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England's last ‘climbing boy’ to be youngest Briton honoured with a blue plaque
AN 11-year-old chimney sweep whose death led to a change in Victorian child labour laws is to become the youngest Briton to be honoured with an official blue plaque.
George Brewster became the last “climbing boy” to die in England after he got stuck in a flue at the County Pauper Lunatic Asylum in Fulbourn near Cambridge.
An Act of Parliament banning the use of climbing boys was passed seven months later in September 1875 after the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury vowed to renew attempts to change the law.
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