The dredgermen of the Thames, or river finders, naturally occupy the
same place with reference to the street-finders, as the purlmen or
river beer-sellers do to those who get their living by selling in the
streets. It would be in itself a curious inquiry to trace the origin
of the manifold occupations in which men are found to be engaged in
the present day, and to note how promptly every circumstance and
occurrence was laid hold of, as it happened to arise, which appeared to
have any tendency to open up a new occupation, and to mark the gradual
progress, till it became a regularly-established employment, followed
by a separate class of people, fenced round by rules and customs of
their own, and who at length grew to be both in their habits and
peculiarities plainly distinct from the other classes among whom they
chanced to be located.
There has been no historian among the dredgers of the Thames to record
the commencement of the business, and the utmost that any of the
river-finders can tell is that his father had been a dredger, and so
had his father before him, and that _that’s_ the reason why they are
dredgers also. But no such people as dredgers were known on the Thames
in remote days; and before London had become an important trading
port, where nothing was likely to be got for the searching, it is not
probable that people would have been induced to search. In those days,
the only things searched for in the river were the bodies of persons
drowned, accidentally or otherwise. For this purpose, the Thames
fishermen of all others, appeared to be the best adapted. They were on
the spot at all times, and had various sorts of tackle, such as nets,
lines, hooks, &c. The fishermen well understood everything connected
with the river, such as the various sets of the tide, and the nature
of the bottom, and they were therefore on such occasions invariably
applied to for these purposes.
It is known to all who remember anything of Old London Bridge, that at
certain times of the tide, in consequence of the velocity with which
the water rushed through the narrow apertures which the arches then
afforded for its passage, to bring a boat in safety through the bridge
was a feat to be attempted only by the skilful and experienced. This
feat was known as “shooting” London Bridge; and it was no unusual thing
for accidents to happen even to the most expert. In fact, numerous
accidents occurred at this bridge, and at such times valuable articles
were sometimes lost, for which high rewards were offered to the finder.
Here again the fishermen came into requisition, the small drag-net,
which they used while rowing, offering itself for the purpose; for,
by fixing an iron frame round the mouth of the drag-net, this part
of it, from its specific gravity, sunk first to the bottom, and
consequently scraped along as they pulled forward, collecting into the
net everything that came in its way; when it was nearly filled, which
the rower always knew by the weight, it was hauled up to the surface,
its contents examined, and the object lost generally recovered.
It is thus apparent that the fishermen of the Thames were the men
originally employed as dredgermen; though casually, indeed, at first,
and according as circumstances occurred requiring their services. By
degrees, however, as the commerce of the river increased, and a greater
number of articles fell overboard from the shipping, they came to be
more frequently called into requisition, and so they were naturally led
to adopt the dredging as part and parcel of their business. Thus it
remains to the present day.
The fishermen all serve a regular apprenticeship, as they say
themselves, “duly and truly” for seven years. During the time of their
apprenticeship they are (or rather, in former times they _were_)
obliged to sleep in their master’s boat at night to take care of his
property, and were subject to many other curious regulations, which are
foreign to this subject.
I have said that the fishermen of the Thames to the present day unite
the dredging to their proper calling. By this I mean that they employ
themselves in fishing during the summer and autumn, either from
Barking Creek downwards, or from Chelsea Reach upwards, catching dabs,
flounders, eels, and other sorts of fish for the London markets. But in
winter when the days are short and cold, and the weather stormy, they
prefer stopping at home, and dredging the bed of the river for anything
they may chance to find. There are others, however, who have started
wholly in the dredging line, there being no hindrance or impediment
to any one doing so, nor any licence required for the purpose: these
dredge the river winter and summer alike, and are, in fact, the only
real dredgermen of the present day living solely by that occupation.
There are in all about 100 dredgermen at work on the river, and these
are located as follows:--
Dredgermen.
From Putney to Vauxhall there are 20
From Vauxhall to London-bridge 40
From London-bridge to Deptford 20
And from Deptford to Gravesend 20
---
100
All these reside, in general, on the south side of the Thames, the two
places most frequented by them being Lambeth and Rotherhithe. They do
not, however, confine themselves to the neighbourhoods wherein they
reside, but extend their operations to all parts of the river, where
it is likely that they may pick up anything; and it is perfectly
marvellous with what rapidity the intelligence of any accident
calculated to afford them employment is spread among them; for should
a loaded coal barge be sunk over night, by daylight the next morning
every dredgerman would be sure to be upon the spot, prepared to collect
what he could from the wreck at the bottom of the river.
The boats of the dredgermen are of a peculiar shape. They have no
stern, but are the same fore and aft. They are called Peter boats,
but not one of the men with whom I spoke had the least idea as to the
origin of the name. These boats are to be had at almost all prices,
according to their condition and age--from 30_s._ to 20_l._ The boats
used by the fishermen dredgermen are decidedly the most valuable. One
with the other, perhaps the whole may average 10_l._ each; and this sum
will give 1000_l._ as the value of the entire number. A complete set
of tackle, including drags, will cost 2_l._, which comes to 200_l._
for all hands; and thus we have the sum of 1200_l._ as the amount of
capital invested in the dredging of the Thames.
It is by no means an easy matter to form any estimate of the earnings
of the dredgermen, as they are a matter of mere chance. In former
years, when Indiamen and all the foreign shipping lay in the river,
the river finders were in the habit of doing a good business, not only
in their own line, through the greater quantities of rope, bones,
and other things which then were thrown or fell overboard, but they
also contrived to smuggle ashore great quantities of tobacco, tea,
spirits, and other contraband articles, and thought it a bad day’s work
when they did not earn a pound independent of their dredging. An old
dredger told me he had often in those days made 5_l._ before breakfast
time. After the excavation of the various docks, and after the larger
shipping had departed from the river, the finders were obliged to
content themselves with the chances of mere dredging; and even then, I
am informed, they were in the habit of earning one week with another
throughout the year, about 25_s._ per week, each, or 6500_l._ per annum
among all. Latterly, however, the earnings of these men have greatly
fallen off, especially in the summer, for then they cannot get so good
a price for the coal they find as in the winter--6_d._ per bushel being
the summer price; and, as they consider three bushels a good day’s
work, their earnings at this period of the year amount only to 1_s._
6_d._ per day, excepting when they happen to pick up some bones or
pieces of metal, or to find a dead body for which there is a reward. In
the winter, however, the dredgermen can readily get 1_s._ per bushel
for all the coals they find; and far more coals are to be found then
than in summer, for there are more colliers in the river, and far more
accidents at that season. Coal barges are often sunk in the winter,
and on such occasions they make a good harvest. Moreover there is the
finding of bodies, for which they not only get the reward, but 5_s._,
which they call inquest money; together with many other chances, such
as the finding of money and valuables among the rubbish they bring up
from the bottom; but as the last-mentioned are accidents happening
throughout the year, I am inclined to think that they have understated
the amount which they are in the habit of realizing even in the summer.
The dredgers, as a class, may be said to be altogether uneducated, not
half a dozen out of the whole number being able to read their own name,
and only one or two to write it; this select few are considered by the
rest as perfect prodigies. “Lor’ bless you!” said one, “I on’y wish
you’d ’ear Bill S---- read; I on’y jist wish you’d ’ear him. Why that
ere Bill can read faster nor a dog can trot. And, what’s more, I seed
him write an ole letter hisself, ev’ry word on it! What do you think
o’ that now?” The ignorance of the dredgermen may be accounted for by
the men taking so early to the water; the bustle and excitement of the
river being far more attractive to them than the routine of a school.
Almost as soon as they are able to do anything, the dredgermen’s boys
are taken by their fathers afloat to assist in picking out the coals,
bones, and other things of any use, from the midst of the rubbish
brought up in their drag-nets; or else the lads are sent on board
as assistants to one or other of the fishermen during their fishing
voyages. When once engaged in this way it has been found impossible
afterwards to keep the youths from the water; and if they have learned
anything previously they very soon forget it.
It might be expected that the dredgers, in a manner depending on
chance for their livelihood, and leading a restless sort of life on
the water, would closely resemble the costermongers in their habits;
but it is far otherwise. There can be no two classes more dissimilar,
except in their hatred of restraint. The dredgers are sober and steady;
gambling is unknown amongst them; and they are, to an extraordinary
degree, laborious, persevering, and patient. They are in general men of
short stature, but square built, strong, and capable of enduring great
fatigue, and have a silent and thoughtful look. Being almost always
alone, and studying how they may best succeed in finding what they
seek, marking the various sets of the tide, and the direction in which
things falling into the water at a particular place must necessarily
be carried, they become the very opposite to the other river people,
especially to the watermen, who are brawling and clamorous, and delight
in continually “chaffing” each other. In consequence of the sober and
industrious habits of the dredgermen their homes are, as they say,
“pretty fair” for working men, though there is nothing very luxurious
to be found in them, nor indeed anything beyond what is absolutely
necessary. After their day’s work, especially if they have “done well,”
these men smoke a pipe over a pint or two of beer at the nearest
public-house, get home early to bed, and if the tide answers may be
found on the river patiently dredging away at two or three o’clock in
the morning.
Whenever a loaded coal barge happens to sink, as I have already
intimated, it is surprising how short a time elapses before that part
of the river is alive with the dredgers. They flock thither from all
parts. The river on such occasions presents a very animated appearance.
At first they are all in a group, and apparently in confusion, crossing
and re-crossing each other’s course; some with their oars pulled in
while they examine the contents of their nets, and empty the coals
into the bottom of their boats; others rowing and tugging against the
stream, to obtain an advantageous position for the next cast; and when
they consider they have found this, down go the dredging-nets to the
bottom, and away they row again with the stream, as if pulling for a
wager, till they find by the weight of their net that it is full; then
they at once stop, haul it to the surface, and commence another course.
Others who have been successful in getting their boats loaded may be
seen pushing away from the main body, and making towards the shore.
Here they busily employ themselves, with what help they can get, in
emptying the boat of her cargo--carrying it ashore in old coal baskets,
bushel measures, or anything else which will suit their purpose; and
when this is completed they pull out again to join their comrades, and
commence afresh. They continue working thus till the returning tide
puts an end to their labours, but these are resumed after the tide has
fallen to a certain depth; and so they go on, working night and day
while there is anything to be got.
The dredgerman and his boat may be immediately distinguished from
all others; there is nothing similar to them on the river. The sharp
cutwater fore and aft, and short rounded appearance of the vessel,
marks it out at once from the skiff or wherry of the waterman. There
is, too, always the appearance of labour about the boat, like a ship
returning after a long voyage, daubed and filthy, and looking sadly in
need of a thorough cleansing. The grappling irons are over the bow,
resting on a coil of rope; while the other end of the boat is filled
with coals, bones, and old rope, mixed with the mud of the river. The
ropes of the dredging-net hang over the side. A short stout figure,
with a face soiled and blackened with perspiration, and surmounted by a
tarred sou’-wester, the body habited in a soiled check shirt, with the
sleeves turned up above the elbows, and exhibiting a pair of sunburnt
brawny arms, is pulling at the sculls, not with the ease and lightness
of the waterman, but toiling and tugging away like a galley slave, as
he scours the bed of the river with his dredging-net in search of some
hoped-for prize.
The dredgers, as was before stated, are the men who find almost all
the bodies of persons drowned. If there be a reward offered for the
recovery of a body, numbers of the dredgers will at once endeavour to
obtain it, while if there be no reward, there is at least the inquest
money to be had--beside other chances. What these chances are may
be inferred from the well-known fact, that no body recovered by a
dredgerman ever happens to have any money about it, when brought to
shore. There may, indeed, be a watch in the fob or waistcoat pocket,
for that article would be likely to be traced. There may, too, be a
purse or pocket-book forthcoming, but somehow it is invariably empty.
The dredgers cannot by any reasoning or argument be made to comprehend
that there is anything like dishonesty in emptying the pockets of a
dead man. They consider them as their just perquisites. They say that
any one who finds a body does precisely the same, and that if they
did not do so the police would. After having had all the trouble and
labour, they allege that they have a much better right to whatever
is to be got, than the police who have had nothing whatever to do
with it. There are also people who shrewdly suspect that some of the
coals from the barges lying in the river, very often find their way
into the dredgers’ boats, especially when the dredgers are engaged in
night-work; and there are even some who do not hold them guiltless of,
now and then, when opportunity offers, smuggling things ashore from
many of the steamers coming from foreign parts. But such things, I
repeat, the dredgers consider in the fair way of their business.
One of the most industrious, and I believe one of the most skilful and
successful of this peculiar class, gave me the following epitome of his
history.
“Father was a dredger, and grandfather afore him; grandfather was a
dredger and a fisherman too. A’most as soon as I was able to crawl,
father took me with him in the boat to help him to pick the coals, and
bones, and other things out of the net, and to use me to the water.
When I got bigger and stronger, I was sent to the parish school, but I
didn’t like it half as well as the boat, and couldn’t be got to stay
two days together. At last I went above bridge, and went along with a
fisherman, and used to sleep in the boat every night. I liked to sleep
in the boat; I used to be as comfortable as could be. Lor bless you!
there’s a tilt to them boats, and no rain can’t git at you. I used to
lie awake of a night in them times, and listen to the water shipping
ag’in the boat, and think it fine fun. I might a got bound ’prentice,
but I got aboard a smack, where I stayed three or four year, and if I’d
a stayed there, I’d a liked it much better. But I heerd as how father
was ill, so I com’d home, and took to the dredging, and am at it off
and on ever since. I got no larnin’, how could I? There’s on’y one or
two of us dredgers as knows anything of larnin’, and they’re no better
off than the rest. Larnin’s no use to a dredger, he hasn’t got no time
to read; and if he had, why it wouldn’t tell him where the holes and
furrows is at the bottom of the river, and where things is to be found.
To be sure there’s holes and furrows at the bottom. I know a good many.
I know a furrow off Lime’us Point, no wider nor the dredge, and I can
go there, and when others can’t git anything but stones and mud, I
can git four or five bushel o’ coal. You see they lay there; they get
in with the set of the tide, and can’t git out so easy like. Dredgers
don’t do so well now as they used to do. You know Pelican Stairs?
well, before the Docks was built, when the ships lay there, I could
go under Pelican Pier and pick up four or five shilling of a morning.
What was that tho’ to father? I hear him say he often made 5_l._ afore
breakfast, and nobody ever the wiser. Them were fine times! there was
a good livin’ to be picked up on the water them days. About ten year
ago, the fishermen at Lambeth, them as sarves their time ‘duly and
truly’ thought to put us off the water, and went afore the Lord Mayor,
but they couldn’t do nothink after all. They do better nor us, as they
go fishin’ all the summer, when the dredgin’ is bad, and come back in
winter. Some on us down here” [Rotherhithe] “go a deal-portering in the
summer, or unloading ’tatoes, or anything else we can get; when we have
nothin’ else to do, we go on the river. Father don’t dredge now, he’s
too old for that; it takes a man to be strong to dredge, so father goes
to ship scrapin’. He on’y sits on a plank outside the ship, and scrapes
off the old tar with a scraper. We does very well for all that--why he
can make his half a bull a day [2_s._ 6_d._] when he gits work, but
that’s not always; howsomever I helps the old man at times, when I’m
able. I’ve found a good many bodies. I got a many rewards, and a tidy
bit of inquest money. There’s 5_s._ 6_d._ inquest money at Rotherhithe,
and on’y a shillin’ at Deptford; I can’t make out how that is, but
that’s all they give, I know. I never finds anythink on the bodies. Lor
bless you! people don’t have anythink in their pockets when they gits
drowned, they are not such fools as all that. Do you see them two marks
there on the back of my hand? Well, one day--I was on’y young then--I
was grabblin’ for old rope in Church Hole, when I brings up a body, and
just as I was fixing the rope on his leg to tow him ashore, two swells
comes down in a skiff, and lays hold of the painter of my boat, and
tows me ashore. The hook of the drag went right thro’ the trowsers of
the drowned man and my hand, and I couldn’t let go no how, and tho’ I
roared out like mad, the swells didn’t care, but dragged me into the
stairs. When I got there, my arm, and the corpse’s shoe and trowsers,
was all kivered with my blood. What do you think the gents said?--why,
they told me as how they had done me good, in towin’ the body in, and
ran away up the stairs. Tho’ times ain’t near so good as they was, I
manages purty tidy, and hasn’t got no occasion to hollor much; but
there’s some of the dredgers as would hollor, if they was ever so well
off.”