On Wednesday 13 December 2017 starting at 7.30pm in St. Mary’s Church Hall, East Leake (opposite St. Mary’s Church Main Street) Peter Hammond tells how in August 1799 cotton mill representatives promised the children of the St Pancras workhouse a lavish life they could hardly imagine. Eagerly 80 boys and girls aged just 7 signed up as mill apprentices, contractually bound to the mill until the age of 21. One of these children was Robert Blincoe, an orphan who told his story to John Brown; this was published in 1832.