Ada Vachell

• Her father was a well to do citizen of Cardiff who had been Mayor of that city 3 time
• As a child she suffered from scarlet fever which resulted in her being left with a facility of constitution and deafness.
• In 1875 her parent with Ada and her baby brother moved to Severn House, Sneyd Park
• As a child Ada loved reading and had a natural bent towards literary and artistic subjects
• She attended lectures at the University and worked for a term or two at the School of Art
  
• She wrote little stories and articles, some of which found their way into print
• Ada started Sunday classes for maids and factory girls
• She taught 3 to 3 days a week at a training home for girls
• The girls called her “Sister Ada”
• In 1892 Ada was the pioneer in Bristol of the country holiday for working girls
• In 1895 The Guild began
• The first meeting was held in the Girls Clubroom, but soon moved to the Settlement at Broad Plain
  
• The Guild held tea parties for new members
  
• The Guild also held services on the first Sunday evening in every month for girls, their families and their sweethearts
  
• In 1899 to meet the needs of the crippled children in the Guild, Ada initiated the Invalid Children’s School
  
• 1895 while staying with friend in London she was taken to see the Guild of the Poor Things founded by Sister Grace (Mrs C.W. Kimmins) in West London Mission
  
• The idea of the Guild had been suggested by Mrs Ewing’s Charming Story ‘The story of a short life
  
• The scheme of enrolling cripples to fight their crippledom under flags and banners with marching orders and high courage in their hearts, was first adopted by Sister Grace
  
• Ada saw that it was not so much to relieve the want and suffering as to create a new spirit and new discipline of life, cheered by fellowship and lightened by sympathy and understanding
  
• It was not a charity, it was to be a sort of military religious order for maimed people, young and old. With military symbolism of scarlet flags, badges and medals, which had a value in emphasising the solder’s ideal of loyalty and courage
• The motto ‘Laetus Sorte mea’ (Happy in my lot) was the key to the new life that had to be lived.
  
• Ada return to Bristol posses with the idea of this Guild
  
• The first meeting of the Guild of the Poor Young Things was held in her little upstairs back room. The second meeting was held in Broad Plain House, a mission settlement in the City
  
• In 1918 the name of the Guild of the Poor Young Things was changes to the Guild of the Handicapped to meet the wishes of the lads and younger men who had found the original name a source of misunderstanding and adverse criticism in their workshops and amount their friends
  
• Sister Ada wrote ‘The Guild of the Handicapped for our members, old and young, have each some weightier impediment they must carry through life. We want to try and help them to carry it bravely, even smilingly – to teach, in spite of physical disability the straight race can be run, the good fight fought’
• The Guild paid as loans the premiums necessary for the child of the Guild to undertake apprenticeships