Foundling Museum

Thomas Coram, a retired sea captain, spent seventeen years lobbying the British aristocracy to establish a home for abandoned infants in the mid eighteenth century. He grew horrified by the sight of discarded children left to die in the gutters of London and successfully petitioned King George the Second for a royal charter. The resulting Foundling Hospital became the first incorporated charity in the country. It provided a sanctuary for thousands of children who would otherwise have faced certain death or lifelong poverty.