I've seen this photo many times, and I know that it also has made a deep impact on many others. When I saw it the first time I assumed that this poor, starving, physically and socially down-trodden woman was a former servant of a wealthy lady. The reason for that assumption was her dress: It looks like a silk dress that the woman may have had - or stolen - from her rich employer. I thought that the child might be hers, maybe after being raped or seduced by the master of the house, the husband of her employer. Actually, the picture gave me an idea of her life story that was a fantasy over the social circumstances of poor women at this time.
However, I found out that others knew - or fantasized - about it, and this fantasy (?) looks interesting to me: "This shocking image of a woman, probably in her 50s, known as a crawler was widely reproduced. It is taken on the steps of the workhouse on Short’s Gardens. Adolphe Smith says the woman earnt bread and a cup of tea by looking after the baby while the mother went to work. She was known as a crawler as these people were homeless and would ‘crawl’ from one area to another, sleeping outdoors or in casual wards."
Homelessness at its worst? No, I think it may have gotten much worse in other parts of the world, like e.g. USA.
https://mylearning.org/stories/streets-of-london-1870-1900/1246
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