Can she escape her past?Patty Jenkins has come a long way from her poverty-stricken days in Brownlow workhouse. She now has a coveted position in the kitchens at Freeman's Department store in Liverpool and even the prospect of advancement.

But Dora is mixed race and illegitimate, two facts that see her treated as little more than a servant by her step-mother and half siblings.Sent to the local workhouse, Dora's future looks bleak but she still dreams of a better life where she can help others as her late mother did with her herbal remedies.