of the new buildings at Swanley, a junction station of the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway, near Farningham, which have been erected, in connection with those at Farningham, for the reception of Orphan and Fatherless Boys. The opening of the Swanley Homes on Friday, by their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wales, will be described in our next publication, when further details of their plans, and of the progress of this interesting charitable institution may be supplied. The Earl of Aberdeen, the chairman of the committee, was to receive their Royal Highnesses at five in the afternoon. Three hundred boys from the Farningham Cottage Homes would sing appropriate hymns. The Archbishop of Canterbury would offer prayer for a blessing on the Homes and the inmates; and a memorial-tree would be planted by the Princess of Wales'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.