At the beginning of the nineteenth century a child who committed a crime was tried in the same court as an adult. If the judge or magistrate sentenced them to prison, they would be sent to the same prison as adult criminals.

Some campaigners, such as Mary Carpenter, argued that children should be kept away from adult criminals so that they did not learn bad habits from them. She also said that children should be given training and be allowed to play.

Pressure from campaigners led to Parliament passing the Reformatory Schools Act in 1854. The Act allowed reformatory schools to be set up and for them to be officially inspected. Magistrates could send children under the age of 16 to these schools, instead of to prison.

A reformatory school was set up in Newcastle in 1853, just before the Act passed through Parliament. The school was moved to Netherton, near Morpeth, in 1857. In 1933 Netherton became an “Approved School”, which replaced reformatories and industrial schools. Netherton continued to be a residential school for boys well into the 1980s.

When he entered Netherton, Isaac was sentenced to stay at the school until he was 19 years old, like most of the boys that were sent to the school.

When a boy left the school, the staff of the school kept in touch with them for a period of 3–4 years afterwards. The staff recorded their contact with Isaac in the pages that you can see here. We often think of reformatories as harsh places, but it is interesting to note that Isaac regularly wrote to the staff at Netherton once he left. This was not unusual.

Isaac left Netherton in April 1918, right at the end of the war. He joined the army as soon as he left the school. He started off his army career in Ripon where he became part of the “Trades Distribution Battalion (as shoemaker).”

Like most new recruits, he did not immediately go abroad. From 1918 to mid-1919, he moved from Yorkshire to Nottinghamshire and then to Staffordshire. In June 1919, he wrote to the school that he was going to France.

He did not go to France, but ended up in Antwerp, Belgium and near Cologne in Germany. In Germany he received treatment for a “poisoned finger”. When he was abroad, Isaac was part of the Royal Army Service Corps (RASC). The RASC were not directly involved in fighting, but provided transport and supplies to the troops.

Isaac’s time in the army did not end well. The letter that Isaac sent in April 1920 was from Dorchester Prison.

His Army Service record (from Ancestry.co.uk) shows that he was charged in November 1919 with stealing from a comrade (one of the other soldiers) and “masquerading as a corporal”. He pretended to be an officer when he was not, something that the army did not take kindly to. He was sentenced at a Court Martial (special military court) to nine months in prison with “hard labour”. After prison, he was discharged from the army. Even though he was forced to leave, he tried to join up to another part of the army, the Royal Engineers, in 1921. He lasted less than a month.

NRO 00820/B/10 p. 2993 Admission register entry for Isaac Cohen.