These are also licensed watermen. The London watermen rarely apply the
term bargemen to any persons working on the river; they confine the
appellation to those who work in the barges in the canals, and who
need not be free of the river, though some of them are so, many of
them being also seamen or old men-of-war’s men. The river lightermen
(as the watermen style them all, no matter what the craft) are,
however, so far a distinct class, that they convey goods only, and not
passengers: while the watermen convey only passengers, or such light
goods as passengers may take with them in the way of luggage. The
lighters are the large boats used to carry the goods which form the
cargo to the vessels in the river or the docks, or from the vessels
to the shore. The barge is a kind of larger lighter, built deeper and
stronger, and is confined principally to the conveyance of coal. Two
men are generally employed in the management of a barge. The lighters
are adapted for the conveyance of corn, timber, stone, groceries and
general merchandise: and the several vessels are usually confined
to such purposes--a corn lighter being seldom used, for instance,
to carry sugar. The lighters and barges in present use are built to
carry from 6 to 120 tons, the greater weight being that of the huge
coal barges. A lighter carrying fourteen tons of merchandise costs,
when new, 120_l._--and this is an average size and price. Some of
these lighters are the property of the men who drive them, and who are
a prosperous class compared with the poor watermen. The lightermen
cannot be said to apply for hire in the way of the watermen, but they
are always what they call “on the look out.” If a vessel arrives,
some of them go on board and offer their services to the captain in
case he be concerned in having his cargo transported ashore; or they
ascertain to what merchant or grocer goods may be consigned, and
apply to them for employment in lighterage, unless they know that
some particular lighterman is regularly employed by the consignee.
There are no settled charges--each tradesman has his regular scale,
or drives his own bargains for lighterage, as he does for the supply
of any other commodity. I heard no complaints of underselling among
the lightermen, but the men who drive their own boats themselves
sometimes submit to very hard bargains. Laden lighters, I was told
on all hands, ought not, in “anything like weather,” to be worked by
fewer than two men; but the hard bargains I have spoken of induce some
working lightermen to attempt feats beyond their strength, in driving
a laden lighter unassisted. Sometimes the watermen have to put off to
render assistance, when they see a lighter unmanageable. Lighters can
only proceed with the tide, and are often moored in the middle of the
river, waiting the turn of the tide, more especially when their load
consists of heavy articles. The lighters, when not employed, are moored
alongshore, often close to a waterman’s stairs. Most master-lightermen
have offices by the waterside, and all have places where “they may
always be heard of.” Many lightermen are capitalists, and employ a
number of hands. The “London Post Office Directory” gives the names of
175 master-lightermen. If a ship has to be laden or unladen in a hurry,
one of them is usually employed, and he sets a series of lighters “on
the job,” so that there is no cessation in the work. Most lightermen
are occasionally employers; sometimes engaging watermen to assist
them, sometimes hiring a lighter, in addition to their own, from some
lighterman. A man employed occasionally by one of the greater masters
made the following statement:--
“I work for Mr. ----, and drive a lighter that cost above 100_l._,
mostly at merchandise. I have 28_s._ a-week, and 2_s._ extra every
night when there’s nightwork. I should be right well off if that lasted
all the year through, but it don’t. On a Saturday night, when we’ve
waited for our money till ten or eleven perhaps, master will say, ‘I
have nothing for you on Monday, but you can look in.’ He’ll say that to
a dozen of us, and we may not have a job till the week’s half over, or
not one at all. That’s the mischief of our trade. I haven’t means to
get a lighter of my own, though I can’t say I’m badly off, and I’m a
single man; and if I had a lighter I’ve no connexion. There’s very few
of the great lightermen that one has a regular berth under. I suppose I
make 14_s._ or 15_s._ the year through, lumping it all like.”
[Illustration: THAMES LIGHTERMEN.
[_From a Sketch._]]
The lightermen who are employed in the conveyance of goods chargeable
with duty are licensed by the Excise Office, as a check against the
conveyance of contraband articles. Both the proprietors of the lighter
and the persons he employs must be licensed for this conveyance, the
cost being 5_s._ yearly. A licensed man thus employed casually by
the master-lighterman is known as a jobber, and has 6_s._ a-day; the
average payment of the regular labourers of the lighterman is 25_s._
a-week; but some employers, whom I heard warmly extolled as the old
masters, give 30_s._ a-week. In addition to this 25_s._ or 30_s._, as
the case may be, nightwork ensures 2_s._ or 2_s._ 6_d._ extra. Thus the
permanent labourers under the lightermen appear to be fairly paid.
The master-lightermen, as I said before, are, according to the “Post
Office Directory,” 175 in number. I am told that the number may be
taken (as the Directory gives only those that have offices) at 200 at
the least, and that of this number one half employ, on an average,
one man each. The proprietors of the lighters who average ten hands
in their employ cannot be reckoned among men working on the river,
except perhaps one-fourth of their number, but of the other class
all work themselves. The annual number of actual labourers in this
department of metropolitan industry will thus be 125 proprietors to
1100 non-proprietors, or 1225 in all, driving 1100 lighters at the
least. The bargemen, who are also employed, when convenience requires,
as lightermen, are 400 or 500, driving more than half that number of
barges; but in these are not included many coal-barges, which are the
property of the coal-merchants having wharfs. The number of London
boat-bargemen and lightermen given in the Occupation Abstract of 1841
was 1503, which, allowing for the increase of population, will be found
to differ but slightly from the numbers above given.
The lightermen differ little in character from the watermen, but,
as far as their better circumstances have permitted them, they have
more comfortable homes. I speak of the working lightermen, who are
also proprietors; and they can all, with very few exceptions, read
and write. They all reside near the river, and generally near the
Docks--the great majority of them live on the Middlesex side. They
are a sober class of men, both the working masters and the men they
employ. A drunken lighterman, I was told, would hardly be trusted
twice. The watermen and lightermen are licensed by the by-laws of
the City, passed for the regulation of the freemen of the Company of
Master, Wardens, and Commonalty of Watermen and Lightermen of the River
Thames, their widows and apprentices, to row or work boats, vessels,
and other craft, in all parts of the river, from New Windsor, Berks,
to Yantlet Creek (below Gravesend), Kent, and in all docks, canals,
creeks, and harbours, of or out of the said river, so far as the tide
flows therein. A rule of the corporation, in 1836, specifies the
construction and dimensions of the boats to be built, after that date,
for the use of the watermen. A wherry to carry eight persons, was to
be 20-1/2 feet in length of keel, 4-1/2 feet breadth in the midships,
and of the burden of 21 cwt. A skiff to carry four persons was to be 14
feet length of keel, 5 feet breadth in the midships, and 1 ton burden.
The necessity of improved construction in the watermen’s boats, since
the introduction of steamers caused swells on the river, was strongly
insisted on by several of the witnesses before Parliament, who produced
plans for improved craft, but the poverty of the watermen has made
the regulations of the authorities all but a dead letter. These river
labourers are unable to procure new boats, and they patch up the old
craft.
The census of 1841 gives the following result as to the number of those
employed in boatwork in the metropolis:--
Boat and barge-men and women 2516
Lightermen 1503
Watermen 1654
----
5673
The boat and barge-men and women thus enumerated are, I presume,
those employed on the canals which centre in the metropolis; so that,
deducting these from the 5673 labourers above given, we have 3157, the
total number of boat, bargemen, lightermen, and watermen, belong to the
Thames.