them a little rill or gutter of running water; if the house was above
the road, it came from it, and crossed the way to run to another; if the
house was below us, it crossed us from some other distant house above
it; and at every considerable house was a manufactory; which not being
able to be carried on without water, these little streams were so parted
and guided by gutters or pipes, that not one of the houses wanted its
necessary appendage of a rivulet.
Again, as the dyeing-houses, scouring-shops, and places where they use
this water, emit it tinged with the drugs of the dyeing vat, and with
the oil, the soap, the tallow, and other ingredients used by the
clothiers in dressing and scouring, etc., the lands through which it
passes, which otherwise would be exceeding barren, are enriched by it to
a degree beyond imagination.
Then, as every clothier must necessarily keep one horse, at least, to
fetch home his wool and his provisions from the market, to carry his
yarn to the spinners, his manufacture to the fulling-mill, and when
finished, to the market to be sold, and the like; so every one generally
keeps a cow or two for his family. By this means, the small pieces of
inclosed land about each house are occupied; and, by being thus fed, are
still farther improved from the dung of the cattle. As for corn, they
scarce sow enough to feed their poultry.
Such, it seems, has been the bounty of nature to this county, that two
things essential to life, and more particularly to the business followed
here, are found in it, and in such a situation as is not to be met with
in any part of England, if in the world beside; I mean coals, and
running water on the tops of the highest hills. I doubt not but there
are both springs and coals lower in these hills; but were they to fetch
them thence, it is probable the pits would be too full of water: it is
easy, however, to fetch them from the upper parts, the horses going
light up, and coming down loaden. This place, then, seems to have been
designed by providence for the very purposes to which it is now
allotted, for carrying on a manufacture, which can nowhere be so easily
supplied with the conveniences necessary for it. Nor is the industry of
the people wanting to second these advantages. Though we met few people
without doors, yet within we saw the houses full of lusty fellows, some
at the dye-vat, some at the loom, others dressing the cloths; the women
and children carding, or spinning; all employed from the youngest to the
oldest; scarce any thing above four years old, but its hands were
sufficient for its own support. Nor a beggar to be seen, nor an idle
person, except here and there in an alms-house, built for those that are
ancient, and past working. The people in general live long; they enjoy a
good air; and under such circumstances hard labour is naturally attended
with the blessing of health, if not riches.
From this account, you will easily imagine, that some of these remote
parts of the North are the most populous places of Great Britain, London
and its neighbourhood excepted.
2. DEFOE'S ACCOUNT OF THE WOOL TRADE AND WOOLLEN INDUSTRIES [_D. Defoe,
The Complete English Tradesman, Ed. 1841, Vol. II, pp. 188-93_], _temp._
George II.
First, the wool itself, being taken from the sheep's back, either by the
shearer, the farmer, or by the fellmonger from the skin, becomes a
subject of trade; and is either sold to the stapler, or wool merchant,
and by him to the manufacturer, or is carried by the farmer and
fellmonger, as is sometimes the case, to the particular counties where
it is consumed.
These staplers and wool dealers are scattered all over the kingdom, and
are a very important and considerable sort of tradesmen, being the first
tradesmen into whose hands the said wool comes for sale: the principal
towns in England where they are found to be in any numbers together, are
in London, or Southwark rather, being principally in Barnaby Street, and
the town of Blandford in Dorsetshire; there are also some in Norwich and
in Lincolnshire, and in Leicestershire a great many.
Stourbridge fair is famous for the great quantity of wool sold there,
and which goes beyond any other fairs or markets in all the north or
east parts of England.
But wherever the wool is carried, and by whomsoever it is sold, this of
course brings it to the first part of its manufacturing; and this
consists of two operations:
1. Combing. 2. Carding.
The combers are a particular set of people, and the combing a trade by
itself; the carding, on the other hand, is chiefly done by workmen hired
by the clothiers themselves; the combers buy the wool in the fleece or
in the pack, and when it is combed, put it on to the next operation on
their own account. The carding is generally done by hired servants, as
above; these operations hand on the wool to the next, which is common to
both, viz., the spinning.
But before it comes this length, it requires a prodigious number of
people, horses, carts or wagons, to carry it from place to place; for
the people of those countries where the wool is grown, or taken as
above, are not the people who spin it into yarn.
On the contrary, some whole counties and parts of counties are employed
in spinning, who see nothing of any manufacture among them, the mere
spinning only excepted.
Thus the weavers of Norwich and of the parts adjacent, and the weavers
of Spitalfields in London, send exceeding great quantities of wool into
remote counties to be spun, besides what they spin in both those
populous counties of Norfolk and Suffolk; particularly they employ
almost the whole counties of Cambridge, Bedford, and Hertford; and
besides that, as if all this part of England was not sufficient for
them, they send a very great quantity of wool one hundred and fifty
miles by land carriage to the north, as far as Westmoreland, to be spun;
and the yarn is brought back in the same manner to London and to
Norwich.
This vast consumption of wool in Norfolk and Suffolk is supplied chiefly
out of Lincolnshire, a county famous for the large sheep bred up for the
supply of the London markets, as the western manufacturers are supplied
from Leicestershire; of which in its place.
Nor is all this sufficient still; but as if all England was not able to
spin sufficient to the manufacture, a very great quantity of yarn, ready
spun, is brought from Ireland, landed at Bristol, and brought from
thence by land carriage to London, and then to Norwich also.
The county of Essex, a large and exceedingly populous county, is chiefly
taken up with the great manufacture of bays and perpets; the consumption
of wool for this manufacture is chiefly bought of the staplers in
London; the sorting, oiling, combing, or otherwise preparing the wool,
is the work of the master manufacturer or bay maker; and the yarn is
generally spun in the same county, the extent of it being not less than
between fifty and sixty miles' square, and full of great and populous
towns, such as Colchester, Braintree, Coggeshall, Chelmsford,
Billericay, Bishop Stortford, Saffron Walden, Waltham, Romford, and
innumerable smaller but very populous villages, and, in a word, the
whole county full of people.
The western part of England, superior both in manufactures and in
numbers of people also, are not to be supplied either with wool or with
spinning, among themselves, notwithstanding two such articles in both,
as no other part of England can come up to by a great deal, viz.:
1. Notwithstanding the prodigious numbers of sheep fed upon those almost
boundless downs and plains in the counties of Dorset, Wilts, Gloucester,
Somerset, and Hampshire, where the multitudes, not of sheep only, but
even of flocks of sheep, are not to be reckoned up; insomuch that the
people of Dorchester say there are six hundred thousand sheep always
feeding within six miles round that one town.
2. Notwithstanding the large and most populous counties of Wilts,
Somerset, Gloucester, and Devon, in which the manufacture being so
exceeding great, all the women inhabitants may be supposed to be
thoroughly employed in spinning the yarn for them, and in which counties
are, besides, the populous cities of Exeter, Salisbury, Wells, Bath,
Bristol, and Gloucester; I say besides these, the greatest towns, and
the greatest number of them that any other part of the whole kingdom of
Great Britain can show, some of which exceed even the great towns of
Leeds, Wakefield, Sheffield, etc., in the North; such as Taunton,
Devizes, Tiverton, Crediton, Bradford, Trowbridge, Westbury, Froome,
Stroud, Biddeford, Barnstaple, Dartmouth, Bridgewater, Mynhead, Poole,
Weymouth, Dorchester, Blandford, Wimbourn, Sherbourne, Cirencester,
Honiton, Warminster, Tewksbury, Tedbury, Malmsbury, and abundance of
others, too many to set down; all which I mention, because those who
pretend to have calculated the numbers of people employed in these four
counties assure me that there are not so few as a million of people
constantly employed there in spinning and weaving for the woollen
manufacture only; that besides the great cities, towns, and seaports,
mentioned above, there are not less than one hundred and twenty market
towns, six large cities, and fifteen hundred parishes, some of which are
exceeding full of people.
And yet, notwithstanding all this, such is the greatness of this
prodigious manufacture, that they are said to take yearly thirty
thousand packs of wool, and twenty-five thousand packs of yarn ready
spun from Ireland.
From hence, take a short view of the middle part of England: Leicester,
Northampton, and Warwick shires have a prodigious number of large sheep,
which, as is said of Lincolnshire, are bred for the London markets; the
wool, consequently, is of an exceeding long staple, and the fineness is
known also to be extraordinary.
This wool is brought every week, Tuesday and Friday, to the market at
Cirencester, on the edge of Gloucester and Wilts; the quantity is
supposed to be at least five hundred packs of wool per week.
Here it is bought by the woolcombers and carders of Tedbury, Malmsbury,
and the towns on all that side of Wilts and Gloucester, besides what the
clothiers themselves buy; these carry it out far and near among the poor
people of all the adjacent countries, for the spinning; and having made
the yarn, they supply that manufacture as far as Froome, Warminster, and
Taunton; and thus the west country is furnished.
The north requires another inspection; the rest of the Leicestershire
wool merchants, who do not bring their wool southward, carry it forward
to the north, to Wakefield, Leeds, and Halifax; here they mix it with,
and use it among the northern wool, which is not esteemed so fine.
Not forgetting, notwithstanding, that they have a great deal of very
fine wool, and of a good staple, from the wolds or downs in the East
Hiding of Yorkshire, and from the bishoprick of Durham, more especially
the banks of the Tees, where, for a long way, the grounds are rich, and
the sheep thought to be the largest in England.
Hither all the finest wool of those countries is brought; and the
coarser sort, and the Scots' wool, which comes into Halifax, Rochdale,
Bury, and the manufacturing towns of Lancashire, Westmoreland, and
Cumberland, are employed in the coarser manufactures of those countries,
such as kerseys, half-thicks, yarn stockings, duffields, rugs, Turkey
work, chairs, and many other useful things, which those countries abound
in.
3. DEFOE'S ACCOUNT OF THE CORN TRADE [_D. Defoe, The Complete English
Tradesman, Ed. 1841, Vol. II, pp. 177-182_], _temp._ George II.
As the corn trade is of such consequence to us, for the shipping off the
overplus, so it is a very considerable business in itself; the principal
people concerned in it, as a trade, are, though very numerous, yet but
of four denominations;--
1. Cornfactors;
2. Mealmen;
3. Maltsters;
4. Carriers.
1. Cornfactors; these, as corn is now become a considerable article of
trade, as well foreign as inland, are now exceeding numerous; and though
we had them at first only in London, yet now they are also in all the
great corn markets and ports where corn is exported through the whole
island of Britain; and in all those ports they generally correspond with
the corn factors in England.
Those in the country ride about among the farmers, and buy the corn even
in the barn before it is threshed; nay, sometimes they buy it in the
field standing, not only before it is reaped, but before it is ripe.
This subtle business is very profitable; for, by this means, cunningly
taking advantage of the farmers, by letting them have money before-hand,
which they, poor men, often want, they buy cheap when there is a
prospect of corn being dear; yet sometimes they are mistaken too, and
are caught in their own snare; but indeed, that is but seldom; and were
they famed for their honesty, as much as they generally are for their
understanding in business, they might boast of having a very shining
character.
2. Mealmen; these generally live either in London or within thirty miles
of it, that employment chiefly relating to the markets of London; they
formerly were the general buyers of corn, that is to say, wheat and rye,
in all the great markets about London, or within thirty or forty miles
of London, which corn they used to bring to the nearest mills they could
find to the market, and there have it ground, and then sell the meal to
the shopkeepers, called mealmen, in London.
But a few years past have given a new turn to this trade, for now the
bakers in London, and the parts adjacent, go to the markets themselves,
and have cut out the shopkeeping mealmen; so the bakers are the mealmen,
and sell the fine flour to private families, as the mealmen used to do.
And as the bakers have cut out the meal shops in London, so the millers
have cut out the mealmen in the country; and whereas they formerly only
ground the corn for the mealmen, they now scorn that trade, buy the
corn, and grind it for themselves; so the baker goes to the miller for
his meal, and the miller goes to the market for the corn.
It is true, this is an anticipation in trade, and is against a stated
wholesome rule of commerce, that trade ought to pass through as many
hands as it can; and that the circulation of trade, like that of the
blood, is the life of the commerce. But I am not directing to what
should be, but telling what is; it is certain the mealmen are, in a
manner, cut out of the trade, both in London and in the country, except
it be those country mealmen who send meal to London by barges, from all
the countries bordering on the Thames, or on any navigable river running
into the Thames west; and some about Chichester, Arundel, and the coast
of Sussex and Hampshire, who send meal by sea; and these are a kind of
meal merchants, and have factors at London to sell it for them--either
at Queenhithe, the great meal-market of England, or at other smaller
markets.
By this change of the trade, the millers, especially in that part of
England which is near the Thames, who in former times were esteemed
people of a very mean employment, are now become men of vast business;
and it is not an uncommon thing to have mills upon some of the large
rivers near the town, which are let for three or four hundred pounds a
year rent.
3. Maltsters; these are now no longer farmers, and, as might be said,
working labouring people, as was formerly the case, when the public
expense of beer and ale, and the number of alehouses, was not so great,
but generally the most considerable farmers malted their own barley,
especially in the towns and counties, from whence they supplied London,
and almost every farmhouse of note.
As the demand for malt increased, those farmers found it for their
purpose to make more and larger quantities of malt, than the barley they
themselves sowed would supply; and so bought the barley at the smaller
farms about them; till at length the market for malt still increasing,
and the profits likewise encouraging, they sought far and near for
barley; and at this time the malting trade at Ware, Hertford, Royston,
Hitchin, and other towns on that side of Hertfordshire, fetch their
barley twenty, thirty, or forty miles; and all the barley they can get
out of the counties of Essex, Cambridge, Bedford, Huntingdon, and even
as far as Suffolk, is little enough to supply them; and the like it is
at all the malt-making towns upon the river of Thames, where the malt
trade is carried on for supply of London, such as Kingston, Chertsey,
Windsor, High Wycombe, Reading, Wallingford, Abingdon, Thame, Oxford,
and all the towns adjacent; and at Abingdon in particular, they have a
barley market, where you see every market-day four or five hundred carts
and wagons of barley to be sold at a time, standing in rows in the
market-place, besides the vast quantity carried directly to the
maltsters' houses.
The malt trade thus increasing, it soon came out of the hands of the
farmers; for either the farmers found so much business, and to so much
advantage, in the malting-trade, that they left off ploughing, and put
off their farms, sticking wholly to the malt; or other men, encouraged
by the apparent advantage of the malting-trade, set it up by itself, and
bought their barley, as is said above, of the farmers, when their malt
trade first increased; or both these together, which is most probable;
and thus malting became a trade by itself.
Again, though the farmers then generally left off malting in the manner
as above, yet they did not wholly throw themselves out of the profit of
the trade, but hired the making of their own malt; that is, to put out
their barley to the malthouses to be made on their account; and this
occasioned many men to erect malthouses, chiefly to make malt only for
other people, at so much per quarter, as they could agree; and at
intervals, if they wanted full employ, then they made it for themselves;
of these I shall say more presently.
Under the head of corn factors, I might have taken notice, that there
are many of those factors who sell no other grain than malt; and are, as
we may say, agents for the maltsters who stay in the country, and only
send up their goods; and assistants to those maltsters who come up
themselves.
The mentioning these factors again here, naturally brings me to observe
a new way of buying and selling of corn, as well as malt, which is
introduced by these factors; a practice greatly increased of late,
though it is an unlawful way of dealing, and many ways prejudicial to
the markets; and this is buying of corn by samples only. The case is
thus:--
The farmer, who has perhaps twenty load of wheat in his barn, rubs out
only a few handfuls of it with his hand, and puts it into a little
money-bag; and with this sample, as it is called, in his pocket, away he
goes to market.
When he comes thither, he stands with his little bag in his hand, at a
particular place where such business is done, and thither the factors or
buyers come also; the factor looks on the sample, asks his price, bids,
and then buys; and that not a sack or a load, but the whole quantity;
and away they go together to the next inn, to adjust the bargain, the
manner of delivery, the payment, etc. Thus the whole barn, or stack, or
mow of corn, is sold at once; and not only so, but it is odds but the
factor deals with him ever after, by coming to his house; and so the
farmer troubles the market no more.
This kind of trade is chiefly carried on in those market-towns which are
at a small distance from London, or at least from the river Thames;
such as Romford, Dartford, Grayes, Rochester, Maidstone, Chelmsford,
Malden, Colchester, Ipswich, and so down on both sides the river to the
North Foreland, and particularly at Margate and Whitstable, on one side;
and to the coast of Suffolk, and along the coast both ways beyond, and
likewise up the river. Also,
At these markets you may see, that, besides the market-house, where a
small quantity of corn perhaps is seen, the place mentioned above, where
the farmers and factors meet, is like a little exchange, where all the
rest of the business is transacted, and where a hundred times the
quantity of corn is bought and sold, as appears in sacks in the
market-house; it is thus, in particular, at Grayes, and at Dartford: and
though on a market-day there are very few wagons with corn to be seen in
the market, yet the street or market-place, nay, the towns and inns, are
thronged with farmers and samples on one hand, and with mealmen, London
bakers, millers, and cornfactors, and other buyers, on the other. The
rest of the week you see the wagons and carts continually coming all
night and all day, laden with corn of all sorts, to be delivered on
board the hoys, where the hoymen stand ready to receive it, and
generally to pay for it also: and thus a prodigious corn trade is
managed in the market, and little or nothing to be seen of it.
4. DEFOE'S ACCOUNT OF THE COAL TRADE [_D. Defoe, The Complete English
Tradesman, Ed. 1841, Vol. II, pp. 172-173_], _temp._ George II.
The Newcastle coals, brought by sea to London, are bought at the pit, or
at the steath or wharf, for under five shillings per chaldron; I suppose
I speak with the most; but when they come to London, are not delivered
to the consumers under from twenty-five to thirty shillings per
chaldron; and when they are a third time loaded on board the lighters in
the Thames, and carried through bridge, then loaded a fourth time into
the great west country barges, and carried up the river, perhaps to
Oxford or Abingdon, and thence loaded a fifth time in carts or wagons,
and carried perhaps ten or fifteen, or twenty miles to the last
consumer; by this time they are sometimes sold from forty-five to fifty
shillings per chaldron; so that the five shillings first cost, including
five shillings tax, is increased to five times the prime cost. And
because I have mentioned the frequent loading and unloading the coals,
it is necessary to explain it here once for all, because it may give a
light into the nature of this river and coast commerce, not in this
thing only, but in many others; these loadings are thus:--
1. They are dug in the pit a vast depth in the ground, sometimes fifty,
sixty, to a hundred fathoms; and being loaded (for so the miners call
it) into a great basket or tub, are drawn up by a wheel and horse, or
horses, to the top of the shaft, or pit mouth, and there thrown out upon
the great heap, to lie ready against the ships come into the port to
demand them.
2. They are then loaded again into a great machine called a wagon; which
by the means of an artificial road, called a wagon-way, goes with the
help of but one horse, and carries two chaldron, or more, at a time, and
this, sometimes, three or four miles to the nearest river or water
carriage they come at; and there they are either thrown into, or from, a
great storehouse, called a steath, made so artificially, with one part
close to or hanging over the water, that the lighters or keels can come
close to, or under it, and the coals be at once shot out of the wagon
into the said lighters, which carry them to the ships, which I call the
first loading upon the water.
5. A DESCRIPTION OF MIDDLEMEN IN THE WOOLLEN INDUSTRY [_J. Smith, The
Memoirs of Wool, Vol. II, pp. 310-313, 1747_], 1739.
THE TYRANNY OF THE BLACKWEL-HALL FACTORS.
The sufferings of the poor employed in working up Spanish wool, are not
owing to the unmercifulness of the clothiers, but the tyranny of
Blackwel-Hall factors; who though originally but the servants of the
makers, are now become their masters, and not only theirs, but the wool
merchants and drapers too.
Perhaps, sir, you may ask how it is possible that these men, who style
themselves but factors or agents, could find means to lord it as tyrants
over their employers? Why thus: they have managed it so, that the
merchant dare not sell his wool to the clothier, nor the clothier
presume to buy it of the merchant. On this grand point their whole power
is founded. To make this clear, sir, you are to understand, that in the
year 1695, the clothiers finding themselves in much the same
circumstances they are at present, by their credit given to the drapers
on one hand, and their being obliged to purchase wool of the factors, on
the other, applied in a body to parliament for relief, and an act was
accordingly past for restoring to them Blackwel-Hall for a market,
limiting the credit to be given for their goods, to six months; obliging
the factor to demand notes of hand of the draper, payable in that term,
for the use of the clothier, on penalty of forfeiting double the value
of the debt; and in case the draper refused to give such notes, so
demanded, fining him 20s.
For a little while, this act had its desired effect; these notes were
immediately returned to the clothier, who carried them to market for
wool, etc., and by that means, made them answer in trade almost as well
as cash itself. The factors thus stripped of the most valuable part of
their business, immediately concerted such measures as rendered the
whole act ineffectual, and put it in their power to tyrannize over the
clothiers as much as ever. This was done, by tampering with those of the
trade, whose circumstances were most precarious, who induced by the
promise of a speedy sale for their goods, prior to those of any other
maker, were easily prevailed upon to forego the advantage of the notes
granted them by Parliament. This fatal precedent being once set, the
factors instantly exacted a like compliance from all the rest; and if
any refused not one piece of their cloth was sold. By which means, being
obliged to keep their workmen employed in the interval, their whole
stock, though ever so large, was exhausted; and the more stock they had,
the more it became their interest to truckle to their old oppressors,
and again take off their wool on what terms they pleased.
This important point carried, like true politicians, they resolved to
pursue their blow, and add some new acquisitions to what they possessed
before. Accordingly, they again allowed the drapers such unreasonable
credit, that it was impossible for the most substantial clothier to
carry on the trade, while the returns were so slow and precarious. On an
universal complaint therefore of this grievance, they graciously
condescended to insure the debt to be paid, twelve months after it was
contracted; but in return of so great a favour, insisted on two and a
half per cent. as a reward; and if any was rash or stubborn enough to
disrelish or oppose this new imposition, he had the mortification to
wait six months longer for his money, that is to say, a year and a half
in all; which, together with the three months the cloth is in making,
and three that (one piece with another) it continues in the hall, before
it is sold off, make two years in the whole. Now let any one judge how
large a stock is absolutely necessary to carry on a trade, under all
these disadvantages, particularly when 'tis recollected, that the
clothier is obliged to pay his workmen ready money all this while,
whether his goods are vended or no; and that the modest factor always
insists on his being paid for his wool, with the first money he receives
for the cloth.
Neither is even this all. But if the clothier, hard drove by so vast and
so continued a charge, should be compelled, as too many are, to draw
upon the factor for money before 'tis due, according to their
calculation, one misfortune makes way for another; and he must pay an
extravagant premium for the advance, probably, of his own money. Nor are
you to wonder, sir, that these worthy gentlemen are so solicitous to
monopolise the whole market of Spanish wool; since, on a medium, they
get four pounds on every pack. Now a considerable clothier may be
supposed to work up 80 packs a year; which is in a manner a rent charge
of 320l. to the factor annually; for it is more than probable that this
very wool is purchased with the clothiers' cash; and while the factor
grows rich without any risk, and with very little trouble the clothier
is doubly excised, both for what he receives, and what is not only
withheld, but employed so manifestly to his prejudice.
'Tis farther to be observed, that as by far the greatest part of a
clothiers' stock must of necessity be lodged in the factors hands, if he
(the clothier) happens to break, or die insolvent (as in spite of a
whole life of toil and industry, many of them do) the factor immediately
seizes on the whole; it being (says he) a pledge for money advanced,
wool sold, etc., so that the rest of the creditors seldom receive a
farthing, while he, to whom the poor man's calamity is principally
owing, runs away with all.
Besides these capital grievances, there are several others, which though
inferior in degree, are, when added together, no small increase of the
load; such as the factors lumping the charges for warehouse-room in the
hall, porterage, pressing, packing, etc., every article of which ought
to be particular; as likewise sending out cloths to the drapers at the
expense of the clothier, not for sale; but one would be almost tempted
to think, to supply the shops with the paper and packthread they are
secured with; since they are returned stripp'd of both, tumbled from end
to end, exposed to all weather and accidents, and in such a condition as
renders it absolutely necessary to have them cleaned, pressed, and
packed anew. And all this, after they have been out of the hall six or
eight weeks; though the above quoted act of Parliament provides that
every cloth shall be reputed sold, after it hath been detained eight
days.
One would think, sir, I had already mentioned grievances enough, not
only to justify the clothier, but to excite the concern of the whole
people in their favour, and the aid of the legislature in their redress.
But there is yet another behind, which ought not to be omitted. It is
this. These worthy factors, not content with all these various methods
of oppression, to crown the whole, often set up people to act as master
clothiers, on their stock, during any little glut of business; and as it
is easy to imagine, give all the cloth so made, the preference of the
market, though perhaps in all respects, least deserving of it. Hence,
those that trade on their own bottoms, and employ the poor in good and
bad times alike, are liable to all the disadvantages of the one, with
little or no share in the benefits of the other. And hence, more people
are admitted into trade, than the trade can possibly maintain; which
opens a new door to the tumults and riots so lately felt.
6. REPORT ON THE CONDITION OF CHILDREN IN LANCASHIRE COTTON FACTORIES
[_Report of Committee on State of Children in Manufactories, 1816 (III),
pp. 139-140_], 1796.
Resolutions for the consideration of the Manchester Board of Health, by
Dr. Perceval, January 25, 1796.
It has already been stated that the objects of the present institution
are to prevent the generation of diseases; to obviate the spreading of
them by contagion; and to shorten the duration of those which exist, by
affording the necessary aids and comforts to the sick. In the
prosecution of this interesting undertaking, the Board have had their
attention particularly directed to the large cotton factories
established in the town and neighbourhood of Manchester; and they feel
it a duty incumbent on them to lay before the public the result of their
inquiries:--
1. It appears that the children and others who work in the large
factories, are peculiarly disposed to be affected by the contagion of
fever, and that when such infection is received, it is rapidly
propagated, not only amongst those who are crowded together in the same
apartments, but in the families and neighbourhoods to which they belong.
2. The large factories are generally injurious to the constitution of
those employed in them, even where no particular diseases prevail, from
the close confinement which is enjoined, from the debilitating effects
of hot or impure air, and from the want of the active exercises which
nature points out as essential in childhood and youth, to invigorate the
system, and to fit our species for the employments and for the duties of
manhood.
3. The untimely labour of the night, and the protracted labour of the
day, with respect to children, not only tends to diminish future
expectations as to the general sum of life and industry, by impairing
the strength and destroying the vital stamina of the rising generation,
but it too often gives encouragement to idleness, extravagance and
profligacy in the parents, who, contrary to the order of nature, subsist
by the oppression of their offspring.
4. It appears that the children employed in factories are generally
debarred from all opportunities of education, and from moral or
religious instruction.
5. From the excellent regulations which subsist in several cotton
factories, it appears that many of these evils may, in a considerable
degree, be obviated; we are therefore warranted by experience, and are
assured we shall have the support of the liberal proprietors of these
factories, in proposing an application for Parliamentary aid (if other
methods appear not likely to effect the purpose), to establish a general
system of laws for the wise, humane, and equal government of all such
works.
7. THE NEWCASTLE COAL VEND
[_Reports from Committees on the Coal Trade, 1800 (X), p. 540, and 1830
(VIII), pp. 6 and 254-5_], 1771-1830.
(_a_) 1800.
_Evidence of Francis Thompson (formerly manager of Washington
colliery)._
Is there any regulation or limit as to price they[317] may give to the
coal-owners?
In August, September, and October, 1771, I found great irregularities in
the Coal Trade, particularly with respect to the measure. I communicated
my sentiments to two of the most respectable agents of the owners ...;
upon which it was agreed that a meeting should be had of the coal owners
belonging to Sunderland, to be convened by me, and the coal owners at
Newcastle, to be convened by a Mr. Gibson and Mr. Morrison, which was
done; and we had three or four meetings, and I was appointed
Secretary.... Since that time, according to the best enquiries I have
been able to make, the coal owners have had frequent meetings for the
purpose of stipulating the vends[318]; that is, that five of the
collieries of the best coals, viz., Walls End, Walker, Wellington,
Hebburn, and Heyton, are permitted to vend the greatest proportion, and
at the best price; after that there is a second class, which sells one
shilling per chaldron lower, being coals of an inferior quality, and
also less in proportion as to quantity; there is likewise a third class,
at a shilling less than the second, and who are allowed to sell a still
less proportion as to quantity.
By what means do you understand those vends have been limited? By the
meetings of the coal owners frequently for the purpose of ascertaining
the vends.
Was there any positive agreement for that purpose? That cannot be well
known, being contrary to Act of Parliament.
(_b_) 1830.[319]
The proprietors of the best coals are called upon to name the price at
which they intend to sell their coals for the succeeding twelve months;
according to this price, the remaining proprietors fix their prices;
this being accomplished, each colliery is requested to send in a
statement of the different sorts of coals they raise, and the powers of
the colliery; that is, the quantity that each particular colliery could
raise at full work; and upon these statements the committee, assuming an
imaginary basis, fix the relative proportions, as to quantity, between
all the collieries, which proportions are observed, whatever quantity
the markets may demand. The committee then meet once a month, and
according to the probable demand of the ensuing month, they issue so
much per 1000 to the different collieries; that is, if they give me an
imaginary basis of 30,000 and my neighbour 20,000, according to the
quality of our coal and our power of raising them in the monthly
quantity; if they issue 100 to 1000, I raise and sell 3,000 during the
month, and my neighbour 2,000; but in fixing the relative quantities, if
we take 800,000 chaldrons as the probable demand of the different
markets for the year; if the markets should require more, an increased
quantity would be given out monthly, so as to raise the annual quantity
to meet that demand, were it double the original quantity.
_Evidence of Robert William Brandling._[320]
What means have been resorted to in the north of England, with a view to
keep the price of coal at such a rate as should compensate the owners of
these collieries in which the expense of raising is the greatest?
We have entered into a regulation at different times, which regulation
is in existence now, and which has for its object to secure us a fair
uniform remunerating price, and enables us to sell our coals at the port
of shipment under our immediate inspection, instead of being driven by a
fighting trade, to become the carrier of our coals, and to sell them by
third persons in the markets to which they are consigned; thereby
trusting our interests to those over whom we have no direct control
whatever.
So that practically the real quantity to be sold is fixed with reference
to each colliery each month?
Yes. The basis originally fixed, is the proportion taken between all the
collieries?
It is merely an imaginary quantity to fix the relative proportions.
Has the scale of prices now in operation been varied materially from
that which was adopted when the regulation of the vend was last on?
I have already stated in my evidence that ours is a competition price,
that we endeavour to get the best price we can, which is a little below
what the consumer can get the same article for elsewhere. In the
regulation in 1828 we found we had fixed our prices too high; the
consequence was, it created an immediate influx of coals from Scotland,
Wales and Yorkshire, and more especially from Stockton; so that when the
coal-owners met together, to enter into another arrangement last year,
we were obliged to fix our prices a little lower.
[Footnote 317: The fitters or agents between coal-owners and
ship-owners.]
[Footnote 318: The name by which the agreements as to output were
known.]
[Footnote 319: Report from Committee on the Coal Trade, 1830 (VIII), p.
6.]
[Footnote 320: _Ibid._ pp. 254-5.]
8. THE OLD APPRENTICESHIP SYSTEM IN THE WOOLLEN INDUSTRY [_Report of
Committee on the Woollen Industry, 1806 (III), p. 5_], 1806.
_Evidence of Mr. James Ellis_,[321] 18 _April_, 1806.
Do you instruct this apprentice in the different branches of the trade?
As far as he has been capable I have done.
Will you enumerate the different branches of the trade which you
yourself learnt, and in which you instruct your apprentice?
I learnt to be a spinner before I went apprentice; my apprentice was
only eleven years old when I took him; when I went apprentice I was a
strong boy, and I was put to weaving first; I never was employed in
bobbin winding myself while I was apprentice; I had learned part of the
business with my father-in-law before I went; I knew how to wind bobbins
and to warp; after that I learned to weave; we had two apprentices, and
after I had been there a little while we used to spin and weave our
webs; while one was spinning the other was weaving.
Did you also learn to buy your own wool?
Yes; I had the prospect of being a master when I came out of my time,
and therefore my master took care I should learn that.
Does that branch require great skill?
Yes, it does; I found myself very deficient when I was loose.
Different sorts of wool are applicable to different dyes and different
manufactures?
Yes; I was frequently obliged to resort to my master for information as
to the dyeing and buying wool.
Does it not require great skill to dye according to pattern, even when
you have bought wool?
Yes.
Were you also instructed in that?
Yes; I kept an account all the time I was apprentice of the principal
part of the colours we dyed, and practised the dyeing: I always assisted
in dyeing; I was not kept constantly to weaving and spinning; my master
fitted me rather for a master than a journeyman.
And you instruct your apprentice in the same line?
Yes; we think it a scandal when an apprentice is loose if he is not fit
for his business; we take pride in their being fit for their business,
and we teach them all they will take.
[Footnote 321: A clothier of Harmley, near Leeds, working with an
apprentice, two hired journeymen and a boy, and giving some work out.]
9. A PETITION OF COTTON WEAVERS [_House of Commons Journals, 47 Geo.
III, 1807, Feb. 26_], 1807.
A petition of the several Journeymen Cotton Weavers resident in the
counties of Lancaster, Chester, York, and Derby, was presented and read;
setting forth, That the petitioners suffer great hardships by the
reduction of their wages, and that whenever the demand for goods becomes
slack, many master manufacturers adopt the expedient of reducing wages,
thereby compelling the petitioners, in order to obtain a livelihood, to
manufacture greater quantities of goods at a time when they are
absolutely not wanted, and that great quantities of goods so
manufactured are sacrificed in the market at low prices, to the manifest
injury of the fair dealer, and the great oppression of the petitioners,
who are reduced one half of the wages they are justly entitled to, and
in many cases, are not able to earn more than nine shillings per week:
And therefore praying, That leave may be given to bring in a bill to
regulate, from time to time, the wages of the petitioners.
10.--DEPRESSION OF WAGES AND ITS CAUSES IN THE COTTON INDUSTRY [_Report
of Committee on Orders in Council_, 1812 (_III_),_pp_. 218 _and_
267-272], 1812.
_Thursday, May 14, 1812._
_Evidence of James Kay_ (_cotton and woollen manufacturer, of Bury_).
What used to be the price of cotton per piece in 1807?--I took out the
manufacturing prices for three years before 1807, and four years since.
Those are minutes from your own books?--Yes, in May, 1805, for the
quality goods called Blackburn supers we gave six shillings; in May,
1806, we gave the same; in May, 1807, we gave the same; in November,
1807, we dropped them to 5s. 6d.; in December, 1807, to 5s.; in January
1808 to 4s. 6d.; in May 1808 they were at 4s.; it was at the time they
were very much distressed, and rioting. In May, 1809, we gave 4s., in
March, 1810, we, gave 7s.; in April, 6s.; and in May the same. In May,
1811, we again gave 4s.; and at the present time we give 4s. 6d.
_Evidence of Jeremiah Bury_ (_cotton manufacturer of Stockport_).
_Friday, May 15, 1812._
What might a man make at weaving, in the year 1810?--A man weaving plain
work, in the year 1810, might make probably from 12s. to 15s. a week.
At plain work now what may a person earn?--The same man now would not
make more than ten or twelve shillings.
What might a man in full employment, in 1810, make in spinning?-- ... I
apprehend that a man might make from fifteen to twenty-five shillings a
week in spinning.
What will the same man make now?--I think a man now might make from
thirteen or fourteen to eighteen shillings.
Do you ever recollect so great distress as there is at present?--Never;
I have known the trade these thirty years, but I never knew anything
like it.
Your manufactures went to the Continent pretty extensively till the year
1807?--Yes, we sold to the merchants who sent to the Continent.
Can you tell what interrupted that trade?--We had no further trade when
the Continent was shut up.
To what is the want of trade owing?--The want of market for our goods.
To what is the want of market owing?--It is impossible for me to say,
but I believe if we had an opening in America, we should have sufficient
market for our goods; when we lost the Continental trade we had America
to depend upon, now we have lost America we have no regular markets to
depend upon.
11.--EVIDENCE OF THE CONDITION OF CHILDREN IN FACTORIES [_Report of
Committee on Children in Manufactories_, 1816 (_III_), _pp_. 89 _and_
132-133], 1816.
_Mr. Robert Owen, again called in, and examined._
Have you anything to add to your evidence of yesterday?--Some questions
were put to me yesterday respecting the early age at which children are
employed at Stockport; I knew I had made a memorandum at the time, but I
could not then put my hand upon it; I have since found it; and I can now
reply to the questions regarding those cases. Mr. George Oughton,
secretary to the Sunday school in Stockport, informed me about a
fortnight ago, in the presence of an individual, who will probably be
here in the course of the morning, that he knows a little girl of the
name of Hannah Downham, who was employed in a mill at Stockport at the
age of four. Mr. Turner, treasurer to the Sunday school, knows a boy
that was employed in a mill at Stockport when he was only three years
old. Mr. Turner and Mr. Oughton, if they were sent for would, I have no
doubt, state these cases before the Committee.
They were mentioned to you as a rare instance?--They were mentioned to
me in the midst of a very numerous assembly of very respectable people;
I inquired of them whether they knew, as they were surrounded with, I
believe, two or three thousand children at the time, what was the age at
which children were generally admitted into cotton mills; their answer
was, Some at five, many at six, and a greater number at seven. I have
also received very important information from a very respectable
individual at Manchester, relative to the age at which children are
employed, the hours they are kept to work, and a variety of other
particulars from very authentic sources.
Name those sources?--Mr. Nathaniel Gould and Mr. George Gould.
Does the information you propose to give come from the manufactory to
which it relates?--No manufacturer would give information against
himself.
State what you know relative to the number of hours which children and
others are employed in their attendance on mills and
manufactories?--About a fortnight ago I was in Leeds; and in
conversation with Mr. Gott, whose name is well-known to many gentlemen
in this room, he stated to me that it was a common practice, when the
woollen trade was going on well, to work sixteen hours in the day: I was
also informed by Mr. Marshall, who is another principal, and considered
a highly respectable manufacturer in Leeds, that it was a common
practice to work at flax-mills there sixteen hours a day whenever the
trade went well: I was also informed by Mr. Gott, that when the Bill,
generally known by the name of Sir Robert Peel's Bill, was brought in
last session of Parliament, the night-work at Leeds was put an end to.
In Stockport, on Sunday fortnight, I saw a number of small children
going to the church; they appeared to me to be going from a Sunday
school; the master was with them; I stopped the master, and asked him
what he knew of the circumstances of the manufacturers in Stockport; he
said he knew a great deal, because he himself had formerly, for many
years, been a spinner in those mills; his name is Robert Mayor, of the
National School in Stockport; he stated that he was willing to make oath
that mills in Stockport, within the last twelve months, had been worked
from three and four o'clock in the morning until nine at night, that he
himself has frequently worked those hours.
_Sir Robert Peel, Bart_.
The house in which I have a concern gave employment at one time to near
one thousand children of this description. Having other pursuits, it was
not often in my power to visit the factories, but whenever such visits
were made, I was struck with the uniform appearance of bad health, and,
in many cases, stinted growth of the children; the hours of labour were
regulated by the interest of the overseer, whose remuneration depending
on the quantity of the work done, he was often induced to make the poor
children work excessive hours, and to stop their complaints by trifling
bribes. Finding our own factories under such management, and learning
that the like practices prevailed in other parts of the kingdom where
similar machinery was in use, the children being much over-worked, and
often little or no regard paid to cleanliness and ventilation in the
buildings; having the assistance of Dr. Percival and other eminent
medical gentlemen of Manchester, together with some distinguished
characters both in and out of Parliament, I brought in a Bill in the
Forty-second year of the King, for the regulation of factories
containing such parish apprentices. The hours of work allowed by that
Bill being fewer in number than those formerly practised, a visible
improvement in the health and general appearance of the children soon
became evident, and since the complete operation of the Act contagious
disorders have rarely occurred.
Diffident of my own abilities to originate legislative measures, I
should have contented myself with the one alluded to, had I not
perceived, that, owing to the present use of steam power in factories,
the Forty-second of the King is likely to become a dead letter. Large
buildings are now erected, not only as formerly on the banks of streams,
but in the midst of populous towns, and instead of parish apprentices
being sought after, the children of the surrounding poor are preferred,
whose masters being free from the operation of the former Act of
Parliament are subjected to no limitation of time in the prosecution of
their business, though children are frequently admitted there to work
thirteen to fourteen hours per day, at the tender age of seven years,
and even in some cases still younger. I need not ask the Committee to
give an opinion of the consequence of such a baneful practice upon the
health and well-being of these little creatures, particularly after
having heard the sentiments of those eminent medical men who have been
examined before us; but I most anxiously press upon the Committee, that
unless some parliamentary interference takes place, the benefits of the
Apprentice Bill will soon be entirely lost, the practice of employing
parish apprentices will cease, their places will be wholly supplied by
other children, between whom and their masters no permanent contract is
likely to exist, and for whose good treatment there will not be the
slightest security. Such indiscriminate and unlimited employment of the
poor, consisting of a great proportion of the inhabitants of trading
districts, will be attended with effects to the rising generation so
serious and alarming, that I cannot contemplate them without dismay, and
thus that great effort of British ingenuity, whereby the machinery of
our manufactures has been brought to such perfection, instead of being a
blessing to the nation, will be converted into the bitterest curse.
Gentlemen, if parish apprentices were formerly deemed worthy of the care
of Parliament, I trust you will not withhold from the unprotected
children of the present day an equal measure of mercy, as they have no
masters who are obliged to support them in sickness or during
unfavourable periods of trade.
12.--CHANGE IN THE COTTON INDUSTRY AND THE INTRODUCTION OF POWER-LOOM
WEAVING [_William Radcliffe, The Origin of Power-Loom Weaving_, 1828,
_pp._ 9-10, _etc._], _c._ 1785-1807.
The principal estates being gone from the family, my father resorted to
the common but never-failing resource for subsistence at that period,
viz., the loom for men, and the cards and hand-wheel for women and boys.
He married a spinster (in my etymology of the word) and my mother taught
me (while too young to weave) to earn my bread by carding and spinning
cotton, winding linen or cotton weft for my father and elder brothers at
the loom, until I became of sufficient age and strength for my father to
put me into a loom. After the practical experience of a few years, any
young man who was industrious and careful, might then, from his earnings
as a weaver, lay by sufficient to set him up as a manufacturer, and
though but few of the great body of weavers had the courage to embark in
the attempt, I was one of the few. Availing myself of the improvements
that came out while I was in my teens, by the time I was married (at the
age of 24, in 1785), with my little savings, and a practical knowledge
of every process from the cotton-bag to the piece of cloth, such as
carding by hand or by the engine, spinning by the hand-wheel or jenny,
winding, warping, sizing, looming the web, and weaving either by hand or
fly-shuttle, I was ready to commence business for myself; and by the
year 1789, I was well established, and employed many hands both in
spinning and weaving, as a master manufacturer.
From 1789 to 1794, my chief business was the sale of muslin warps, sized
and ready for the loom (being the first who sold cotton twist in that
state, chiefly to Mr. Oldknow, the father of the muslin trade in our
country). Some warps I sent to Glasgow and Paisley. I also manufactured
a few muslins myself, and had a warehouse in Manchester for my general
business.
* * * * *
At Midsummer, 1801, on taking[322] stock very accurately we[323] found
we had upwards of £11,000 in our concern; I had also a landed estate in
Mellor, in which was comprehended Podmore, where my father was born,
with a rent roll, and good tenants of upwards of £350 per annum, charged
with about £1,800 on mortgage. Mr. Ross's father was a merchant and
magistrate in Montrose, and rich, and, my partner being an only son,
could at any time lend us a few thousands, which he afterwards did to
the amount of £6,000, including the £2,500 paid down on the formation of
our partnership. With this real capital--an unlimited credit (£5,000
with our bankers amongst the rest), an excellent trade, and every
prospect of its continuing so for a time, we came to the conclusion of
purchasing the premises in the Hillgate, from Mr. Oldknow and Mr.
Arkwright, then standing empty, which I never should have thought of for
a moment, but from what had passed at the Castle Inn, for the sole
purpose of filling them with looms, etc., on some new plan, and just so
much spinning machinery as would supply the looms with weft. But beyond
the common warping, sizing, weaving, etc., all was a chaos before me;
yet so confident was I, that with such assistance as I could call in, we
should succeed, that before I began I laid a trifling wager with my
partner, that in two years from the time I commenced, I produced 500
pieces of 7-8ths and 9-8ths printing cambrics, all wove in the building
in one week by some new process, which I won easily. And as the price
for weaving alone when we began was 17s. per piece, and had never been
below 16s. at any time, we thought we were justified in what we were
doing, even if little improvement could be found. And if the goods made
abroad from the annually increasing export of twist, and their
prohibitions of our goods in consequence, had not gradually reduced this
price of weaving from 17s. (with a profit of 10 to 20 per cent. to the
master), to 4s. to the weaver (and no profit to the master!), we should
have been handsomely rewarded by our trade. But to return from this
digression, we concluded our contract about Michaelmas with Messrs.
Oldknow and Arkwright, for the premises above mentioned; and I brought
my family to Stockport in the latter end of December, 1801. I must here
observe that we had at that time a large concern in Mellor, that with
its various branches for putting out work, employing upwards of 1000
weavers, widely spread over the borders of three counties, in a vast
variety of plain and fancy goods, all of which had been raised (like a
gathering snowball) from a single spindle, or single loom by myself, and
was then upon such a system as apparently might go on without my
personal attention.
* * * * *
I shut myself up (as it were) in the mill on the 2nd January, 1802,[324]
and with joiners, turners, filers, etc., etc., set to work; my first
step was some looms in the common way in every respect, which I knew
would produce the cloth so much wanted, and in some degree cover our
weekly expenses.
Before the end of the month I began to divide the labour of the weavers,
employing one room to dress the whole web, in a small frame for the
purpose, ready for the looms in another room, so that the young weaver
had nothing to learn but to weave; and we found this a great
improvement, for besides the advantage of learning a young weaver in a
few days, we found that by weaving the web as it were back again, the
weft was driven up by the reed the way the brushes had laid the fibres
down with the paste, so that we could make good cloth in the upper rooms
with the dressed yarn quite dry, which could not be done in the old way
of dressing, when the weft was drove up against the points of the
fibres, which shewed us the reason why all weavers are obliged to work
in damp cellars, and must weave up their dressing, about a yard long,
before the yarn becomes dry, or it spoils.
This accomplished, I told my men I must have some motion attached to
either traddles or the lathe, by machinery, that would take up the cloth
as it was wove, so that the shed might always be of the same
dimensions, and of course the blow of the lathe always moving the same
distance, would make the cloth more even than could possibly be done in
the old way, except by very skilful and careful weavers.
This motion to the loom being at length accomplished to our
satisfaction, I set Johnson to plan for the warping and dressing,
suggesting several ideas myself. His uncommon genius led him to propose
many things to me, but I pointed out objections to them all, and set him
to work again. His mind was so teased with difficulties, that he began
to relieve it by drinking for several days together (to which he was too
much addicted) but for this I never upbraided him, or deducted his wages
for the time, knowing that we were approaching our object; at length we
brought out the present plan, only that the undressed yarn was all on
one side, and the brush to be applied was first by hand, then by a
cylinder, and lastly the crank motion.
* * * * *
The partnership being thus dissolved,[325] I proceeded in my business
with a double prospect of success; first, by the real business I was
doing weekly, of 6 to 700 pieces per week, of printing cambrics, mostly
woven in the factory, and the other part in weaving-families in the
neighbourhood, on the small looms I had furnished to them, delivering
them dressed warps on the beam, and pin-cops for the weft. This system
had now become practicable, and was so greatly approved of by the
weavers, that, had I weathered the calm, which soon after came upon my
credit, I might, in a short time, have had all my looms in the dwellings
of the operative weavers on the plan I had been driving at from the
first, and from the superior advantage of machine dressing. The evenness
produced by this mode of preparation, and the working in my loom, not
only rendered these goods of ready sale, but gave me a weekly profit of
90l. to 100l., which, along with the second branch of income that formed
my double prospect, viz., the premiums of licenses under patent rights
beginning to pour in from the first houses in the trade, to the amount
of 1,500l., in the eight months from the first of July, 1806, to March,
1807, when my vessel became quite becalmed.
* * * * *
In the year 1770,[326] the land in our township was occupied by between
fifty to sixty farmers; rents, to the best of my recollection, did not
exceed 10s. per statute acre, and out of these fifty or sixty farmers,
there were only six or seven who raised their rents directly from the
produce of their farms; all the rest got their rent partly in some
branch of trade, such as spinning and weaving woollen, linen, or cotton.
The cottagers were employed entirely in this manner, except for a few
weeks in the harvest. Being one of those cottagers, and intimately
acquainted with all the rest, as well as every farmer, I am the better
able to relate particularly how the change from the old system of
hand-labour to the new one of machinery operated in raising the price of
land in the subdivision I am speaking of. Cottage rents at that time,
with convenient loomshop and a small garden attached, were from one and
a half to two guineas per annum. The father of a family would earn from
eight shillings to half a guinea at his loom, and his sons, if he had
one, two, or three alongside of him, six or eight shillings each per
week; but the great sheet anchor of all cottages and small farms was the
labour attached to the hand-wheel, and when it is considered that it
required six to eight hands to prepare and spin yarn, of any of the
three materials I have mentioned, sufficient for the consumption of one
weaver,--this shews clearly the inexhaustible source there was for
labour for every person from the age of seven to eighty years (who
retained their sight and could move their hands) to earn their bread,
say one to three shillings per week, without going to the parish.
* * * * *
From the year 1770 to 1788[327] a complete change had gradually been
effected in the spinning of yarns. That of wool had disappeared
altogether, and that of linen was also nearly gone; cotton, cotton,
cotton, was become the almost universal material for employment. The
hand-wheels, with the exception of one establishment, were all thrown
into lumber-rooms, the yarn was all spun on common jennies, the carding
for all numbers, up to 40 hanks in the pound, was done on carding
engines; but the finer numbers of 60 to 80 were still carded by hand, it
being a general opinion at that time that machine-carding would never
answer for fine numbers. In weaving no great alteration had taken place
during these eighteen years, save the introduction of the fly-shuttle, a
change in the woollen looms to fustians and calico, and the linen
nearly gone, except the few fabrics in which there was a mixture of
cotton. To the best of my recollection there was no increase of looms
during this period,--but rather a decrease.
I shall confine myself to the families in my own neighbourhood.[328]
These families, up to the time I have been speaking of, whether as
cottagers or small farmers, had supported themselves by the different
occupations I have mentioned in spinning and manufacturing, as their
progenitors from the earliest institutions of society had done before
them. But the mule-twist now coming into vogue, for the warp, as well as
weft, added to the water-twist and common jenny yarns, with an
increasing demand for every fabric the loom could produce, put all hands
in request of every age and description. The fabrics made from wool or
linen vanished, while the old loomshops being insufficient, every
lumber-room, even old barns, cart-houses, and outbuildings of any
description were repaired, windows broke through the old blank walls,
and all fitted up for loomshops. This source of making room being at
length exhausted, new weavers' cottages with loomshops rose up in every
direction; all immediately filled, and when in full work the weekly
circulation of money, as the price of labour only, rose to five times
the amount ever before experienced in this subdivision, every family
bringing home weekly 40, 60, 80, 100, or even 120 shillings per week!!!
[Footnote 322: _Ibid._ pp. 15-16.]
[Footnote 323: Radcliffe and his partner Ross.]
[Footnote 324: _Ibid._ pp. 20-21.]
[Footnote 325: _Ibid._ p. 41.]
[Footnote 326: _Ibid._ pp. 59-60.]
[Footnote 327: _Ibid._ pp. 61-62.]
[Footnote 328: _Ibid._ p. 65.]
13. EVIDENCE BY FACTORY WORKERS OF THE CONDITION OF CHILDREN [_Report of
Committee on Factory Children's Labour_, 1831-2 (_XV_), _p._ 192,
_etc._], 1832.
_Evidence of Samuel Coulson._
5047. At what time in the morning, in the brisk time, did those girls go
to the mills?
In the brisk time, for about six weeks, they have gone at 3 o'clock in
the morning, and ended at 10, or nearly half past at night.
5049. What intervals were allowed for rest or refreshment during those
nineteen hours of labour?
Breakfast a quarter of an hour, and dinner half an hour, and drinking a
quarter of an hour.
5051. Was any of that time taken up in cleaning the machinery?
They generally had to do what they call dry down; sometimes this took
the whole of the time at breakfast or drinking, and they were to get
their dinner or breakfast as they could; if not, it was brought home.
5054. Had you not great difficulty in awakening your children to this
excessive labour?
Yes, in the early time we had them to take up asleep and shake them,
when we got them on the floor to dress them, before we could get them
off to their work; but not so in the common hours.
5056. Supposing they had been a little too late, what would have been
the consequence during the long hours?
They were quartered in the longest hours, the same as in the shortest
time.
5057. What do you mean by quartering?
A quarter was taken off.
5058. If they had been how much too late?
Five minutes.
5059. What was the length of time they could be in bed during those long
hours?
It was near 11 o'clock before we could get them into bed after getting a
little victuals, and then at morning my mistress used to stop up all
night, for fear that we could not get them ready for the time; sometimes
we have gone to bed, and one of us generally awoke.
5060. What time did you get them up in the morning?
In general me or my mistress got up at 2 o'clock to dress them.
5061. So that they had not above four hours' sleep at this time?
No, they had not.
5062. For how long together was it?
About six weeks it held; it was only done when the throng was very much
on; it was not often that.
5063. The common hours of labour were from 6 in the morning till
half-past eight at night?
Yes.
5064. With the same intervals for food?
Yes, just the same.
5065. Were the children excessively fatigued by this labour?
Many times; we have cried often when we have given them the little
victualling we had to give them; we had to shake them, and they have
fallen to sleep with the victuals in their mouths many a time.
5066. Had any of them any accident in consequence of this labour?
Yes, my eldest daughter when she went first there; she had been about
five weeks, and used to fettle the frames when they were running, and my
eldest girl agreed with one of the others to fettle hers that time, that
she would do her work; while she was learning more about the work, the
overlooker came by and said, "Ann, what are you doing there?" she said,
"I am doing it for my companion, in order that I may know more about
it," he said, "Let go, drop it this minute," and the cog caught her
forefinger nail, and screwed it off below the knuckle, and she was five
weeks in Leeds Infirmary.
5067. Has she lost that finger?
It is cut off at the second joint.
5068. Were her wages paid during that time?
As soon as the accident happened the wages were totally stopped; indeed,
I did not know which way to get her cured, and I do not know how it
would have been cured but for the Infirmary.
5069. Were the wages stopped at the half-day?
She was stopped a quarter of a day; it was done about four o'clock.
5072. Did this excessive term of labour occasion much cruelty also?
Yes, with being so very much fatigued the strap was very frequently
used.
5073. Have any of your children been strapped?
"Yes, every one; the eldest daughter; I was up in Lancashire a fortnight,
and when I got home I saw her shoulders, and I said, "Ann, what is the
matter?" she said, "The overlooker has strapped me; but," she said, "do
not go to the overlooker, for if you do we shall lose our work"; I said
I would not if she would tell me the truth as to what caused it. "Well,"
she said, "I will tell you, father." She says, "I was fettling the
waste, and the girl I had learning had got so perfect she could keep the
side up till I could fettle the waste; the overlooker came round," and
said, "What are you doing?" I said, "I am fettling while the other girl
keeps the upper end up"; he said, "Drop it this minute;" she said, "No,
I must go on with this"; and because she did not do it, he took a strap,
and beat her between the shoulders. My wife was out at the time, and
when she came in she said her back was beat nearly to a jelly; and the
rest of the girls encouraged her to go to Mrs. Varley, and she went to
her, and she rubbed it with a part of a glass of rum, and gave her an
old silk handkerchief to cover the place with till it got well."
5080. What was the wages in the short hours?
Three shillings a week each.
5081. When they wrought those very long hours what did they get?
Three shillings and sevenpence halfpenny.
5082. For all that additional labour they had only 7-1/2d. a week
additional?
No more.
5083. Could you dispose of their wages, when they had received them, as
you wished: did you understand that?
They never said anything to me; but the children have said, "If we do
not bring some little from the shop I am afraid we shall lose our work."
And sometimes they used to bring a bit of sugar or some little oddment,
generally of their own head.
5084. That is, they were expected to lay out part of their wages under
the truck system?
Yes.
5086. Had your children any opportunity of sitting during those long
days of labour?
No; they were in general, whether there was work for them to do or not,
to move backwards and forwards till something came to their hands.
5118. At the time they worked those long hours, would it have been in
their power to work a shorter number of hours, taking the 3s.?
They must either go on at the long hours, or else be turned off.
_Evidence of Gillett Sharpe._[329]
5484. Have you had any children, yourself, working at these mills?
Yes.
5488. What sort of mill did she go to?
To a worsted manufactory; but it so happened with her that her
stepmother dying, I took her away to manage the affairs of my house; she
was very young to be sure, but she did what I had to do, except what I
hired out, and she is very healthy and strong; but with regard to my
boy, Edwin, he was a proverb for being active and straight before he
went; there is a portion of ground of considerable extent, opposite to a
building in our neighbourhood, and that boy would run seven times round
that piece of ground, and come in without being much fatigued; but when
he had gone to the mill some time, perhaps about three years, he began
to be weak in his knees; and it went on to that degree, that he could
scarcely walk; I had three steps up into my house, and I have seen that
boy get hold of the sides of the door to assist his getting up into the
house; many a one advised me to take him away; they said he would be
ruined, and made quite a cripple; but I was a poor man, and could not
afford to take him away, having a large family, six children, under my
care; they are not all mine, but I have to act as a father to them; he
still continued to go, but during the last six or seven months the
factory has been short of work; they spin for commission; and it has so
happened that they have worked less hours since last November than they
formerly did, not being able to obtain so much work; and he is very much
improved in that time with regard to the strength of his knees, and it
has been observed by the neighbours that he grows a little, but he is
bent in one knee.
5492. Have you had any other children on whom this labour has had a
similar effect?
Yes, I have a daughter Barbara; she went to the mill between 7 and 8
years of age; she was straight then, but, however, a few years back,
about three years since, she fell weak and lame in one of her knees, and
she was off her work in consequence; but, however, in a few weeks she
got a little recovered and went to the mill again, and she has continued
to go there ever since, and she has got very much bow-legged, the legs
are bent outwards.
_Evidence of Elizabeth Bentley._[330]
5127. What age are you?
Twenty-three.
5128. Where do you live?
At Leeds.
5129. What time did you begin to work at a factory?
When I was six years old.
5130. At whose factory did you work?
Mr. Busk's.
5131. What kind of mill is it?
Flax-mill.
5132. What was your business in that mill?
I was a little doffer.
5133. What were your hours of labour in that mill?
From 5 in the morning till 9 at night, when they were thronged.
5134. For how long a time together have you worked that excessive length
of time?
For about half a year.
5214. You are considerably deformed in your person in consequence of
this labour?
Yes, I am.
5215. At what time did it come on?
I was about 13 years old when it began coming, and it has got worse
since; it is five years since my mother died, and my mother was never
able to get me a pair of good stays to hold me up, and when my mother
died I had to do for myself, and got me a pair.
5216. Were you perfectly straight and healthy before you worked at a
mill?
Yes, I was as straight a little girl as ever went up and down town.
5217. Were you straight till you were 13?
Yes, I was.
5218. Have you been attended to by any medical gentleman at Leeds or the
neighbourhood?
Yes, I have been under Mr. Hares.
5219. To what did he attribute it?
He said it was owing to hard labour, and working in the factories.
_Evidence of Mr. Charles Stewart._[331]
8094. Does that length of standing and of exertion tend to deform the
limbs of the children so employed?
Yes, that is my opinion; I took an examination of those that were
employed under me in that flat.
8095. In which of Mr. Boyack's mills are you employed?
In a tow-mill.
8097. The New Ward Mill, is it?
Yes; there are fifty hands in the room altogether, old and young; and I
found that out of that fifty there were nine who had entered the mill
before they were nine years of age, who are now above thirteen years of
age.
8098. Having been at that employment then, four years?
Yes; and out of those nine, there were six who were splayfooted, and
three who were not; the three who were not splayfooted were worse upon
their legs than those who were; and one was most remarkably bow-legged;
she informed me she was perfectly straight before she entered the mills.
8099. What was that girl's name?
Margaret Webster.
8100. You say she was remarkably bow-legged, was it very observable?
Very observable; I can hardly describe the woman's deformity, from the
way in which she walks; but I have passed by, and thought that I was far
from her, and have got on her shins as I was going past her.
8103. Have you made any other examination?
I have examined those who had not entered the mills till after twelve
years of age, and found that out of fifty there were fourteen of this
class; two of them were splayfooted, and one with her ankle a little
wrong; the others were all perfectly straight.
[Footnote 329: _Ibid._ p. 209, Numbers 5484, 5488, 5492.]
[Footnote 330: _Ibid._ p. 195, Numbers 5127-5219.]
[Footnote 331: _Ibid._ p. 353, Numbers 8094-8103.]
14.--WOMEN'S AND CHILDREN'S LABOUR IN MINES [_Children's Employment
Commission, Mines_, 1842 (_XV_), _p._ 24, _etc._], 1842.
Sex: Employment of Girls and Women in Coal Mines. Districts in which
Girls and Women are Employed Underground.
119. In England, exclusive of Wales, it is only in some of the colliery
districts of Yorkshire and Lancashire that female children of tender age
and young and adult women are allowed to descend into the coal mines and
regularly to perform the same kinds of underground work, and to work
for the same numbers of hours, as boys and men; but in the East of
Scotland their employment in the pits is general; and in South Wales it
is not uncommon.
120. West Riding of Yorkshire: Southern Part.--In many of the collieries
in this district, as far as relates to the underground employment, there
is no distinction of sex, but the labour is distributed indifferently
among both sexes, excepting that it is comparatively rare for the women
to hew or get the coals, although there are numerous instances in which
they regularly perform even this work. In great numbers of the coal-pits
in this district the men work in a state of perfect nakedness, and are
in this state assisted in their labour by females of all ages, from
girls of six years old to women of twenty-one, these females being
themselves quite naked down to the waist.
121. "Girls," says the Sub-Commissioner, "regularly perform all the
various offices of trapping, hurrying, filling, riddling, tipping, and
occasionally getting, just as they are performed by boys. One of the
most disgusting sights I have ever seen was that of young females,
dressed like boys in trousers, crawling on all fours, with belts round
their waists and chains passing between their legs, at day pits at
Hunshelf Bank, and in many small pits near Holmfrith and New Mills: it
exists also in several other places. I visited the Hunshelf Colliery on
the 18th of January: it is a day pit; that is there is no shaft or
descent; the gate or entrance is at the side of a bank, and nearly
horizontal. The gate was not more than a yard high, and in some places
not above two feet. When I arrived at the board or workings of the pit I
found at one of the side-boards down a narrow passage a girl of fourteen
years of age, in boy's clothes, picking down the coal with the regular
pick used by the men. She was half sitting, half lying, at her work, and
said she found it tired her very much, and of course she didn't like
it. The place where she was at work was not two feet high. Further on
were men at work lying on their sides and getting. No less than six
girls out of eighteen men and children are employed in this pit. Whilst
I was in the pit the Rev. Mr. Bruce, of Wadsley, and the Rev. Mr.
Nelson, of Rotherham, who accompanied me, and remained outside, saw
another girl of ten years of age, also dressed in boy's clothes, who
was employed in hurrying, and these gentlemen saw her at work. She was a
nice-looking little child, but of course as black as a tinker, and with
a little necklace round her throat."
_Conclusions._[332]
From the whole of the evidence which has been collected, and of which we
have thus endeavoured to give a digest, we find--
In regard to Coal Mines--
1. That instances occur in which children are taken into these mines to
work as early as four years of age, sometimes at five, and between five
and six, not unfrequently between six and seven, and often from seven to
eight, while from eight to nine is the ordinary age at which employment
in these mines commences.
2. That a very large proportion of the persons employed in carrying on
the work of these mines is under thirteen years of age; and a still
larger proportion between thirteen and eighteen.
3. That in several districts female children begin to work in these
mines at the same early ages as the males.
7. That the nature of the employment which is assigned to the youngest
children, generally that of "trapping," requires that they should be in
the pit as soon as the work of the day commences, and, according to the
present system, that they should not leave the pit before the work of
the day is at an end.
8. That although this employment scarcely deserves the name of labour,
yet, as the children engaged in it are commonly excluded from light and
are always without companions, it would, were it not for the passing and
re-passing of the coal carriages, amount to solitary confinement of the
worst order.
9. That in those districts in which the seams of coal are so thick that
horses go direct to the workings, or in which the side passages from the
workings to the horseways are not of any great length, the lights in the
main ways render the situation of these children comparatively less
cheerless, dull, and stupefying; but that in some districts they remain
in solitude and darkness during the whole time they are in the pit,
and, according to their own account, many of them never see the light
of day for weeks together during the greater part of the winter season,
excepting on those days in the week when work is not going on, and on
the Sundays.
10. That at different ages, from six years old and upwards, the hard
work of pushing and dragging the carriages of coal from the workings to
the main ways, or to the foot of the shaft, begins; a labour which all
classes of witnesses concur in stating requires the unremitting exertion
of all the physical power which the young workers possess.
11. That, in the districts in which females are taken down into the coal
mines, both sexes are employed together in precisely the same kind of
labour, and work for the same number of hours; that the girls and boys,
and the young men and young women, and even married women and women with
child, commonly work almost naked, and the men, in many mines, quite
naked; and that all classes of witnesses bear testimony to the
demoralizing influence of the employment of females underground.
13. That when the workpeople are in full employment, the regular hours
of work for children and young persons are rarely less than eleven; more
often they are twelve; in some districts they are thirteen; and in one
district they are generally fourteen and upwards.
14. That in the great majority of these mines night-work is a part of
the ordinary system of labour, more or less regularly carried on
according to the demand for coals, and one which the whole body of
evidence shows to act most injuriously both on the physical and moral
condition of the workpeople, and more especially on that of the children
and young persons.
15. DESCRIPTION OF THE CONDITION OF MANCHESTER BY JOHN ROBERTSON,
SURGEON [_Report of Committee on Health of Towns_, 1840 (_XI_), _pp._
221-222, _App. II_], 1840.
Until twelve years ago there was no paving and sewering Act in any of
the townships; even in the township of Manchester, containing in the
year 1831 upwards of 142,000 inhabitants, this was the case; and the
disgraceful condition of the streets and sewers on the invasion of the
cholera you have no doubt learned from Dr. Kay's able and valuable
pamphlet.[333] At the present time the paving of the streets proceeds
rapidly in every direction, and great attention is given to the drains.
Upon the whole, it is gratifying to bear testimony to the zeal of the
authorities in carrying on the salutary improvements, especially when it
is known that no street can be paved and sewered without the consent of
the owners of property, unless a certain large proportion of the land on
either side is built upon. Owing to this cause several important streets
remain to this hour disgraceful nuisances.
Manchester has no Building Act, and hence, with the exception of certain
central streets, over which the Police Act gives the Commissioners
power, each proprietor builds as he pleases. New cottages, with or
without cellars, huddled together row behind row, may be seen springing
up in many parts, but especially in the township of Manchester, where
the land is higher in price than the land for cottage sites in other
townships is. With such proceedings as these the authorities cannot
interfere. A cottage row may be badly drained, the streets may be full
of pits, brimful of stagnant water, the receptacle of dead cats and
dogs, yet no one may find fault. The number of cellar residences, you
have probably learned from the papers published by the Manchester
Statistical Society, is very great in all quarters of the town; and even
in Hulme, a large portion of which consists of cottages recently
erected, the same practice is continued. That it is an evil must be
obvious on the slightest consideration, for how can a hole underground
of from 12 to 15 feet square admit of ventilation so as to fit it for a
human habitation?
We have no authorised inspector of dwellings and streets. If an epidemic
disease were to invade, as happened in 1832, the authorities would
probably order inspection, as they did on that occasion, but it would be
merely by general permission, not of right.
So long as this and other great manufacturing towns were multiplying and
extending their branches of manufacture and were prosperous, every fresh
addition of operatives found employment, good wages, and plenty of food;
and so long as the families of working people are well fed, it is
certain they maintain their health in a surprising manner, even in
cellars and other close dwellings. Now, however, the case is different.
Food is dear, labour scarce, and wages in many branches very low;
consequently, as might be expected, disease and death are making unusual
havoc. In the years 1833, 1834, 1835, and 1836 (years of prosperity),
the number of fever cases admitted into the Manchester House of Recovery
amounted only to 1,685, or 421 per annum; while in the two pinching
years, 1838 and 1839, the number admitted was 2,414, or 1,207 per annum.
It is in such a depressed state of the manufacturing districts as at
present exists that unpaved and badly sewered streets, narrow alleys,
close, unventilated courts and cellars, exhibit their malign influence
in augmenting the sufferings which that greatest of all physical evils,
want of sufficient food, inflicts on young and old in large towns, but
especially on the young.
Manchester has no public park or other grounds where the population can
walk and breathe the fresh air. New streets are rapidly extending in
every direction, and so great already is the expanse of the town, that
those who live in the more populous quarters can seldom hope to see the
green face of nature.... In this respect Manchester is disgracefully
defective; more so, perhaps, than any other town in the empire. Every
advantage of this nature has been sacrificed to the getting of money in
the shape of ground-rents.
[Footnote 332: _Ibid._ p. 255, etc.]
[Footnote 333: J.P. Kay. _Moral and Physical Condition of the Working
Classes in Manchester_, 1832.]
SECTION II
AGRICULTURE AND ENCLOSURE
1. Enclosure Proceedings in the Court of Chancery, 1671--2. Advice to
the Stewards of Estates, 1731--3. Procedure for Enclosure by Private
Act, 1766--4. Farming in Norfolk, 1771--5. A Petition against
Enclosure, 1797--6. Extracts on Enclosure from the Surveys of the
Board of Agriculture, 1798-1809--7. Arthur Young's Criticism of
Enclosure, 1801--8. Enclosure Consolidating Act, 1801--9. General
Enclosure Act, 1845.
Progress in methods of agriculture (No. 4) and the movement towards
enclosure and consolidation (Nos. 1-3 and 5-9) are the subjects
illustrated in this section. Great advances were made in the science and
practice of farming between the end of the Commonwealth and the repeal
of the Corn Laws. But the controversial subject of enclosure overshadows
everything else. And, as is shown by the extract from Arthur Young's
account of the famous Norfolk farming, agricultural progress was closely
connected with enclosure and consolidation (No. 4). Specimens are given
of two stages of enclosure proceedings (No. 1 and No. 3), which suggest
that voluntary agreements ratified in Chancery gradually merged in
enclosure by Act, compulsory upon a dissatisfied minority. The Awards,
on which the justice or injustice of the settlement would in some degree
depend, are generally too long for quotation. But the General Act of
1801 (No. 8) was an attempt to codify the best existing practice, and
gives a general view of the practice of the best Commissioners.
A mass of controversial literature on both sides deals with the reasons
and effects of the enclosures. The advantages, from the point of view of
a large landowner, are set out in a text book for land stewards (No. 2).
The reverse side, as it appeared to the small holder, is given in a
petition, which was fruitless, against the enclosure of a
Northamptonshire village (No. 5). Arthur Young's criticism of the way in
which the process was carried out is of great importance, because he had
been the most strenuous advocate of enclosing and because he had had
unrivalled opportunities of judging the change, both as an independent
traveller and as secretary of the Board of Agriculture (No. 7). The best
printed material for an independent judgment is to be found in the
surveys made by this, a semi-official Society of Agriculture, whose
agents, with easily recognisable degrees of impartiality, describe the
objects, methods and results of the enclosing movement in different
counties. Extracts are given from their reports (No. 6), together with
the first real reform of procedure, made when the nineteenth century was
far advanced, so as to safeguard the interests of the peasantry (No. 9).
AUTHORITIES
The most important modern books on the subject are:--Hammond, _The
Village Labourer_; Gonner, _Common Land and Inclosure_; Prothero,
_English Farming Past and Present_; Hasbach, _The English
Agricultural Labourer_; Levy, _Large and Small Holdings_; Johnson,
_The Disappearance of the Small Landowner_; Slater, _The English
Peasantry and the Enclosure of the Common Fields_; Ashby, _One
Hundred Years of Poor Law Administration in a Warwickshire village_
in _Oxford Studies in Social and Legal History_, Vol. III; Leonard in
_Transactions of the Royal Historical Society_, 3rd Series, Vol. XIX.
Bibliographies in Hasbach, Hammond, Levy, and Cunningham, _English
Industry and Commerce, Modern Times_, Part II.
_Contemporary_ (1).--Records of late seventeenth century enclosures
may be found in Chancery Enrolled Decrees, and Enclosures Awards in
Proceedings in Chancery (Public Record Office, and some copies in
Durham Court of Chancery). Eighteenth century material includes
petitions in Journals of the House of Commons; proceedings in
Parliament, ditto; Awards, in custody of Clerks of the Peace and of
County Councils--a Return of Commons (Inclosure Awards) to the House
of Commons, 1904, shows where they are to be found. There are reports
of Committees on Cultivation of Waste, etc., 1795 (IX), ditto, 1797
(IX), ditto, 1800 (IX); on Inclosure, 1844 (V), on Allotments, 1843
(VII).
_Contemporary_ (2) _Literary Authorities_.--The best descriptions of
agriculture are to be found in Arthur Young's various Tours (1768-71)
in The Annals of Agriculture (1784-1815), and in the Reports made to
the Board of Agriculture; Reports on individual counties (partial
list in Hasbach's bibliography), a General Report (1808), and Reviews
of Reports for different sections of the country (by William
Marshall, 1808-17). Cobbett's Rural Rides are more literary and
political and less official (1830). For agricultural progress, see J.
Tull, The New Horse-hoeing Husbandry (1731), and Young _passim_; for
the legal aspect, The Law of Commons (1698); for contemporary
opinion, D. Davies, The Case of Labourers in Husbandry (1795), Young,
An Enquiry into the Propriety of Applying Wastes, etc. (1802), and a
long list of pamphlets (bibliography in Hasbach).
1. ENCLOSURE PROCEEDINGS IN THE COURT OF CHANCERY [_Entry Book on the
Division of Commons, etc., in the Durham Court of Chancery, Book M, No._
482, 1671-1676 (_Original in Public Record Office_)], 1671.
_Division of the Town Fields of Bishop Auckland_, October, 1671
Forasmuch as heretofore by order and decree of this Court bearing date
the fifteenth day of September last past, made between the parties above
named, for the reasons then appearing to this Court it was then ordered
and decreed by the consent of all the said parties ... that all the
lands and grounds lying and being in the three common fields called the
Hitherfield, Midlefield and Fairfield lying at Bishop Auckland, therein
mentioned should ... be forthwith measured and divided according to the
agreements and consents of the said parties, ... and also that every of
the said parties should have his and their particular shares, parts, and
proportions therein particularly allotted and set forth in severalty
unto him and them, to be by them respectively hedged, fenced, enclosed
and enjoyed in severalty for ever thenafter for the better husbandry and
improvement thereof.... And now upon the motion of Mr. William Brabart
... alleging that since the making of the said decree several of the
parties thereunto, perceiving that some of the defendants, formerly
being the chief opposers of the said intended division, have obtained
their shares in the premisses to be in such part thereof as themselves
desired, their said parts being small and inconsiderable, they have
therefore of late descended from their shares and parts of the premisses
formerly by them desired or consented unto and do now endeavour to have
their proportionate parts to lie in other parts and places of the
premisses, to the great decay, hindrance, and obstruction of the said
division, notwithstanding their former consents thereunto. It was
therefore humbly prayed by the said Counsel that a Commission might be
awarded out of this Court to indifferent Commissioners ... as well for
the hearing of all the said objections ... as also to view and divide
all the said premisses and to appoint and set forth to every of the said
parties their proportionable parts therein.
[_August, 1672, Decree of the Court._]
Forasmuch as ... every owner's share hath been duly set out ... and yet
nevertheless one of the said defendants hath endeavoured to obstruct the
said division ... it is therefore now thought fit and so ordered by the
Right Honourable Sir Francis Goodriche Knight, Chancellor of the County
of Durham and Sadberge, that the Award ... shall stand absolutely
confirmed and decreed unless good cause be shown to the contrary at the
next sitting at Durham.
2. ADVICE TO THE STEWARDS OF ESTATES [_Edward Lawrence, The Duty and
Office of a Land Steward, 3rd Ed._, 1731, _pp._ 25, 26, _and_ 39], 1731.
A Steward should not forget to make the best enquiry into the
disposition of any of the freeholders within or near any of his Lord's
manors to sell their lands, that he may use his best endeavours to
purchase them at as reasonable a price, as may be for his Lord's
advantage and convenience--especially in such manors, where improvements
are to be made by inclosing commons and common-field; which (as every
one, who is acquainted with the late improvement in agriculture, must
know) is not a little advantageous to the nation in general, as well as
highly profitable to the undertaker. If the freeholders cannot all be
persuaded to sell, yet at least an agreement for inclosing should be
pushed forward by the steward, and a scheme laid, wherein it may appear
that an exact and proportional share will be allotted to every
proprietor; persuading them first, if possible, to sign a form of
agreement, and then to choose commissioners on both sides.
If the Steward be a man of good sense, he will find a necessity for
making a use of it all, in rooting out superstition from amongst them,
as what is so great a hindrance to all noble improvements? The
substance of what is proper for the proprietors to sign before an
inclosure is to be made, may be conceived in some such form as
followeth.
"Whereas it is found, by long experience, that common or open fields,
wherever they are suffered or continued, are great hindrances to a
public good, and the honest improvement which every one might make of
his own, by diligence and a seasonable charge: and, whereas the common
objections hitherto raised against inclosures are founded on mistakes,
as if inclosures contributed either to hurt or ruin the poor; whilst it
is plain that (when an enclosure is once resolved on) the poor will be
employed for many years, in planting and preserving the hedges, and
afterwards will be set to work both in the tillage and pasture, wherein
they may get an honest livelihood: And whereas all or most of the
inconveniences and misfortunes which usually attend the open wastes and
common fields have been fatally experienced at----, to the great
discouragement of industry and good husbandry in the freeholders, viz.,
that the poor take their advantage to pilfer, and steal, and trespass;
that the corn is subject to be spoiled by cattle, that stray out of the
commons and highways adjacent; that the tenants or owners, if they would
secure the fruits of their labours to themselves, are obliged either to
keep exact time in sowing and reaping or else to be subject to the
damage and inconvenience that must attend the lazy practices of those
who sow unseasonably, suffering their corn to stand to the beginning of
winter, thereby hindering the whole parish from eating the herbage of
the common field till the frosts have spoiled the most of it," etc.,
etc.
* * * * *
To conclude this article upon commons,[334] I would advise all noblemen
and gentlemen, whose tenants hold their lands by Copy of Court Roll for
three lives, not to let them renew, except they will agree to deliver up
their Copy, in order to alter the tenure by converting it to leasehold
on lives. This method will put a stop to that unreasonable custom of the
widow holding a life by her free-bench, which is a fourth life, not
covenanted for in the Copy, but only pretended to by custom; which
deprives the lord of an undoubted right of making the best, and doing
what he will with his own.
[Footnote 334: p. 39.]
3. PROCEDURE FOR ENCLOSURE BY PRIVATE ACT, _January &c._, 1766 [_Commons
Journals, Vol._ XXX, 1765-6, _p. 459, etc._], 1766.
A Petition of Stephen Croft, the Younger, Esquire, Lord of the manor of
Stillington, in the county of York, and owner of several estates, within
the said manor and parish of Stillington, and also Improprietor of the
Great Tithes there; of the Reverend James Worsley, Clerk, Prebandary of
the Prebend of Stillington aforesaid, patron of the Vicarage of
Stillington aforesaid, of the Reverend Lawrence Sterne, Clerk, Vicar of
the said parish,[335] and of William Stainforth, Esquire, and of several
other persons, whose names are thereunto subscribed, being also owners
of copyhold messuages, cottages, estates, and other properties, within
the said parish; was presented to the House and read; setting forth,
that, within the said manor and parish, is a common, or waste, called
Stillington Common, and also open fields and ings,[336] which, in their
present situation, are incapable of improvement; and that it would be of
great advantage to the several persons interested in the said common,
fields and ings, if they were enclosed and divided into specific
allotments, and all rights of common and average thereon, or upon any
other commonable lands in the said parish, were extinguished, or if the
said common was so inclosed, and a power given to the several
proprietors and owners of estates in the said fields and ings, to flat
and inclose the same, first making satisfaction to the improprietor upon
the tithes thereof; and after the flatting and inclosing the same, all
right of common, or average, was to cease; and therefore praying, that
leave may be given to bring in a Bill for the purposes aforesaid, or any
of them, in such manner, and under such regulations, as the House shall
deem meet.
Ordered, That leave be given to bring in a Bill pursuant to the prayer
of the said petition: and that Mr. Cholmley, Sir George Savile, and Sir
Joseph Mawbey, do prepare and bring in the same.
[_February 3._--Bill presented to the House and read a first time.]
_February 10, 1766._[337] A Bill for inclosing and dividing the common
waste grounds, open fields, open meadows, grounds, and ings, within the
parish of Stillington, in the county of York, was read a second time.
Resolved, That the Bill be committed to Mr. Cholmley, Mr. Fonereau, Sir
John Taines [etc., etc.]; and all the members who serve for the counties
of York, Nottingham, Northumberland, and Durham: and they are to meet
this afternoon, at five of the clock, in the Speaker's Chamber.
_February 27._[338] Mr. Cholmley reported from the Committee, to whom
the Bill for inclosing and dividing the common waste grounds [etc.]
within the parish of Stillington, in the county of York, was committed.
That the Committee had examined the allegations of the Bill; and found
the same to be true; and that the parties concerned had given their
consent to the Bill, to the satisfaction of the Committee, except the
proprietors of sixty acres of land in the said fields and ings, who
refused their consent to the inclosure, and the proprietors of twenty
seven acres of land, who were not at home when application was made for
their consents; and that the whole of the said fields and ings contain
six hundred acres or thereabouts; and also, except the proprietors of
eight common rights, who refused to consent, and the proprietors of
seven common rights, who were from home when application was made for
their consents; and that the whole number of common rights are
eighty-nine; and that no person appeared before the Committee to oppose
the Bill; and that the Committee had gone through the Bill, and made
several amendments thereunto; which they had directed him to report to
the House; and he read the report in his place; and afterwards delivered
the Bill, with the amendments, in at the Clerk's Table; where the
amendments were once read throughout; and then a second time, one by
one; and, upon the Question severally put thereon, were agreed to by the
House; and several amendments were made, by the House, to the Bill.
Ordered, that the Bill, with the amendments be ingrossed.
[_March 3._ The Bill read a third time and passed. Sent to the House of
Lords.
_March 18._ Reported that the Lords agreed to the Bill without
amendment.
The King's Assent given to the Bill.]
[Footnote 335: Author of _Tristram Shandy_.]
[Footnote 336: _i.e._ Meadows.]
[Footnote 337: _Ibid._ p. 522.]
[Footnote 338: _Ibid._ p. 610.]
4. FARMING IN NORFOLK [_A. Young, The Farmer's Tour_, 1771, _Vol. II,
Letter XIV, pp._ 150, 156, 161], 1771.
As I shall presently leave Norfolk it will not be improper to give a
slight review of the husbandry which has rendered the name of this
county so famous in the farming world. Pointing out the practices which
have succeeded so nobly here, may perhaps be of some use to other
countries possessed of the same advantages, but unknowing in the art to
use them.
From forty to fifty years ago, all the northern and western, and a part
of the eastern tracts of the county, were sheep walks, let so low as
from 6d. to 1s. 6d. and 2s. an acre. Much of it was in this condition
only thirty years ago. The great improvements have been made by means of
the following circumstances.
First. By inclosing without the assistance of parliament.
Second. By a spirited use of marl and clay.
Third. By the introduction of an excellent course of crops.
Fourth. By the culture of turnips well hand-hoed.
Fifth. By the culture of clover and ray-grass.
Sixth. By landlords granting long leases.
Seventh. By the country being divided chiefly into large farms.
* * * * *
_The Course of Crops._[339]
After the best managed inclosure, and the most spirited conduct in
marling, still the whole success of the undertaking depends on this
point: No fortune will be made in Norfolk by farming, unless a judicious
course of crops be pursued. That which has been chiefly adopted by the
Norfolk farmers is,
1. Turnips.
2. Barley.
3. Clover: or clover and ray-grass.
4. Wheat.
* * * * *
_Large Farms._[340]
If the preceding articles are properly reviewed, it will at once be
apparent that no small farmers could effect such great things as have
been done in Norfolk. Inclosing, marling, and keeping a flock of sheep
large enough for folding, belong absolutely and exclusively to great
farmers.... Nor should it be forgotten that the best husbandry in
Norfolk is that of the largest farmers.... Great farms have been the
soul of the Norfolk culture: split them into tenures of an hundred
pounds a year, you will find nothing but beggars and weeds in the whole
county.
[Footnote 339: _Ibid._ p. 156.]
[Footnote 340: _Ibid._ p. 161.]
5. A PETITION AGAINST ENCLOSURE [_Commons Journals_[341] _July 19,
1797_], 1797.
A Petition of the hereunder-signed small Proprietors of Land and Persons
entitled to Rights of Common [at Raunds, Northamptonshire].
That the petitioners beg leave to represent to the House that, under the
pretence of improving lands in the same parish, the cottagers and other
persons entitled to right of common on the lands intended to be
enclosed, will be deprived of an inestimable privilege, which they now
enjoy, of turning a certain number of their cows, calves, and sheep, on
and over the said lands; a privilege that enables them not only to
maintain themselves and their families in the depth of winter, when they
cannot, even for their money, obtain from the occupiers of other lands
the smallest portion of milk or whey for such necessary purpose, but in
addition to this, they can now supply the grazier with young or lean
stock at a reasonable price, to fatten and bring to market at a more
moderate rate for general consumption, which they conceive to be the
most rational and effectual way of establishing public plenty and
cheapness of provision; and they further conceive, that a more ruinous
effect of this enclosure will be the almost total depopulation of their
town, now filled with bold and hardy husbandmen, from among whom, and
the inhabitants of other open parishes, the nation has hitherto derived
its greatest strength and glory, in the supply of its fleets and armies,
and driving them, from necessity and want of employ, in vast crowds,
into manufacturing towns, where the very nature of their employment,
over the loom or the forge, soon may waste their strength, and
consequently debilitate their posterity, and by imperceptible degrees
obliterate that great principle of obedience to the Laws of God and
their country, which forms the character of the simple and artless
villagers, more equally distributed through the open counties, and on
which so much depends the good order and government of the state. These
are some of the injuries to themselves as individuals, and of the ill
consequences to the public, which the petitioners conceive will follow
from this, as they have already done from many enclosures, but which
they did not think they were entitled to lay before the House (the
constitutional patron and protector of the poor) until it unhappily came
to their own lot to be exposed to them through the Bill now pending.
[Footnote 341: Quoted Hammond, _The Village Labourer_, pp. 39-40.]
6. EXTRACTS ON ENCLOSURE FROM THE SURVEYS OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE,
1798-1809.
_Somersetshire_ [_J. Billingsley, Somerset_, 1798, _pp._ 48-50 _and_
52].
Let us begin with taking a view of the objections which have been
started to this species of improvement, and see if we cannot prove them
to be for the most part either false or frivolous.
1st. Invasion of the rights and interest of the cottagers.
* * * * *
The foremost of these objections carries with it the appearance of a
humane attention to the comfort of the poor; but a brief investigation
will lessen its influence, if not totally refute it.
There are but two modes of enclosing commons. First, by unanimous
consent of the parties claiming rights, who delegate power to
commissioners, chosen by themselves, to ascertain their validity, and
divide them accordingly, under covenants and agreements properly drawn
and executed for the purpose. Or secondly, by act of parliament obtained
by the petition of a certain proportion of the commoners, both in number
and value, whereby a minority, sanctioned only by ignorance, prejudice,
or selfishness, is precluded from defeating the ends of private
advantage and public utility.
In point of economy, the first of these methods is most eligible, as it
saves the expense of an act of parliament, with an equal security to
the proprietors. But it is seldom practised unless in commons on a small
scale, from the difficulty of procuring the consent of every individual
claimant, without which it cannot be accomplished.
In either of these methods, it is manifest that the right of the
cottager cannot be invaded; since with respect to legal or equitable
construction, he stands precisely on the same ground with his more
opulent neighbours; and as to his interest, I can truly declare that, in
all cases which have fallen within my observation, inclosures have
meliorated his condition, by exciting a spirit of activity and industry,
whereby habits of sloth have been by degrees overcome, and supineness
and inactivity have been exchanged for vigour and exertion.
* * * * *
Besides, moral effects of an injurious tendency accrue to the cottager
from a reliance on the imaginary benefits of stocking a common. The
possession of a cow or two, with a hog, and a few geese, naturally
exalts the peasant, in his own conception, above his brothers in the
same rank of society. It inspires some degree of confidence in a
property, inadequate to his support. In sauntering after his cattle, he
acquires a habit of indolence. Quarter, half, and occasionally whole
days are imperceptibly lost. Day labour becomes disgusting; the aversion
increases by indulgence; and at length the sale of a half-fed calf, or
hog, furnishes the means of adding intemperance to idleness. The sale of
the cow frequently succeeds, and its wretched and disappointed
possessor, unwilling to resume the daily and regular course of labour,
from whence he drew his former subsistence, by various modes of artifice
and imposition, exacts from the poor's rate the relief to which he is in
no degree entitled.
_Lincolnshire_ [_Arthur Young, Lincoln_, 1799, _pp._ 85-6].
[Evidence of Elmhurst, a Commissioner under Enclosure Act.]
Another observation I at the first made, and ever after put in practice,
was this, always to begin to line out and allot for the smallest
proprietors first (whether rich or poor) in every parish, so as to make
such allotment as proper and convenient for the occupation of such, or
their tenant (as that might be) to occupy; and so on, from the smallest
to the greatest: for it is for the advantage of the greatest and most
opulent proprietors that a bill is presented and act passed; and at
their requests, and not the small ones; and, as the little ones would
have no weight by opposition, they must submit, was it ever so
disadvantageous to them; as it very often happens; and, therefore, there
can be no partiality in defending those who cannot help or defend
themselves; and a little man may as well have nothing allotted to him,
as to have it so far off, or so inconvenient for him, that it is not
worth his having, as it would prevent his going to his daily labour;
and, therefore, he must sell his property to his rich and opulent
adjoining neighbours; and that, in some measure, decreases population.
_Norfolk_ [_Young, Norfolk_, 1804, _pp_. 82, 86, 94, 135, 156]. _Bintrey
and Twiford._[342] Enclosed 1795.
Poor. There were 20, acres allotted for fuel, let by the parish. There
were 46 commonable rights; the whole divided according to value; very
few little proprietors; but small occupiers suffered.
_Brancaster._[343] Enclosed 1755.
Poor. Very well off; Barrow-hills, a common of 65 acres, allotted to
them; and each dwelling-house has a right to keep the two cows or
heifers; or a mare and foal; or two horses; and also to cut furze.
_Cranworth_, _Remieston_, _Southborough_.[344] Enclosed 1796.
Poor. They kept geese on the common, of which they are deprived. But in
fuel they are benefited; an allotment not to exceed 1/20 let, and the
rent applied in coals for all not occupying above 5l. a year: this is to
the advantage of those at Southborough, having enough allowed for their
consumption; at Cranworth the poor are more numerous, and the coals of
little use.
_Ludham._[345]