Of these I can at present give but a general description. The
individual instances of oppression that I have sought out I must
reserve for a subsequent page, when I most heartily hope that the
publication of the iniquity of which these poor fellows are the
victims, will be at least instrumental in putting an end to a most
vile and wicked plan for the degradation and demoralization of our
fellow-creatures. The tales I have to tell are such as must rouse every
heart not positively indurated by the love of gain. I must, however, be
here content, as I said before, with merely describing the system.
The duty of the ballast-heaver is to heave into the holds of the ship
the ballast brought alongside the vessel by the Trinity-lighters from
the dredging-engines. The ships take in ballast either in the docks or
in the Pool. When the ship is cranky-built, and cannot stand steady
after a portion of her cargo has been discharged, she usually takes
in what is called shifting or stiffening ballast. The ballast is
said to stiffen a cranky vessel, because it has the effect of making
her firm or steady in the water. The quantity of ballast required by
cranky vessels depends upon the build of the ships. Sixty tons of
cargo will stiffen the most cranky vessel. I am informed by those who
have been all their lives at the business, that they never knew a
vessel, however cranky, but what 60 tons’ weight would stiffen her.
Some vessels are so stiff-built, that they can discharge the whole of
their cargo without taking in any ballast at all. These are generally
flat-bottomed vessels, whereas cranky vessels are built sharp towards
the keel. The colliers are mostly flat-bottomed vessels, and could in
calm weather return to the north without either ballast or cargo in
them. This, however, is not allowed by the owners. The generality of
ships discharge all their cargo before they take in any ballast. The
cranky-built ships form the exception, and begin taking in ballast when
they are about three-parts discharged. When a ship requires ballast,
the owner or one of his agents or servants applies to the Trinity
House for the quantity needed. If the ship belong to the merchant
service, and is lying in any of the docks, the owner has to pay 1_s._
7_d._ per ton to the Trinity Company for the ballast supplied: but
if the merchant vessel be lying in the Pool, then the price is 1_s._
3_d._ per ton, and if the vessel be a collier, the price is 1_s._ per
ton. On application being made at the Ballast Office, the party is
supplied with a bill, specifying the name and situation of the vessel,
the quantity of ballast required for her, and the price that has been
paid for it. The bill is then taken to the Ruler’s Office, where it is
entered in a book, and the ship supplied with the ballast, according to
the place that she has on the books. If the weather is rough, a ship
has often to remain three or four days without receiving the ballast
she wants. The application for ballast is seldom made directly from
the captain or shipowner himself. There are parties living in the
neighbourhood of Wapping and Ratcliffe who undertake, for a certain
sum per score of tons, to have the requisite quantity of ballast put
aboard the ship. These parties are generally either publicans, grocers,
butchers, lodging-house keepers or watermen, and they have a number of
labourers dealing with them whom they employ to heave the ballast on
board. The publicans, butchers, grocers, or lodging-house-keepers, are
the ballast-contractors, and they only employ those parties who are
customers at their houses. It is the owner or captain of the vessel
who contracts with these “truckmen” for the ballasting of the ship
at a certain price per score of tons, and the truckmen for that sum
undertake not only to procure the ballast from the Trinity Company,
and save the owner or captain all the trouble of so doing, but also to
carry it from the Trinity-lighters on board the ship. The reason of the
publicans, grocers, butchers, or lodging-house-keepers, undertaking
the job is to increase the custom at their shops, for they make it a
rule to employ no heavers but those who purchase their goods from them.
The price paid to these truckmen varies considerably. Their principal
profit, however, is made out of the labourers they employ. The highest
price paid to the contractors for putting the ballast on board colliers
(exclusive of the cost of the ballast itself) is 10_s._ per score tons.
Many contractors charge less than this--not a few indeed undertake to
do it for 9_s._, and there are one or two who will do it for 8_s._
the score. But these, I am informed, “are men who are trying to get
the work away from the other contractors.” The highest price paid to
the contractors for ballasting small merchant vessels is 12_s._ per
score as well. For large vessels the price varies according to their
size, and, consequently, the number of heavers required to put the
ballast on board. The lowest price paid per score to the contractors
for small merchant vessels is 10_s._ Eight or nine years ago the price
for ballasting small merchant vessels was much higher. Then the highest
price paid to the contractor was 15_s._ Since that time the prices
both for merchant vessels and colliers have been continually falling.
This, I am told, arises from the number of contractors increasing,
and their continual endeavours to underwork one another. Before the
establishment of the Coal-whippers’ Office, the contractors for ballast
were solely publicans; and they not only undertook to put ballast on
board, but to deliver the coals from the ships as well. At this time
the publicans engaged in the business made rapid and large fortunes,
and soon became shipowners themselves, but after the institution of
the Coal-whippers’ Office, the business of the publicans, who had
before been the contractors, declined. Since that period the contracts
for ballasting ships have been undertaken by butchers and grocers, as
well as publicans, and the number of these has increased every year,
and according as the number of the contractors has increased, so have
the prices decreased, for each one is anxious to undersell the other.
In order to do this, the contractors have sought everywhere for fresh
hands, and the lodging-house-keepers in particular have introduced
labouring men from the country, who will do the work at a less price
than those who have been regularly brought up to the business: and
I am credibly informed, that whereas nine or ten years ago every
ballast-heaver was known to his mates, now the strangers have increased
to such an extent that at least two-thirds of the body are unacquainted
with the rest. There is treble the number of hands at the work now, I
am told, to what there was but a few years back. The prices paid by
the contractors to the ballast-heavers are very little below what the
owners pay to them, indeed some of the publicans pay the heavers the
same price that they themselves receive, and make their profit solely
out of the beer and spirits supplied to the workmen. The butchers
and grocers generally pay the men 6_d._ and some 1_s._ in the score
less than they themselves get; but, like the publican, their chief
profit is made out of the goods they supply. The lodging-house-keepers
seldom contract for the work. They are generally foremen employed by
the publican, butcher, or grocer contracting, and they make it a rule
that the ballast-heavers whom they hire shall lodge at their house,
as well as procure their beer, meat, or grocery, as the case may be,
from the shop of the contractor by whom they are employed. All the
English ships that enter the port of London are supplied with ballast
in this manner. The owners always make it a rule to contract with some
publican, butcher, grocer, or lodging-house-keeper for the ballasting
of their vessels, and it is impossible for the ballast-heaver to
obtain employment at his calling but by dealing at the shops of some
or other of these parties. According to the Government returns there
were 170 ballast-heavers in the metropolis in 1841, and I am assured
that there are more than double that number at present, or nearly 400
labourers engaged in the business. There are now 27 publicans who make
a regular business of contracting for the supply of ballast. Besides
these there are four butchers, the same number of grocers, and as many
lodging-house-keepers. Further than this, there is a foreman attached
to each of the public-houses, or butchers’ or grocers’ shops, and
these foremen are mostly lodging-house-keepers as well. The foremen in
general have the engagement of the heavers, and the first hands they
employ are those who lodge at their houses: these hands are expected
also to deal with the contractor under whose foreman they serve. The
heavers generally, therefore, are obliged to lodge at the house of some
foreman, and to obtain their meat, beer, and grocery from the different
ballast-contractors, in order to obtain work; indeed, with the
exception of clothing, the heaver is compelled to obtain almost every
article he consumes through the medium of some contractor. The greater
the number of contractors the heaver deals with, the greater is his
chance of work. The rule with each of the contractors is to give credit
to the hands they employ, and those who are the most in debt with them
have the preference in labour. The butchers and grocers generally
charge 1_d._ per lb. extra for everything they sell to the heavers,
and the publicans make it up in adulteration. Each of the publicans,
butchers, and grocers, who make a rule of contracting for the supply
of ballast, has, on an average, two gangs of men dealing at his house,
and if he have more ships to supply than his regular hands are capable
of doing, then he sends the foreman to either of the places of call
where the unemployed men wait for hire throughout the day. Each ship
requires from four to six heavers to put the ballast on board, and the
men generally ship about 50 tons in the course of the day. They often
do as much as 100 tons, and sometimes only 20 in the day. The heavers
are divided into constant and casualty men.
The constant men are the first gang working out of the public-house,
or butchers’ or grocers’ shops. The constant men with the publicans
are those that are the best customers. “If they didn’t drink,” said
my informant, “they’d be thought of very little use.” These constant
men make three times as much as the casualty men, or, in other words,
they have three times as much to drink. Generally, one-fifth part of
what the publican’s constant men earn is spent in drink. The casualty
men are those who belong to no regular houses; but these, if taken on
by a publican, are expected to spend the same amount in drink as the
constant men. There are no ballast-heavers who are teetotalers. “Indeed
it would be madness,” says my informant, “for a man to think of it, for
to sign the pledge would be entirely to deprive himself and his family
of bread.”
To complete the different classes of ballast-labourers, I will conclude
with the statement of a casualty man:--
“I am about 57,” (said my informant, who was 6 feet high, and
looked like a man far older than 57,) “and have been 35 years a
ballast-heaver, with the exception of seven or eight years, when I had
the care of some horses used in coal-waggons. When I first knew the
trade, earnings was good. I might clear my 1_l._ a-week. On that I
brought up four sons and one daughter--all now married. At that time, I
mean when I first worked at ballast-heaving, the men were not so much
employed by publicans and other tradesmen. A gang of men could then
get work on their own account, a good deal easier than they can get
it now through the tradesmen who supply the ballast. As the trade got
more and more into the hands of the publicans and such-like, it grew
worse and worse for such as me. We earned less, and were not anything
like to call free men. Instead of my 1_l._ I had to stir myself to make
15_s._ or as low as 12_s._ a-week. Lately I have been what is called
a casualty man. There’s constant men and casualties. Each publican
has a foreman to look out, and get men, and see after them. These
foremen--all of them that I know of--keeps lodgers, charging them 2_s._
6_d._ or 3_s._ a-week for a room they could get but for this tie,
for 2_s._--ay, that they could. Suppose now a publican has a ship to
supply with ballast, he acquaints his foreman, and the foreman calls on
his lodgers, and sets them to work. These are the constant men. They
have always the first turn out of the house. If they return from work
at 4, and there’s another job at 5, they get it. That’s interest you
see, sir. The more such men earn this way, the more they’re expected
to spend with the publican. It’s only bad stuff they have to drink at
a full price. It’s only when all the constant men are at work, and a
job must be done at once, that me, and such as me, can get work. If
I hear of a chance of a job I call on the foreman. If I have money,
why, I must drink myself, and treat the foreman with a drop of gin, or
what he fancies. If I haven’t the money, I have the worse chance for a
job. Suppose I get a job and earn 6_s._ out of 60 tons of ballast; out
of that 6_s._ I may have 4_s._, or, at most, 4_s._ 6_d._ to take home
with me, after paying for what I must drink at the publican’s--what I’m
forced to spend. Casualty men have sad trouble to get any work. Those
that belong to the houses have all the call. Last week I was on the
look-out every day, and couldn’t get a single job, nor earn a single
farthing. Last night I had to get a bite of supper at my son’s, and a
bite of breakfast this morning as well, and I had to borrow a pair of
shoes to come out in. The best week’s work I’ve had this winter was
15_s._ I had five days in one ship. For that five days I was entitled,
I fancy, to 20_s._, or may be 21_s._, so that the difference between
that and the 15_s._ went for drink. I only wanted a pint of beer now
and then at my work--two or three a day. The worst of it is, we don’t
get drink at our work so much as at the public-house we’re employed
from. If we want to go home, some of the constant men want to have
more and more, and so the money goes. Other weeks I have carried home
10_s._, 8_s._, 5_s._, and many a week nothing, living as I could. It
would be a deal better for poor men, like me, if tradesmen had nothing
to do with ballast work. If the men that did the work were paid by the
gentlemen what wants the ballast, there might then be a living for a
poor man. As it is, it’s a very bad, hateful system, and makes people
badly off. A ballast-man may sit in a tap-room, wet, and cold, and
hungry, (I’ve felt it many a time,) and be forced to drink bad stuff,
waiting to be paid. It always happens, unless they’re about shutting
up, that we have to wait. We have no sick-fund or benefit societies.
I declare to you, that if anything happened to me--if I was sick--I
have nothing to call my own but what I’ve on; and not all that, as I’ve
told you--and there’s nothing but the parish to look to. (Here the man
somewhat shuddered.) I pay 2_s._ a-week rent.
“Then again, sir, there’s the basket-men at the docks--all the docks.
They’re as bad to the poor man as the publican, or worse. The way they
do is this. They’re not in any trade, and they make it their business
to go on board ships--foreign ships--American generally. In better
times, twenty or twenty-five years ago, there used to be 1_s._, and as
high as 1_s._ 6_d._ paid for a ton from such ships to a gang of six
ballast-men. I’ve earned six, seven, and eight shillings a-day myself
then. We heaved the ballast out of the lighters with our shovels on to
a stage, and from that it was heaved into the hold. Two men worked in
the lighter, two on the stage, and two in the hold of the vessel. The
basket-men manage to fill the hold now by heaving the ballast up from
the lighter in baskets by means of a windlass. The basket-man contracts
with the captain, and then puts us poor men at the lowest rate he can
get; he picks them up anywhere, anything in the shape of men. For
every half-crown he pays these men he’ll get 9_s._ for himself, and
more. An American liner may require 300 tons of ballast, and, maybe,
a captain will give a basket-man 8_d._ a-ton: that would be 10_l._
The basket-man employs six men, and he makes another. He never works
himself--never--not a blow: but he goes swaggering about the ship when
his men are at work, and he’s on the look-out in the streets at other
times. For the 10_l._ he’ll get for the 300 tons, he’ll pay his men
each 2_s._ 6_d._ for 60 tons, that is 3_l._ 15_s._, and so there’s
6_l._ 5_s._ profit for him. Isn’t that a shame, when so many poor men
have to go without dinner or breakfast? There’s five basket-men to my
knowledge. They are making money all out of poor men that can’t help
themselves. The poor suffers for all.”
In order to assure myself of the intensity of the labour of
ballast-heaving, of which I heard statements on all sides, I visited a
gang of men at work, ballasting a collier in the Pool. My engagements
prevented my doing this until about six in the evening. There was a
very dense fog on the river, and all along its banks; so thick was
it, indeed, that the water, which washed the steps where I took a
boat, could not be distinguished, even with the help of the adjacent
lights. I soon, however, attained the ballast-lighter I sought. The
ballast-heavers had established themselves alongside a collier, to be
filled with 43 tons of ballast, just before I reached them, so that
I observed all their operations. Their first step was to tie pieces
of old sail, or anything of that kind, round their shoes, ankles, and
half up their legs, to prevent the gravel falling into their shoes,
and so rendering their tread painful. This was rapidly done; and the
men set to work with the quiet earnestness of those who are working
for the morrow’s meal, and who know that they must work hard. Two
men stood in the gravel (the ballast) in the lighter; the other two
stood on “a stage,” as it is called, which is but a boarding placed
on the partition-beams of the lighter. The men on this stage, cold as
the night was, threw off their jackets, and worked in their shirts,
their labour being not merely hard, but rapid. As one man struck his
shovel into the ballast thrown upon the stage, the other hove his
shovelful through a small porthole in the vessel’s side, so that the
work went on as continuously and as quickly as the circumstances could
possibly admit. Rarely was a word spoken, and nothing was heard but an
occasional gurgle of the water, and the plunging of the shovel into
the gravel on the stage by one heaver, followed instantaneously by the
rattling of the stones in the hold shot from the shovel of the other.
In the hold the ballast is arranged by the ship’s company. The throwing
of the ballast through the porthole was done with a nice precision. A
tarpaulin was fixed to prevent any of the ballast that might not be
flung through the porthole being wasted by falling into the river, and
all that struck merely the bounds of the porthole fell back into the
lighter; but this was the merest trifle. The men pitched the stuff
through most dexterously. The porthole might be six feet above the
stage from which they hove the ballast; the men in the lighter have an
average heave of six feet on to the stage. The two men on the stage and
the two on the lighter fill and discharge their shovels twelve times in
a minute; that is, one shovelful is shot by each man in every alternate
five seconds; so that every one of the four men engaged at the work
flings the height of 36 feet every minute, or 2160 feet in an hour; and
in that time, according to the concurrent computation of the heavers,
the four men may easily fling in 10 tons, or 5600 lbs. a man. The men
work with the help of large lanterns, being employed mostly by night.
I shall now state the sentiments of the men generally, and then
individually, upon the subject of their grievances.
To be certain as to the earnings of the men, to see their condition,
and to hear from a large number of them their own statements as to the
hardships they suffered, and the sums they gained, I met two bodies of
the ballast-heavers, assembled without pre-arrangement. At one station
50 were present, at the other 30. The men were chiefly clad in coarse,
strong jackets; some of them merely waistcoats, with strong, blue
flannel sleeves, and coarse trowsers, thick with accumulated grease
from long wear. They had, notwithstanding their privations, generally
a hardy look. There was nothing squalid in their appearance, as in
that of men who have to support life on similar earnings with in-door
employment. Their manners were quiet, and far from coarse. At the first
meeting 50 were present. One man said, “Well, I think I am the oldest
man at present, and I don’t get above 5_s._ a-week; but that’s because
I’m an old man, and cannot work with the young ones.” Upon an average
the common men earned 10_s._ a-week the year through, and took home
5_s._ I inquired, “Are you all compelled to spend a great part of all
you earn in drink with the publican?” The answer was simultaneously,
“All of us--all--all!” Of the remainder of their earnings, after the
drink deductions, the men were all satisfied they spent so much, that
many only took 2_s._ 6_d._ a-week home to their wives and families on
an average. Last week two earned 20_s._, the publican taking 10_s._
from each. Three earned 15_s._; one of these took 1_s._ 6_d._ home,
the other 3_s._, both working for publicans; the third, who worked for
a grocer, took home 13_s._; the other 2_s._ being spent in tea and
sugar, he being a single man. Three earned 10_s._; one, working for a
publican, carried home 6_s._, the difference going in compulsory drink;
another 4_s._, and another 5_s._ Six did one load of ballast, receiving
7_s._ 6_d._ each for it; one took home 4_s._ 11_d._; another 6_s._
6_d._ (a private job); another, who did a load for 5_s._ 3_d._, took
home 2_s._ 3_d._; the other two took home 5_s._ each. One man earned
3_s._, and took it all home, having worked at a private job for a
foreigner. Fifteen earned nothing in the course of the last week. For
the last fortnight nine had earned nothing. There were nine present
that had earned something in the last three weeks. “The fortnight
before Christmas,” said one, “I didn’t earn 5_s._ all that fortnight.”
“Nor I, nor I,” said several others. On being asked, “Are you compelled
to spend half of your earnings in drink?” there was a general cry of,
“More than that, sir; more than that.” I asked if men were forced to
become drunkards under this system; there was a general cry of, “We
are; and blackguards, too.” Seventeen were married men. Of them, 3
had no children; 3 had one child; 4 had 2 children; 2 had 3; 3 had
4; one had 5; one had 6. The men all said, that to get away from the
publican would be “a new life to them--all to their benefit--no force
to waste money in drink--and the only thing that would do them good.”
Many threw away the drink they had from the publicans, it was so bad;
they drank Thames water rather. They were all satisfied “they earned
10_s._ a-week the year through, spending of that sum what they _must_
spend, and what they were induced to spend, from 5_s._ to 7_s._ 6_d._
a-week.” “Another thing,” they said, “if you get a job, the publican
will advance 1_s._--now and then he may. They hate to give money;
there’s trust for as much grog as you like.” All hailed with delight
the least possible chance of being freed from the publican. One man
said he was compelled often enough to pawn something of his own or his
wife’s to go and spend it at the public-house, or he would have no
chance of a job. All declare “such a system never was known to have
been carried on for years.” Many said, “We shall be discharged if they
know we have told you the truth.” They stated that the ballast-heavers
numbered between 300 and 400. There were 60 craft, each requiring 4
heavers; and many men were idle when all the others were at work.
Thirty were present when I counted the other meeting. A man said there
might be three times that number looking for work then, and as many at
work belonging to that station alone. In 1841 the census returns showed
that there were 170 ballast-heavers; the men assembled declared that
their numbers had more nearly trebled than doubled since then. Within
the last two or three years many new hands had got to work, on account
of the distress in Ireland. The men agreed with the others I had seen
that they earned, one week with another, 10_s._, taking home but 5_s._
at the outside, and often only 2_s._ 6_d._ In answer to my questions
they said, the winter is the best season; the trade is very slack in
summer. Earnings in winter are pretty well double what they are in
summer. Many agricultural labourers work among the heavers in winter,
when they cannot be employed on the land. Of this body all said they
were sober men till they took to ballast-heaving, and would like to
become sober men again. (A general assent.) Three of the men had taken
the pledge before becoming ballast-heavers, and were obliged to break
it to get work. They had to drink five pots of beer, they declared,
where, if they were free men, they would only drink one. When asked
if the present system made drunkards, they answered with one voice,
“All; every ballast-heaver in it.” Twenty were married men. All their
wives and children suffered (this was affirmed generally with a loud
murmur), and often had nothing to eat or drink while their husbands
had but the drink. It was computed (with general concurrence) that
150 ballast-heavers paid foremen for lodgings, not half of them ever
seeing the bed they paid for. About twelve years ago they could earn
twice or three times as much as they can now; but prices were higher
(12_s._ per score, for what is now 8_s._), and the men were far less
numerous. The following is a precise statement of the sums to which
each ballast-heaver present was entitled, followed by the amount he
had carried home the week before, after payment of his compulsory
drinkings, and of what he might be induced to drink at the house of his
employer while waiting to be paid:--
Earned. | Took home.
£ 0 12 0 | £ 0 7 6
0 7 0 | 0 3 6
0 15 0 | 0 9 0
0 12 0 | 0 6 0
0 13 0 | 0 4 0
0 11 0 | 0 5 0
0 5 0 | 0 2 6
0 8 0 | 0 5 0
0 9 6 | 0 5 0
1 0 0 | 0 10 0
0 12 6 | 0 3 6
1 0 0 | 0 9 0
0 12 0 | 0 4 0
0 15 0 | 0 9 0
0 15 0 | 0 8 6
0 16 0 | 0 6 0
0 15 0 | 0 5 0
Nothing | Nothing
„ | „
„ | „
„ | „
0 12 0 | 0 2 6
0 9 0 | 0 5 0
1 0 0 | 0 4 6
1 0 0 | 0 10 0
0 10 0 | 0 3 0
0 10 0 | 0 5 0
0 12 0 | 0 2 6
0 8 0 | 0 3 6
0 14 0 | 0 9 0
-------- | --------
£16 13 0 | £ 7 7 0
This statement shows, out of 11_s._ 1-1/2_d._ earnings, a receipt of
less than 5_s._ a-week.
According to the returns of the Trinity House, there were 615,619
tons of ballast put on board 11,234 ships in the year 1848. The
ballast-heavers are paid at the rate of 6_d._ per ton for shovelling
the ballast out of the Trinity Company’s lighters into the holds of
vessels. Hence, the total earnings of the ballast-heavers in that
year were 15,390_l._ 9_s._ 6_d._ And calculating two-thirds (the
men say they always get rid of a half, and often three-fourths, of
their earnings in drink) of this sum to have been spent in liquor, it
follows that as much as 10,260_l._ 6_s._ 4_d._ went to the publican,
and only 5,130_l._ 3_s._ 2_d._ to the labouring men. According to this
estimate of their gross earnings, if we calculate the body of the
ballast-heavers as numbering 350 men, the average wages of the class
are about 16_s._ 6_d._ per week each man; or if we reckon the class at
400, then the average wages of each person would be about 14_s._ 6_d._
per week. From all I can learn this appears to be about the truth--the
earnings of the men being about 15_s._ a-week, and their real income
about 5_s._
* * * * *
The men shall now speak for themselves.
The first that I saw were two of the better class of foremen, who
volunteered to give me an account of the system.
“I am a foreman or ganger of the ballast-heavers,” said one. “I work
under a man who is a publican and butcher; and I also work under
another who is only a butcher. I, moreover, work under a grocer. I
engage the different gangs of men for the parties under whom I work. I
also pay the men. The publican, butcher, or grocer, as the case may be,
agrees to give me 9_s._ a score tons. The foremen often give the men
the same money as they themselves receive, barring a pot of beer or a
quartern of gin that they may have out of the job. Some foremen take
much more.”
Another foreman, who was present while I was taking the statement
of this man, here observed, that “Many foremen claim tow-tow, or a
‘fifth-handed’ proportion--that is, they will have 10_s._ when the
working men have only 5_s._ There is a great deal of imposition on the
working-classes here, I can assure you; the general thing, when we go
to a job out of a public-house is, that the publican expects the men
to drink to the amount of 4_s._ out of every 1_l._, and 6_s._ out of
every 30_s._ that’s coming to them--that is, one-fifth part of the
men’s money must be spent in liquor. The drink is certainly not the
best; indeed, if there is any inferior stuff they have it: it’s an
obligation on them that they drink. If they refuse to drink, they won’t
get employed, and that’s the plain truth of it. Oh, it’s long wanted
looking to; and I’m glad at last to find some one inquiring into it.
If they went to get the regular beer from the fair public-houses they
would have to pay 3_d._ a pot for it; and at the contracting publicans’
they must give 4_d._ a pot, and have short measure, and the worst of
stuff too. Every six pots of beer they give to the men is only five
pots fair measure; and the rum they charge them 2_d._ half-a-pint
more than the regular public-houses would, and far worse rum into the
bargain. Besides the profit on their drink, some publicans charge 6_d._
per score tons as well. Out of the money coming to the men after the
publican has been paid his score, many foremen claim one-fifth part
over and above their regular share; or, in other words, the foremen
takes two shares, and the men only one each. When the men have been
paid, the publican paying them expects them to spend a further sum in
drink, looking black at the man who goes away without calling for his
pint or his pot, and not caring if they drink away the whole of their
earnings. There’s a good many would be glad if the men sat in their
houses and spent their last farthing, and then had to go home penniless
to their wives and families.”
“I am a ‘ganger’ to a butcher as well as a publican,” said one of
the foremen. “His practice is just the same as the publican’s. He
receives 10_s._ per score tons, and pays me for the men 9_s._ The men
and myself are all expected to spend about one-half of our earnings
with the butcher in meat. He charges 6-1/2_d._ per lb.; and at other
houses, with ready money, I and the men might get it for 4_d._ as good.
His meat is at least one-third dearer than other butchers’. I am also
ganger to a grocer, and he gets about the same profit out of the men he
employs--that is to say, the articles he supplies the men with are at
least one-third dearer than at other shops. If anything, he makes more
out of the men than the butcher; for if any man goes a score (which he
always encourages) he stops the whole out the man’s earnings, and often
leaves him without a penny after the job is done. When the publican,
grocer, butcher, or lodging-house keeper has a contract for ballast,
he directs the foreman working under him to get together the gang that
regularly work from his house. This gang are men who always deal at the
shop, and the contractor would dismiss me if I was to engage any other
men than those who were his regular customers. Many a time a publican
has told me that some man was a good, hard drinker, and directed me to
engage him whenever I could. If a man sticks up a score, he also tells
me to put him on first of all: the grocer and the butcher do the same.
This system is the cause, I know, of much distress and misery among the
men; the publicans make the men drunkards by forcing them to drink. I
know many wives and children who starve half their time through it.
They haven’t a bit of shoe or clothing, and all through the publican
compelling the men to spend their earnings in drink. After the gang
is paid, at least three out of the four get drunk; and, often, the
whole four. Many a time I have seen the whole of the men reeling home
without a penny to bless themselves, and the wife and children have to
suffer for all this; they are ill-treated and half-starved: this I can
safely say from my own knowledge.”
I next saw two men, who stated that they were oppressed by the
publican, and the foreman also. The first said, “I work under a
publican, and have to pay the foreman one-fifth of my earnings; I only
have fourpence out of every shilling I earn, and I must be a sober man
indeed to get that. Both the publican and the foreman get eightpence
out of a shilling, and make their money out of my sweat. Nine years
ago I was left, to my sorrow, with nine motherless children, and I
am the slave of the publican. He is my destruction, and such are my
sufferings, that I don’t care what I do if I can destroy the system; I
shall die happy if I can see an end to it. I would go to bed supperless
to-night, and so should my children, if I could stop it. After I have
had a job of work, many’s the time I have not had a penny to take home
to my children, it has all gone betwixt the foreman and the publican;
and what is more, if I had brought anything home I should have stood
a worse chance of work the next day. If I had gone away with sixpence
in my pocket, the work that should have come to me would have gone
to those who had spent all in the house. I can solemnly say that the
men are made regular drunkards by the publicans. I am nine-and-twenty
years dealing with this oppression, and I wish from my heart I could
see an end to it, for the sake of my children and my fellow-creatures’
children as well. But I suffer quite as much from the foreman as I
do from the publican. I am obliged to treat him before I can get a
job of work. The man who gives him the most drink he will employ the
first. Besides this, the foreman has two-fifth parts of the money paid
for the job; he has twice as much as the men if he does any of the
work; and if he does none of the work he takes one-fifth of the whole
money: besides this, the men do three times the foreman’s labour. If
I could get the full value of my sweat, I could lay by to-morrow, and
keep my family respectably. In the room of that, now, my family want
bread often--worse luck, for it hurts my feelings. I have been idle
all to-day; for hearing of this, I came to make my statement, for it
was the pride of my heart to do all that I could to put an end to the
oppression. The publicans have had the best of me, and when the system
is done away with I shan’t be much the better for it. I have been
nine-and-twenty years at it, and it has ruined me both body and soul;
but I say what I do for the benefit of others, and those who come after
me.”
The other man said that he worked under a publican, and a grocer as
well, and lodged with a foreman. “I pay 2_s._ a week for my lodgings,”
he said; “there are two beds in the room, and two men in each. The
room where we all sleep is not more than seven feet long by five feet
wide, and barely seven feet high. There is no chimney in it. It is a
garret, with nothing in it but the two beds. There hadn’t need be much
more, for it wouldn’t hold even a chair besides. There’s hardly room,
in fact, for the door to open. I find it very close sleeping there at
night-time, with no ventilation, but I can’t help myself. I stay there
for the job of work. I must stay; I shouldn’t get a day’s work if I
didn’t. The lodgings are so bad, I’d leave them to-morrow if I could. I
know I pay twice as much as I could get them for elsewhere. That’s one
way in which I, for one, am robbed. Besides this, I am obliged to treat
the foreman; I am obliged to give him two glasses of rum, as well as
lodging at his house, in order to get employment. I have also to drink
at the public-house; one-fifth of my money is kept, first and foremost,
by the publican. That goes for the compulsory drink--for the swash
which he sends us on board, and that we think the Thames-water is sweet
and wholesome to it. It is expressly adulterated for our drink. If we
speak a word against it we should be left to walk the streets, for a
week and more forward. Even if we were known to meet a friend, and have
a pint or a pot in another public-house, we should be called to an
account for it by the publican we worked under, and he would tell us to
go and get work where we spent our money; and, God knows, very little
money we would have coming out of his house after our hard sweat.
After the compulsory drink, and the publican has settled with us, and
his fifth part of our hard-earned money for the swash--it’s nothing
else--that he has given us to drink, then I should be thought no man at
all if I didn’t have two pots of beer, or half-a-pint of gin, so that
I would count myself very lucky indeed if I had a couple of shillings
to take home, and out of that I should have to spend two-thirds of it
to get another job. I am a married man, and my wife and three children
are in Ireland. I can’t have them over, for it is as much as I can do
to support myself. I came over here thinking to get work, and to send
them money to bring them over after me, but since I have been here I
have been working at the ballast-work, and I have not been able to keep
myself. I don’t complain of what is paid for the work; the price is
fair enough; but we don’t get a quarter of what we earn, and the Irish
ballast-heavers suffer more here than in their own country. When I came
over here I had a good suit of clothes to my back, and now I’m all in
rags and tatters, and yet I have been working harder, and earning more
money, that I did in all my life. We are robbed of all we get by the
foremen and publicans. I was eight years a teetotaler before I went
to ballast-work, and now I am forced to be a drunkard, to my sorrow,
to get a job of work. My wife and children have a bit of land in
Ireland to keep them, and they’re badly off enough, God knows. I can
neither help them, nor send money to bring them over to me; nor can I
get over to them myself. The grocers whom we work under rob us in the
same manner. I have worked under one. He supplied bread, butter, tea,
sugar, coffee, candles, tobacco, cheese, &c. It is a larger kind of
chandlers’ shop. He charges us 5-1/2_d._ for the same bread as I can
buy for 4-1/2_d._ at other shops. The tea, sugar, and other articles
he supplies us with are at the same rate; they are either worse or
dearer than at other shops. They generally manage to get a fifth part
of our earnings wherever we go; but the grocers are best of all, for
they don’t ruin our health, as what they give us don’t make us sick.
I work for these two houses because the foreman that I lodge with has
work out of both houses, and we are obliged to deal at the houses that
he works under; if we didn’t we shouldn’t get the job, so that if we
are not robbed by the publican we are by the grocer. They will have it
out of the poor hard-working man, and the foreman must have the gain
out of it as well. I only wish to God it was done away with, for it is
downright oppression to us all, and if I never have another stroke of
work I will strive all I can to have it done away with for the sake of
my fellow-men.”
[Illustration: BALLAST-HEAVERS AT WORK IN THE POOL.
[_From a Sketch._]]
After these two cases came one who said,--“I have been three years a
ballast-heaver. Just before that I came to this country. When I came
I got to be a lodger with a foreman to a publican. I paid him 2_s._
6_d._ a-week. My family, a wife and two children, came over when I had
got work as a ballast-heaver. I couldn’t take them to the lodgings I
then had; they were all for single men: so I had to take another place,
and there I went to live with my family; but to keep my work I had to
pay the foreman of the publican--him that lets these lodgings to the
ballast-heaver--2_s._ 6_d._ a-week all the same as if I had been living
there. That I had, and I had to do it for two years. Yes, indeed. I
didn’t earn enough to pay for two lodgings, so two or three months
back I refused to pay the 2_s._ 6_d._ a-week for a place I hadn’t set
my foot in for two years, and so I lost my work under that foreman and
his publican. If me and my children was starving for want of a bite of
bread, neither of them would give me a farthing. There’s plenty as bad
as them, too, and plenty used like me, and it’s a murdering shame to
tax poor men’s labour for nothing.”
This man reiterated the constant story of being compelled to drink
against his will, hating the stuff supplied to him, being kept for
hours waiting before he was paid, and being forced to get drunk,
whether he would or no. The man also informed me that he now works
under a butcher, who pays 8_s._ a score to the hands he employs, he
(the butcher) receiving from the captain 10_s._
“Suppose,” he said, “I have a 60-ton job, I’d be entitled to 7_s._
6_d._ without beer, or such-like; but under this butcher I get only
5_s._ 3_d._, and out of that 5_s._ 3_d._--that’s all I get in hard
money--I’m expected to spend 4_s._ or thereabouts in meat, such as he
chooses to give. I have no choice; he gives what he likes, and charges
me 6-1/2_d._ a-pound for what I could buy at 4_d._ in a regular way.
Very inferior stuff he keeps. Working under a butcher, we must all live
on this poor meat. We can’t afford bread or vegetables to it.”
This same butcher, I was afterwards informed, had been twice fined for
using false weights to customers, such as the man whose statement I
have given; he even used wooden weights made to look like lead.
The following is an instance of the injustice done to the men by those
who contract to whip rather than to heave the ballast on board.
“I now work,” said the man, whom I was referred to as an exponent of
the wrong, “for Mr. ----, a publican who contracts to supply ships
with ballast by the lump. He’ll contract to supply a ship with all the
ballast she’ll want by the lump--that is, so much money for all she
wants, instead of so much by the ton; or he may contract with a ship
at 2_s._ 6_d._ a-ton. We--that is a gang of eight men--may put two
loads or 120 tons on board in the course of a day. For those 120 tons
he will receive 120 half-crowns, that’s 15_l._ For putting in those
120 tons we--that is, the eight ballast-heavers employed--receive
2_s._ 6_d._ a-day of 12 or 14 hours; that is 8 half-crowns or 20
shillings, with 3_s._ 6_d._ a-day for a basket-man, in addition to
the eight, so leaving the publican a profit of 13_l._ 16_s._ 6_d._”
I could hardly believe in the existence of such a system--yielding
a mere pittance to the labourer, and such an enormous profit to the
contractor, and I inquired further into the matter. I found the
statement fully corroborated by many persons present; but that was not
all I learned. When the men, by incessant exertion, get in 120 tons
in a day, as they often do, nothing is charged them for the beer they
have had, four or five pints a-day each; but if only 60 tons be got
in, as sometimes happens, through the weather and other circumstances,
then the men employed on the half-a-crown a-day must pay for their own
beer and pay their private scores for treating a friend, or the like.
“There’s no chance of a job,” said my informant; “not a bit of it.” He
continued: “Very bad drink it is--the worst--it makes me as sick as a
dog. There’s two brothers there what they call blood-hounds; they’re
called so because they hunt up the poor men to get them to work, and
to see that they spend their money at their employer’s public-house
when work’s done. If you don’t spend something, no bread to cut the
next morning--not a bit of it--and no chance of another job there. He
employs us ballast-heavers, when we are not at the ballast, in backing
coals into the steamers.”
I have given the statement of a ballast-heaver as to the system pursued
by those whom he called basket-men. The employer here alluded to is one
of that class, the difference being, that the ballast-heavers shovel
the ballast out of the lighter on to the stage, and from the stage
through a port-hole into the hold. Four men are thus employed, two
on the lighter, and two on the stage. With a large ship five men are
employed, and two stages. When the basket-man or the man contracting
by the lump is employed, this process is observed:--There are two men
in the lighter alongside the vessel to be ballasted, whose business it
is to fill five baskets. There are five men at the winch aboard ship
employed heaving up these baskets, and a basket-man to turn them over
and empty out their contents.
To ascertain that there was no provident fund--no provision whatever
for sickness--I investigated the case of a man who, in consequence
of illness occasioned by his trade, was afflicted with a pulmonary
complaint. This man was formerly one of the wine-cellarmen in the
London Dock; he was then made a permanent man at the St. Katherine’s
Dock, and was dismissed for having taken a lighted pipe in while at
his work; and for the last fourteen years and upwards he has been a
ballast-heaver. I now give his wife’s statement:--“My husband has been
ill for three months, and he has been six weeks in Guy’s Hospital, and
I am afraid he’ll never get out again, for he kept up as long as he
could for the sake of the children. We have five at home; one of them
(twelve years old) I hope to get to sea, having two older sons at sea,
and being the mother of twelve children altogether. I will tell you
what led to my poor husband’s illness; he was a kind husband to me. I
consider it was his hard work that made him ill, and his not getting
his rights--not his money when entitled to it. After doing a heavy
day’s work he had to go and sit in a cold tap-room, drinking bad beer;
but it wasn’t beer--muck, I call it--and he had to wait to be paid,
ay, and might have had to wait till the day after, and then come home
cold and have to go to bed without a bit of victuals. His illness is
owing to that; no horse could stand it long. Ballast-men are worse than
slaves in the West Indies. When at work he earned what the others did.
He only drank what he couldn’t help--the worst of stuff. No drink, no
work. Six weeks ago he went to the hospital, I conveying him. When I
returned home I found three strange men had turned my four children
into the street, doing it in a brutal way. I rushed into the house,
and one said, ‘Who are you?’ I seized the fellow who said this by the
handkerchief, and put him out. One of them said, ‘Be off, you old Irish
hag, you have no business here; we have possession.’ When I saw the
children in the street, passion made me strong, and so I put him out.
The collector of the rent, who employed the broker, is a publican, for
whom my husband worked as a ballast-heaver until he was unable to work
from illness. I was given into custody for an assault, and taken before
Mr. Yardley. He considered the assault proved, and as an honest woman I
couldn’t deny it, and so I had fourteen days with bread and water. The
children were placed in the workhouse, where they were well treated. I
was very glad they were so taken care of. As soon as I got out I went
to see about my children; that was the first thing I did. I couldn’t
rest till I did that. I brought them home with me, though it was only
to bread and water, but I was with them. I only owed about 15_s._ rent,
and had been four years in the house at the time the publican put the
broker in. We paid 6_s._ 6_d._ a-week; it was no use asking such a man
as that any mercy. He was in the habit of employing ballast-heavers for
many years; and if that doesn’t harden a man’s heart, nothing will.
In general these ballast publicans are cruel and greedy. At present
I go out washing or charing, or doing anything I can to maintain
my children, but work’s very slack. I’ve had a day and a-half this
fortnight, earning 2_s._ 6_d._, that’s all for a fortnight; the parish
allows me four loaves of bread a-week. The children, all boys, just
get what keeps a little life in them. They have no bed at night, and
are starved almost to death, poor things. I blame the system under
which my husband had to work--his money going in drink--for leaving me
destitute in the world. On Christmas-day we lived on a bit of workhouse
bread--nothing else, and had no fire to eat it by. But for the money
gone in drink we might have had a decent home, and wouldn’t so soon
have come to this killing poverty. I have been tenderly reared, and
never thought I should have come to this. May God grant the system may
be done away with, for poor people’s sake.”
I now give the statement of two women, the wives of ballast-heavers,
that I may further show how the wives and families of these men are
affected by the present system.
“I have been 11 years married,” said one, “and have had five children,
four being now living.”
The other woman had been married 23 years, but has no children living.
“We are very badly off,” said the woman with a family, “my husband
drinking hard. When I first knew him--when we were sweethearts in a
country part of Ireland--he was a farm-labourer and I was a collier’s
daughter, he was a sober and well-behaved man. Two years after we
were married, and he was a sober man those two years still. We came
to London to better ourselves, worse luck. The first work he got was
ballast-heaving. Then he was obligated to drink or he couldn’t get
work; and so, poor man, he got fond of it. This winter oft enough he
brings me and the children home 2_s._ or 1_s._ 6_d._ after a job; and
on that we may live for two or three days,--we’re half starved, in
course. The children have nothing to eat. It’s enough to tear any poor
woman’s heart to pieces. What’s gone into the publican’s till would
get the children bread, and bedding, and bits of clothes. Nothing but
his being employed at ballast-heaving made him a drunkard, for he _is_
a drunkard now. He often comes home and ill-uses me, but he doesn’t
ill-use the children. He beats me with his fists; he strikes me in the
face; he has kicked me. When he was a sober man he was a kind, good
husband; and when he’s sober now, poor man, he’s a kind, good husband
still. If he was a sober man again with his work, I’d be happy and
comfortable to what I am now. Almost all his money goes in drink.”
“We can’t get shoes to our feet,” said the second woman.
“When my husband is sober and begins to think,” (continued the first,)
“he wishes he could get rid of such a system of drinking,--he really
does wish it, for he loves his family, but when he goes out to work he
forgets all that. It’s just the drink that does it. I would like him to
have a fair allowance at his work, he requires it; and beyond that it’s
all waste and sin: but he’s forced to waste it, and to run into sin,
and so we all have to suffer. We are often without fire. Much in the
pawn-shop do you say, sir? Indeed I haven’t much out.”
“We,” interposed the elder woman, “haven’t a stitch but what’s in
pawn except what wouldn’t be taken. We have 50_s._ worth in pawn
altogether--all for meat and fire.”
“I can’t, I daren’t,” the younger woman said, “expect anything better
while the present system of work continues. My husband’s a slave, and
we suffer for it.”
The elder woman made a similar statement. After his score is paid, she
said, her husband has brought her 4_s._, 3_s._, 2_s._, 1_s._, and often
nothing, coming home drunk with nothing at all. Both women stated that
the drink made their husbands sick and ill, and for sickness there was
no provision whatever. They could have taken me to numbers of women
situated and used as they were. The rooms are four bare walls, with a
few pieces of furniture and bedding such as no one would give a penny
for. The young woman was perfectly modest in manner, speech, and look,
and spoke of what her husband was and still might be with much feeling.
She came to me with a half-clad and half-famished child in her arms.
I then took, for the sake of avoiding repetition, the statements of
two ballast-heavers together--_constant men_--working under different
publicans. The account they gave me of the way in which the publicans
contracted to ballast a ship was the same as I have given elsewhere.
“I have been twenty years a ballast-heaver,” said one, “and all that
time I have worked for a publican, and haven’t a coat to my back.
Twenty years ago the publicans had the same number of hands, but had
more work for them, and I might then earn 20_s._ a-week; but I couldn’t
fetch that home from the publican. He expected me to spend one-half of
my earnings with him; and when I left his house drunk, I might spend
the other half. I’ve drunk gallons of drink against my will. I’ve drunk
stuff that was poison to me. I turned teetotaler about six months
ago, and the publican, my employer, _sacked_ me when he found it out,
saying, ‘He’d be d----d if he’d have such men as me--he didn’t make his
living by teetotalers.’”
“Yes,” added the other man, “and so _my_ publican told me; for I turned
teetotaler myself somewhere about seven years ago, and took the pledge
from Father Mathew in the Commercial-road. The publican told me, that
if Father Mathew chose to interfere with me, why Father Mathew might
get employment for me, for he--that’s the publican--wouldn’t. So I was
forced to break my pledge to live--me and my youngsters--I had six
then, and I’ve buried two since.”
“Work,” resumed the man who first gave me the statement, “keeps getting
worse. Last week I carried only 8_s._ home, and if I’d got paid by the
captain of the ship for the amount of work I did, and on the same terms
as the publican, I should have taken home at the very least 16_s._ The
publican that employs us gives us only 8_s._ a-score, and receives
10_s._ from the captain. All the publicans don’t do this; some give
what they get from the captain, but some publicans takes two-thirds,
and that’s the truth. (The second man assented.) One week with another
I’ve taken home, this winter, from 12_s._ to 13_s._, and but for this
shameful starvation system, having to work for a publican’s profit,
and to drink his drink, I’d take home my 20_s._ every week. It makes
a man feel like a slave; indeed, I’m not much better. We should be
in heaven if we got away from the publican or butcher either; it’s
compulsion one’s life through. Some of the publicans have as many as
sixty single men lodging in their houses, paying half-a crown a-week;
ay, and men that don’t lodge with them, when the house is full, must
pay half-a-crown all the same, to get a job of work, as well as paying
for the places where they do lodge.”