His 119.05/.06 Notes 1/21/10

Stephanie:
Working-Class Life:
1. Minutes of the evidence taken before the Committee on the Factories Bill
http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/factmine/best.htm
“Have you reason to think that in any of those mills the masters or the managers were aware that the children were thus beaten and strapped?
Yes, they knew it very well; they encouraged them to do it. Mr. Stirk's was the last place I was at, and the young Mr. Stirk made a strap for me himself, and told me to use it freely, and make them look sharp.
Will you describe the sort of straps which are made use of?
They are about a foot and a half long, and there is a stick at the end: and that end they beat them with is cut in the direction of my fingers, thus, having five of six thongs, some of them.
Are some of them set in a handle?
Yes, and some are not.”
-this specific passage is an “urgent challenge for Britain because their work force is not only being harmed by these sort of activities, if it were to continue like this in the future, they would probably no longer have employees because they would go elsewhere because of the ill-treatment in the Britain Factories. This specific passage I found urgent and interesting because not only did the master expect the worker and children to work 12 hours a day but they were expected to it without slacking or stopping and orderly and if they didn’t they were beaten as stated above.
2. Inspectors of Factories http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/factmine/horner.htm
“I particularly allude to the offence of employing children twelve hours a day who are under thirteen years of age, often considerably so. But the culpability is fully as chargeable upon the parents of those children, and upon the operative spinners, who hire them as their assistants, as it is upon the masters of the factories. In a visit to a mill near Bury on the 23rd of November last, I noticed a girl who was working, as I was informed, twelve hours a day, and had been doing so for more than two years, who appeared to me very young to have a certificate of thirteen; and on examining her father, by whom she was employed as his piecer, he admitted that she was between eleven and twelve years of age. On calling for her certificate I found that it was dated the 17th of August 1836. Here, then, was a father, in the receipt of good wages and in regular employment, who had been knowingly working his own child twelve hours a day, and that too from the time when she was little more than nine years old. It is not at all improbable that he was one of those who sent up petitions calling on Parliament to interfere for the protection of the poor factory children, 'the white slaves', who were so cruelly over-worked by 'the hard-hearted, avaricious masters'…”
This example is a case of urgent challenge because Britain had parents who were taking advantage of this Factory Bill and hiring their children as young as 7 years old working them twelve hours a day and paying them minimum wage. This was a problem because these parents were taking advantage of the bill to get their work done by using fraud certificates to allow their children to work for them. This is cruelty to the children.
Rural Life:
1. The rural life was under a huge change from farmer’s laborers living and eating in the house to them getting their own cottages and living on their own. This urgent challenge was unheard of to these farmer’s and would have to be something they got used to as it changed across Europe and had already occurred in France.
“The land produces, on an average, what it always produced; but, there is a new distribution of the produce. This 'Squire Charington's father used, I dare say, to sit at the head of the oak-table along with his men, say grace to them, and cut up the meat and the pudding. He might take a cup of strong beer to himself, when they had none; but, that was pretty nearly all the difference in their manner of living. So that all lived well. But the 'Squire had many wine-decanters and wine-glasses and 'a dinner-set' and a 'breakfast-set' and 'desert-knives'; and these evidently imply carryings on and a consumption that must of necessity have greatly robbed the long oak table if it had remained fully tenanted. That long table could not share in the work of the decanters and the dinner set. Therefore, it became almost untenanted; the laborers retreated to hovels, called cottages; and instead of board and lodging, they got money; so little of it as to enable the employer to drink wine; but the, that he might not reduce them to quiet starvation they were enabled to come to him, in the king's name and demand food as paupers ...”
2. The Working of the Old Poor Law
The 1601 Elizabethan Poor Law divided the poor into two groups
a. the impotent poor - the sick, elderly, those unable to work - who were to be helped via outdoor relief or in almshouses. These people were classed as "would work but couldn't".
b. this group were the able-bodied paupers and it was thought that these people "could work but wouldn't". They were to be severely beaten until they realised the error of their ways.
Relief was given in variety of ways, and not all parishes had a poor-house or house of correction. It soon became obvious that some parishes were more sympathetic towards their poor, and this tended to result in paupers moving into that area from less generous parishes. To prevent this, parliament passed the
1662 Settlement Act
This stated that a person had to have a 'settlement' in order to obtain relief from a parish. This could be secured by:
• birth in the parish
• marriage (in the case of a woman)
• working in the parish for a year and a day
If a labourer moved away from his parish of origin in search of work the JPs issued him with a certificate of settlement saying that if the man fell on hard times his own parish would receive him back and pay for him to be 'removed'.
The Settlement Laws caused problems because they:
• hindered the free movement of labour
• prevented men from leaving overpopulated parishes in search of work on the 'off-chance' of finding employment
• led to short contracts of, for example, 364 days or 51 weeks. A man might live in a parish for 25 years, working on short contracts, and still not be eligible for poor relief later in life.
I thought this was interesting about the “Old Poor Law”. The people who were injured or could not work were brought to a whole different place and not allowed to be with the “workers”. This was an urgent challenge, because why would Britain feel the need to separate these people? Possibly so they would not interfere with the mindset of the workers. However, this would later pose challenges; hence the Settlement laws for these “non-workers”.

Katy H.:
The conditions of the mines were terrible. There was little lighting, and the only lighting was provided by candles. This would cause problems because there would not be full visibility, so the miners could face problems and make a wrong turn very easily. Also the candles could burn out which would cause totaly blackness which would be a problem for all the workers. Also there were many obvious dangers in the mining business. Carrying the baskets of coal up ladders is a huge problem because if it fell it would fall right on the person behind them, causing harm to them and also a loss of coal. Young boys and girls were used to push the carts because they were the only people that could fit in the small shafts. This was dangerous because these shafts were often very poorly dug and could collapse at any time. According to the accounts of the workers in the coal mines, the conditios are portrayed as terrible and very extreme. One man said he worked since he was eight and everyday he woke up at 1 or 2 AM and went to work and worked until 5 or 6PM.
 
The furniture in the farm house looks very underused. He is saying that the owners of the farms do not let their servants have them. They have enough for everyone and would satisfy most of the workers but they choose not to. They instead do not let them use these. "All these he has; all these cost him nothing; and yet so much does he gain by pinching them in wages that he lets all these things remain as on no use, rather than feed labourers in the house." All these things he already has in the house, so he should let his workers have access to them since he does not use them all. The owner also does not feed them and instead gives them wages. The only way they got food was to demand food as beggars because the owner woould not provide their needs otherwise. "Farmers were not the authors of the mischief; and now they are compelled to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages, in order to be able to pay their own taxes; and, besides this, the manners and the principles of the working class are so changed, that a sort of self-preservation bids the farmer (especially in some counties) to keep them from beneath his roof."

Daniel C.:

First Example for Working Life
            “Child Labour”

  1. During the 1800’s, the English society started to develop concern about the employment of children and the long hours of hard work that they had to endure every work day.
  2. History often views factory owners as unsympathetic towards their workers.
  3. Robert Southey’s response to a factory owner describing the working environment of his employees also supports this.
    1. “I was looking, while he spoke, at the unnatural dexterity with which the fingers of these little creatures were playing in the machinery, half giddy myself with the noise and the endless motion; and when he told me there was no rest in these walls, day or night, I thought that if Dante had peopled one of his hells with children, here was a scene worthy to have supplied him with new images of torment” (www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/factmine/southey.htm).
    2. The owner of the factory believes that allowing children to work where their families live and educating them was treating them well.

Second Example for Working Life
            “Inspectors of Factories”

  1. Leonard Horner reports to Lord John Russell his findings after inspecting multiple factories.
    1. Horner’s main complaint is the faults of the Factory Act.
      1. I have no expectation that there will be much change for the better, until the imperfections of the existing law are removed… often frustrated, in our endeavours to obtain the full advantages and protection which it was the intention of the legislature to secure to children and young persons by this law” (http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/factmine/horner.htm).
      2. He also believes that parents and owners should be punished if they lie about a child’s age in order to have them work longer hours than the laws allowed.

Rural Examples
            “The Destruction of the Rural Economy”

  1. William Cobbett gives his findings of the state of rural life.
    1. His first observation that he would change
      1. Farmers paying employees only money instead of housing and food.
      2. Allows farmers to save money and live a better life.

“Why do not farmers now feed and lodge their work-people, as they did formerly? Because they cannot keep them upon so little as they give them in wages. This is the real cause of the change. There needs no more to prove that the lot of the working classes has become worse than it formerly was. This fact alone is quite sufficient to settle this point. All the world knows, that a number of people, boarded in the same house, and at the same table, can, with good food, be boarded much cheaper than those persons divided into twos, threes, or fours, can be boarded. This is a well-known truth: therefore, if the farmer now shuts his pantry against his labourers, and pays them wholly in money, is it not clear, that he does it because he thereby gives them a living cheaper to him; that is to say, a worse living than formerly” (http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/ruralife/reigate.htm).

  1. Blames the first reason on his second observation that he would change
    1. Internal Stock-Jobbing System
      1. Causes famers to shut labourers from houses and pinching wages in order to pay for their own taxes
      2. “…internal stock-jobbing system. There was no reason to expect, that farmers would not endeavour to keep pace, in point of show and luxury, with fund-holders, and with all the tribes that war and taxes created. Farmers were not the authors of the mischief; and now they are compelled to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages, in order to be able to pay their own taxes…” http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/ruralife/reigate.htm

Zach:
•       Children of poor families who were then sent to the church to be taken care of would be sent to the Mills where they could work for their food and when they became 7 they would be able to bring in money for their families.

•       Children would have a same full work day as every other worker and were not given any extra privileges
•       Children sometimes would attend schooling for an hour after they finished their full work day

Factory Act of 1833

•       Children who were under the age of 18 could not work more then from 5 in the morning until 8 at night
o       Could not work more then 69 hours in one week
•       Workers has to be given at lease 90 minutes for meals during the work day
•       Child workers had to complete there 9th year in school to be able to work in a mill, for the exception of silk
•       The mills who used children to work for them had to be open for inspection by the king


Destruction of Rural Economy

•       Farmers were being forced out of there jobs causing them to sell everything they owned and pack up and move
•       Not only were the farm owners being forced to give up there land and homes but they were also being forced to put out there workers  which caused their families tough times

•       Instead farm owners housing there workers, they have learned that they can instead pay them less and not here any complains which in turn causes them to be able to turn a larger profit

•       The farm house that he is describing in this passage is full of lavish items that are of no use to the farmer and his family other then the fact that they look nice. And yet he refuses to not spend the money but instead house his workers

Katie K.:

Factory Challenges:

Rural Challenges:

Kimberly:

Two features of working class life that posed urgent challenges for Great Britain were child labor and the long hours they are working.  The child labor that was taking place in the factories of Great Britain was inhibiting the ability for children to be just that, children, by putting them to work at such young ages and keeping them until they were grown.  Childhood is a crucial time for growth and education and this is noted by Robert Southey as he writes dialogue saying, “’These children then,' said I, 'have no time to receive instruction.' 'That, sir,' he replied 'is the evil which we have found,” (Robert Southey, Letters from England (1807)).  Due to this time being taken away from the children many women were uneducated for their duties as wife when they are done in the factories. Alongside the issue of children being put to work so young was the hours they were working.  The Parliamentary Papers of 1833 read, “And a third witness, a proprietor, (chairman of the woollen manufacturers of Gloucestershire,) deposes that in his own factory, in those parts in which children are employed, the regular hours are from nine in the morning until four in the evening, deducting an hour for dinner,” (Report of the Commissioners on the Employment of Children in Factories 1833).  Seven hours in a factory, while minor in comparison to the up to 12 hours worked by some, is still far to great at such a young age.  It was important for Great Britain to face the challenges of child labor promptly so that these children weren’t being so misused, however commerce seemed to prevail for the time being. 
            Rural life posed urgent challenges as well.  For one, the change of help no longer being fed and lodged by the people they worked for was causing great issue.  “All the world knows, that a number of people, boarded in the same house, and at the same table, can, with good food, be boarded much cheaper than those persons divided into twos, threes, or fours, can be boarded,”(William Cobbett, Rural Rides) writes William Cobbett.  Yet even with this knowledge employers were refusing to house their staff while paying them unlivable wages.  One of the challenges that contributed to this greater challenge was the rising in taxes which caused the farmers, “to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages,” (William Cobbett, Rural Rides).  The combination of these challenges made a definite struggle for employees of farmers to receive enough food and shelter.

Dan D.:

Urban
In 19th century urban Great Britain a cheap labor source was vital to the success of industry. Those employed in mines or by factories were overworked, underpaid, and subject to horrible conditions, as a result Trade Unions which had existed for years prior came to have more of an effect on society. Trade Unions represented urgent challenges for Britain on the part of two ends of society, the worker wanted fair wages and conditions, however the British hierarchy believed that these groups could be a danger to the established monarchy and the class separation of the society. As labor and laborer alike evolved so came the “New Model Trade Union”; these were “single craft unions” that used arbitration rather than strike, collected dues, were centralized and respectable, brought together skilled workers, and cooperated well with other unions. These groups marked an urgent challenge for Britain in that what were once shunned and sometimes feared laborers and unions became respected and important facets of not only industry in Britain but social life as well.
            Cities in Great Britain also faced an urgent challenge regarding the “Public Reaction to the Disclosure of Conditions in the Coal Mines”. The horrible conditions in which the miners worked became general knowledge to the public in 1842 following the “Mines Report”, this report stated how children as young as six and pregnant women would be tasked with carrying heavy loads of coal up steep shafts and how safety protocols were non-existent. The accounts of these miners and the commission in which observed them led to public outcry and forced Parliament to enact legislation, the 1842 Mines Act which detailed that “No female was to be employed underground…No boy under 10 years old was to be employed underground…Parish apprentices between the ages of 10 and 18 could continue to work in the mines”. The urgent challenge facing Britain here was in regards to both industry and humanity and whether the latter was really as important.
Rural
            William Cobbett describes the urgent challenges facing Great Britain regarding rural life. He states how the laborers on farms are paid very little money from the owner and how these owners have the ability and means to house and feed the workers but rather solely pay them an almost unlivable wage. Cobbett describes how it has become the custom that the farmer would rather only give the laborers a small wage so as to increase their own economic standing, that farmers are paying taxes and indulging in frivolous luxuries while their workers are starving in substandard living conditions. Cobbett also points out that in many counties farmers now see it as a disgrace to have their workers even in their house; these mark urgent challenges for Great Britain in that there is a very large social gap and that those who are doing most of the work are finding themselves in almost unlivable conditions.

Kristina:
The Factory Act of 1833:
  Conditions included:
       1. No one under 18 is allowed to work between "half-past eight in the evening and half-past five in the morning, in any cotton, woollen, worsted, hemp, flax, tow, linen or silk mill."
       2. No one under 18 can work "in any such mill ... more than twelve hours in ... one day, nor more than sixty-nine hours in ... one week..."
       3. Workers shall have no less than one and a half hours to eat.
       4.  To work in any mill a child must be the age of 9 or older.
       5. Every child restricted to working 48 hours of labor in any week must attend some school.
  
The 1842 Mines Act:
    Conditions include:
         1. Females were not allowed to work underground.
         2. Boys under the age of 10 are not allowed to work underground.
         3. "Parish apprentices between the ages of 10 and 18 could continue to work in the mines."

Rural:
  "In the mid-1820s, William Cobbett toured southern England on horseback, reporting on its cultivation, the standard of living of its labourers, and the decline of its traditional practices such as living-in."
   "He claimed that new money and new urban styles were upsetting the placid stable rural economy. In 1830 the rural workers of the arable south and east of England rose in the Swing riots."
  "They demanded higher wages and an end to the threshing machine which destroyed their winter employment. They reinforced their demands with rick-burning, the destruction of the threshing machines and cattle-maiming among other things."


Jaime:

            Two Features of Working Class Life

“Child labor in cotton factories 1807” by Robert Southey, Letters from England (1807)
            Children given food and time to eat
            Factories can pay children less
            People who ran factories made it look like children were healthy
                        Burden to parents, extra cost
            In reality, children were in danger of losing fingers and obtaining diseases
            Only means of making a living for the family
            This dirty work had to be done in order for the family to survive
            Thousands of people willing to work in the factories so they can make money
            Lying of factory supervisors was a common occurrence ie. wages, hours, working conditions, etc…

“Contemporary illustrations of conditions in the mines” last modified September 23, 2009.
            Most people were almost naked because of the extremely hot temperatures
            Fear of cave-ins underground
            Poisonous gases can kill miners
            Young girls and Women performed heavy work too even those that were pregnant
                        Newborns can be affected by this tedious workload
            Children went into tiny canals to fill the coal carts
                        Tiny canals- no air, very hot
             Coal and gases affected the lungs of the miners, causing breathing trouble later in life
            Dangers of ladders and other equipment can cause serious injures

            Two Features of Rural Life

“The Destruction of the Rural Economy” by William Cobbett: Rural Rides (1969 edition) p.226-229
           
Farmers
                        Had everything they wanted: plentiful dinners with numerous courses, massive houses, well furnished décor
                        Gave the laborers money for wages; this sum was very little at best
                        Gave no hospitality, no lodging, no food or drink
                        Food went directly to the farmers
                        Farmers were selfish and commanded the laborers
           
            Laborers
                        Very hard work and received very little reward
                        Were on their own to make a living, farming was not sufficient enough
                        Were given just enough to pass by, not anything more
                        Viewed and treated as slaves, nothing more
                        All their hard work was useless to them because they never received any shares of it           

Emma:

Working Class
• On the webpage titled parental collusion in child employment, a witness Samuel Coulson who had daughters working in the mills described how they were treated. He said that in all 19 hours that his girls worked they would only get about an hour break all day. He says that often times they would come home and not have had time to eat at all. This should be of concern to Britain because if the workers conditions are this bad they will become worn down and ill and not only will this cause a lack of product to be made but also the moral conscience reputation of the country could be up for destruction once word gets out of how the young girls are treated.

• “Were they always able to eat their food then? 
Sometimes in those dusty places it takes away their appetite, and they cannot eat it, and some of them are obliged to desist from their labor two or three times a week.”(Flogging in Factories- Minutes of the evidence taken before the Committee on the Factories Bill”

This should be an urgent problem for Great Britain and the working class for two reasons. One being that a country should always care about the general health and well being of their citizens. There is also a second reason why having workers be in such poor conditions that they are forced to be unable to eat is bad for Britain. If the workers cannot eat and have to take time off, this stops or slows down production causing the factories to be off schedule, lose money, and it could lead to the over working of other workers.

Rural Class
• “Why do not farmers now feed and lodge their work-people, as they did formerly? Because they cannot keep them upon so little as they give them in wages”(William Cobbett’s Rural Rides) This should be an urgent concern to Great Britain relating to the working class because if the farmers are not able to house their workers as they previously had, this could cause farmers to not be able to work and the lack of crops or supplies should be a concern.

• “Girls are employed here from the age you see them till they marry, and then they know nothing about domestic work, not even how to mend a stocking or boil a potato.”(The Factory Movement-Child Labor).”

This quote from a conversation between two men observing the cotton factories poses an “urgent” problem for Great Britain. The girls who traditionally would spend time with their mothers learning how to run the household are now being sent to work in the factories. As a result there is bound to be some sort of trouble in the homes as the working class girls are forced into working rather than being able to learn how to run a home before they are married and forced into doing so.

Tom:

            Great Britain faced many challenges when it came to the working-class and rural life.  The rural economy was basically being destroyed by the fact that not enough money was being made by the farmers. At one point, the once wealthy farm-owners would hire peasants to work on their farms, put a roof over their heads, and even feed them.  As the economy went on a decline, the farm-owners couldn’t afford this anymore. They now had to strictly pay the workers, and that’s it, no roof over their heads and no food. This thereby, saved the farm-owners more money for themselves (Cobbett 226-229).  This now made it so the peasants had nowhere to live, and had very little money to live off of.  All of these things, affected one after another after another to mess up Great Britain’s economy to the way it was.  This accounted for the rise in crime that Great Britain experienced in this time.  All of these peasant workers had barely any money to live off of so some resulted to stealing.  An increase in crime rates definitely doesn’t help the economy.
            When it came to the working-class, Great Britain was facing many issues.  The most important being that workers in most factories were under-paid, under-aged, worked in horrible conditions, and did not have good education.  Robert Owen went in to change that.  At first, he was failing miserably not really taking into consideration that the individual workers were still being mistreated (Peel Web, 1).  Eventually he changed this and things started turning around for the working-class.  The Factory Act of 1819 was the thing that started all the changing of conditions for workers.
            Many problems arose from those working in coal mines. One major problem associated with using children or women as “hurriers” in coal mines is that they can develop major health problems as they age.  Because these little kids and women are underground all hours of the day and are exposed to carbon deposits as well as other elements that aren’t meant to be in the body, they can develop such health problems as cancer, emphysema and other issues mainly in the lungs.  With all of these kids and young men in these mines all day, they put themselves at huge risk of developing health problems in their lifetimes. 
            Another issue that these kids and women faced was the many physical risks in the mines.  It is very possible that these kids could get trapped in the mines and that there could be a cave in.  Also, in these caves, there was very little air to breathe, therefore they could be suffocated.  Another risk they faced, was breaking their backs.  This wasn’t unusual because the coal was extremely heavy and these kids and women were pulling it uphill all day long.  Women are a lot more delicate than men; therefore they were more prone to injury.  All in all, there were tons of problems people faced when working in the coal mines and no action was done to stop it for years to come.

Work Cited
William Cobbett: Rural Rides (1969 edition), pp. 226-229
The Peel Web: Robert Owen and Factory Legislation (23 September 2009)

Chelsea:

Issues with the Factory Reform Movement

Issues in Cobbett’s “Rural Rides”

Jennifer S.:
Urgent challenges working-class
Corn Laws:


Public Health:


Rural living

John:
Child Labor In Cotton Factories in 1807
        As the indistrualization period moved on, the living and working conditions of the working-class became unspeakably bad.  As we know, industrialization changed distribution of wealth, but what it also did was change the living conditions of the different classes.  For example, the unskilled working families were plagued with the undeniable financial need to send their children at young ages to work in factories and coal mines.  In this article, the children’s work schedule is described as beginning at 5 in the morning and ending at 6 pm.  That is a tough working schedule for anyone, never mind children of 7 or 8 years old.  I worked 13 hour shifts over the summer and it was exhausting, I can only imagine what it must have been for these children.  In this article, Robert Southey compares the work day of the children to something you would see as torment in hell, “I was looking, while he spoke, at the unnatural dexterity with which the fingers of these little creatures were playing in the machinery, half giddy myself with the noise and the endless motion; and when he told me there was no rest in these walls, day or night, I thought that if Dante had peopled one of his hells with children, here was a scene worthy to have supplied him with new images of torment.”  This part of the working class life obviously challenges great Britain because it is simply inhumane to have a young child do this.  The women who are old enough to marry are completely uneducated on any domestic skills because they have been working their whole lives.  Another aspect to think about is how the health of these children.  

Contemporary accounts of working conditions in mines
I hurry the corves a mile and more underground and back; they weigh 3 cwt* ... the getters that I work for are naked except for their caps, sometimes they beat me - if I am not quick enough.

Patience Kershaw, aged 17, to the Children's Employment Commission, 1842

How can the British government ignore such actions as this?  The basic rights of humans are becoming less recognized as this industrial revolution takes place.  This quote is self explanatory in the sense that workers were basically punished for accomplishing their work in an untimely manner.  When working long hours in the mine lugging heavy weights all day, one can imagine the workers would become tired and might not work quite as fast.  This is an outrageous


Rural Life
-       The fact that employers are cutting wages but supplying workers with basic neccesities such as a place to live isn’t good for the workers.  It’s cheaper for the employer to house all the people under one roof rather then pay them higher wages so they can all afford to live separately in twos, threes or fours.   “All the world knows, that a number of people, boarded in the same house, and at the same table, can, with good food, be boarded much cheaper than those persons divided into twos, threes, or fours, can be boarded.”

-       At the time of the Rural Wars, many adults were commiting many crimes.  The criminals in the prisons lived a better life and were treated better then many of the working class citizens which work hard and obey the law.  What kind of a message does this send to citizens of the country?  If you obey the laws and work hard to support your family, you will eventually live a low quality of life and will barely be able to support your family.  On the other hand, if you break the law and go to jail, you will at least be fed better and will have better working and living conditions.  This aspect is of the utmost urgency because it will slowly turn the citizens into criminals from their basic need to survive.  

Laura:

Factory Movement: Primary sources

William Cobbett: Rural Rides,"Reigate, Thursday evening, 20 October 1825"

Dylan:
Working-Class Life Challenges:
 
a) One of the greatest challenges that needed to be overcome by the average working-class citizen was the abhorrent conditions of the working environment. This especially applies to those who worked in the mines. Not only was the work physically demanding and often performed by women and young children, but the surroundings were very hazardous. Peel Web illustrates examples of these conditions in which workers would have to climb ladders with heavy baskets of coal, carry giant slabs of coal on their backs, and all the while be exposed to extreme heat and potentially dangerous gases.
 
b) Another challenge was the presence of child labor. While it is generally perceived today that putting young children to work in dangerous factories for countless hours is a detestable thought, it was not always necessarily thought so during much of the 19th century. The dangers and lack of ethics associated with child labor were often disregarded during this time. In fact, the challenge at the time seemed to lie within the mentality of the people. Supporting a family on only one member’s pay was not nearly enough to get by and this became a central issue. The following excerpt is an additional argument made by a “Manchester gentleman” offering his insight on the issue:
 
“In most parts of England poor children are a burthen to their parents and to the parish <http://www.historyhome.co.uk/peel/pltopic.htm> ; here the parish, which would else have to support them, is rid of all expense; they get their bread almost as soon as they can run about, and by the time they are seven or eight years old bring in money. There is no idleness among us: they come at five in the morning; we allow them half an hour for breakfast, and an hour for dinner; they leave work at six, and another set relieves them for the night; the wheels never stand still.”
 
Rural Life Challenges:
 
a) The concept of “rural life” during the 19th century is nearly synonymous with “agriculture”. However, this type of life began to face serious complications. On one hand are the farm-owners, who are now in financial turmoil. William Cobbett mentioned how these farm-owners would sometimes live a life of too much luxury; however Cobbett more directly blames the “internal stock-jobbing system” which had a strongly negative impact on these farm-owners. This following excerpt evidences Cobbett’s sentiments:
 
“…the blame belongs to the internal stock-jobbing system. There was no reason to expect, that farmers would not endeavour to keep pace, in point of show and luxury, with fund-holders, and with all the tribes that war and taxes created. Farmers were not the authors of the mischief; and now they are compelled to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages, in order to be able to pay their own taxes…”

b) Meanwhile, the agricultural laborers are suffering the worst. Cobbett is clearly sympathetic to these laborers who can no longer be supported by farm-owners. This, along with the financial issues of the farm-owners, are the elements of “The Downfall of the Rural Economy” that Cobbett is referencing. Cobbett connects the mutual misfortunes of the two classes when he writes:
 
“Why do not farmers now feed and lodge their work-people, as they did formerly? Because they cannot keep them upon so little as they give them in wages. This is the real cause of the change.”

Danielle:
One feature of the working class life that posed “urgent” challenges for Great Britain was inadequate cleansing. For example, “The child was sucking from a filthy feeding bottle which contained sour milk curds, while the teat was stinking. I swept maggots from under the bed with a broom, while with the handle of the broom I stirred up maggots from the bed itself.” The urgent challenge was to give the working class enough money to cleanse themselves while still keeping them at the level where they could not rise up from their class.

People also had poor living conditions with dirt roads and small allies which caused filth and dust everywhere. The buildings were also poorly make and spaced too close together making disease easier to spread.

Another urgent challenge was the Anti-Corn Law Campaign. “To make as much money as they could by letting corn rise to famine prices, was all the owners of it cared about. "Make money at any price" was their motto.” The owners of the corn crops would not tell the poor their corn because they wanted the money even though they were the rich and it would have been the neighborly thing to do to lend a hand and give their neighbors corn. Britain again was struggling to keep their power of the crops and the money and suppressing the poor without killing them all off.
Also, all the rich cared about was if a poor man could work. They did not care about his life or how he would support his family. If a man could not work he was considered useless and should be put to death. “When no more work could be squeezed out of him, he was no better than a cumberer of other folks' ground, and the proper place for such as he was the churchyard, where he would be sure to lie quiet under a few feet of earth, and want neither food nor wages any more. A quick death and a cheap burying - that was the motto of those extortioners for the poor man past work..”

One feature of the rural life that was an urgent challenges for Great Britain was, the mistreatment of farm workers by the farm owner. “. This is a well-known truth: therefore, if the farmer now shuts his pantry against his labourers, and pays them wholly in money, is it not clear, that he does it because he thereby gives them a living cheaper to him; that is to say, a worse living than formerly?” the farm owner wanted to save money and make themselves richer. But the farm workers could quit, leaving the farm owner with less workers which means less product is produced also taking the rest of the workers longer to finish their jobs.
The workers were given such little money that many of them were starving because they couldn’t afford food. If they wanted food they had to beg the owner to give them food which made the farm workers feel that they were nothing and would be nothing without this job.
The problem stems from the taxes that have been put on the farm owners which forced them to cut their workers’ wages. “There was no reason to expect, that farmers would not endeavour to keep pace, in point of show and luxury, with fund-holders, and with all the tribes that war and taxes created. Farmers were not the authors of the mischief; and now they are compelled to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages, in order to be able to pay their own taxes;”

Kara:
-Factory Movement
1- British factories were relying heavily on child labor. Because the children spend their whole life working in factories, they never learn anything else. For example, little girls would work in the factories throughout their youth and then when they got married, they didn’t know anything about domestic work, like mending a stocking or boiling a potato. So they needed different workers so their society would continue to run smoothly.
2- Women and children were forced to work in the coal mines, pulling carts of coal up the mine shafts. This was dangerous because it often caused black lung. An example in the article is a pregnant woman working in the mine shafts, this would be very dangerous for her baby seeing as it could die or have mild to severe defects. This would affect the next generation.

       -Rural Rides
1- There was a tremendous gap in wealth, farmers would have so much, yet their laborers had barely anything. It was unfair for him to have a beer while having dinner with them because he had a plentiful supply yet wouldn’t share with them.
2- There is starvation while others are living rich, luxurious lives.

Jennifer R.:
               Working Class

a)Working conditions in the mills- The environment in the mills was very unsanitary and was not safe for people of any age, not only kids, to work in. As said on The Peel Web: “One of the Witnesses has stated, that in some mills it was so mixed with the material of the work, that the refuse hangs about the mouth when they are eating their food; is that the case?

In a dusty place it will fly about till they can scarcely see themselves.” This shows how unsanitary the workplaces were that at times the workers couldn’t even eat their food because there was too much dust on the food they brought. Workers were not even able to cleanse themselves of the dust without getting fined by the people who ran the mines. If they were caught combing their hair or washing the dust from them they were fined no matter how filthy they were.

b) Child Labor- Children were not treated properly at all and had no rights that could keep them from being treated unfairly. Children were put into very dangerous situations and were even beaten so that they would work faster. Adult workers would make the children work more hours and faster to keep up with the slack and laziness they were causing. In a quote from one of the commissioners they say, “I believe it is the common practice for the idle weavers to place their draw-boys in the looms, and to employ younger boys or girls as drawers, to make up for their own laziness or dissipation.”  Children could not stand up for themselves; therefore they were taken advantage of and were forced to do extreme tasks. Children were also flogged when they got tired to try to get them to work faster.  An interview on the Peel Web3 states “Unless they are driven and flogged up, they cannot get the quantity of work they want from them.” Children were forced to work numerous hours a day and when they became the slightest bit tired they were beaten until they picked their speed up again.

Rural Life

a)      William Cobbett in “ The Destruction of the Rural Economy” states one of his major concerns is that the masters do not house the workers, which he believes is more expensive in the long run. His explanation of this is:  “All the world knows, that a number of people, boarded in the same house, and at the same table, can, with good food, be boarded much cheaper than those persons divided into twos, threes, or fours, can be boarded.” Cobbett liked the idea that all the tenants as well as the family ate together and lived together. He believed this gave the tenants a better standard of living because they were able to enjoy a nice meal and live in a proper place. Cobbett believes by taking this away they have stolen what they deserve.  Cobbett keeps talking about the long oak table which he believes all of the workers and employers should eat together because the extra food is going to waste and the extra money that the employers give out is just not enough.

b) William Cobbett also believes that by taking away the housing of the workers and giving them extra money does not equal nearly the right amount. As said in his article, “Instead of board and lodging, they got money; so little of it as to enable the employer to drink wine” The money they received from their employers caused them to live in poverty and almost lead to starvation. This caused William Cobbett to become very angry because he believed that the employers were taking what rightfully belonged to the workers away, which caused them to live in poverty. Even though the employers believe they are still giving the workers the same amount of pay they are not nearly as much making enough to support themselves with a house as well as food that they would have received if they went back to the old way of running the farms.  

Bill:
Factory Life
Factory Life in Great Britain at the beginning of the nineteenth century can be characterized as a time of great injustice and abuse.  One of the primary issues of working class life was the prevalence of workers being assigned shifts up to or even exceeding twelve hours. In Report of the Commissioners on the employment of children in factories (1833) it was reported that people including young children worked around the clock in twelve-hour shifts.
Another urgent issue concerning factory workers in Great Britain at the turn of the nineteenth century was the use of child labor. Children were put through long hours at low wages. In one account taken from Minutes of the evidence taken before the Committee on the Factories Bill it was reported that not only were children put through strenuous labor but they were also beaten if their work began to slack as the day progressed.

Rural Life
A great and urgent challenge facing rural communities at the dawn of the nineteenth century was the separation of large communities into smaller groups.  In The Destruction of the Rural Economy, William Cobbett discuses the breakdown of these larger social groups.  It was thought that living in smaller groups would make more sense economically, but in fact it ended up creating additional economic hardship.
Another urgent issue that Cobbett discuses was the drastic increase in taxes in the early part of the nineteenth century in Great Britain.  This increase in taxes also created more economic hardship.  Farmers, particularly, felt the greatest effect of these taxes. As a result, ages were cut and many also lost their homes.

Brenna:
WORKING CLASS LIFE

1. Flogging in factories

Do you think that you could have got the quantity of work out of the children for so great a number of hours without that cruel treatment?

No, I dare say I should not, for that number of hours I could not, I think; it is a long time; I think they could not, without beating them, get the quantity of work they want. The speed of the machinery is calculated, and they know how much work it will do, and unless they are driven and flogged up, they cannot get the quantity of work they want from them.

So that the children have to be kept up to their work, more particularly towards the evening by this flogging?
Yes.

Were they fined as well as beaten occasionally?
Yes.

For what were they fined?
For various things; if they were caught combing their hair before they went home, or washing themselves; they were fined for such things as those.

These are the types of situations that people try to push under the rug.  You don't hear about things like this until you dig deeper or are really interested in the subject.  I had no idea that seven year olds were pulling tons of coal up shafts for 12 hours a day.  The children being beaten for motivation is incredibly hypocritical and hurts the children way more than it is helping them. It is ridiculous to think that beating them would help them. I found it ridiculous that the children would get fined for various things. The factories are dirty and the children should be allowed to wash themselves when they feel the need.

2. Conditions of the mines

“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... 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 labor by females of all ages, from girls of six years old to women of twenty-one... although this employment scarcely deserves the name of labour [trapping], 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”

This passage grabbed my attention because not only are the conditions described unbearable, but this is not a 25 year old man; it is a young girl working in the mines. She works in a space that is two feet high which makes her work very hard to complete. I was also just appauled in general about the disregard of the children's age.  It is awful how the adults at this time are only interested in using these children's bodies and care nothing about them as a person or the fact that they are slowly dying from the chemicals and exhaust that they are inhaling.

RURAL LIFE

The Destruction of the Rural Economy

1. “This is a well-known truth: therefore, if the farmer now shuts his pantry against his labourers, and pays them wholly in money, is it not clear, that he does it because he thereby gives them a living cheaper to him; that is to say, a worse living than formerly? Mind he has a house for them; a kitchen for them to sit in, bed rooms for them to sleep in, tables, and stools, and benches, of everlasting duration. All these he has; all these cost him nothing; and yet so much does he gain by pinching them in wages that he lets all these things remain as on no use, rather than feed labourers in the house.”

In order for a farm to function it needs many workers.  If the owner of the farm wants to make maximum profits he will sell his crops for as much as he can and pay his workers for as little as possible. If the workers demands aren't met and if they are working in poor conditions the farm and owner are going to not only lose workers but the farm and money eventually as well.

2. “Therefore, it became almost untenanted; the labourers retreated to hovels, called cottages; and instead of board and lodging, they got money; so little of it as to enable the employer to drink wine; but the, that he might not reduce them to quiet starvation they were enabled to come to him, in the king's name and demand food as paupers.”

The workers are being starved.  They can't eat what they harvest and they don't make enough money to eat regular meals.  They are going to get sick and not have enough energy to work at the farm.  This is also going to result in loss of workers and loss of money.  

These points all pose as urgent problems for Great Britain because with out workers, or when these awful conditions begin killing off their workers, the economy will plummet.  If there is a shortage or workers it can affect the country as a whole.  When the population is not longer rising, enough is enough and something needs to be done differently.  People need to find new ways to do these jobs more efficiently and without hurting the workers.

Carly:
Rural Life

1.      One feature of rural life that posed as an urgent challenge for Great Britain was poverty. William Cobbett states in “The Destruction of the Rural Economy” that farmers were “compelled to shut the labourers out of their houses, and to pinch them in their wages, in order to be able to pay their own taxes.” This meant that the farmers were cutting the wages of their laborers and were no longer offering their laborers the opportunity to stay in their houses and eat their food. Because of this, many laborers were living in poverty. Instead of living in the house with the farmer, the laborers were forced to live in hovels, or cottages, and live off of the small salary they made. This made it difficult for the laborers to afford food and other necessities. Cobbett suggests that in decreasing the wages and refusing housing, the farmers were submitting their laborers to “quiet starvation.”

2.      Another feature of rural life that posed as an urgent challenge for Great Britain was the living and working conditions of the laborers and the farmers. Living in poverty created very unhealthy living conditions for the laborers. This is turn, most likely affected their performance while working. Because many laborers were living in poverty and did not have a sufficient amount of food, it is likely that their bodies became physically weaker, which would have made it more difficult for them to do the tasks they were given. William Cobbett noted in “The Destruction of the Rural Economy” that a significant change for the worse took place in the laborers after their wages were lowered and they were forced to live on their own.  Cobbett also stated that the farmers “ground the labourers down into real slaves”. This means that in addition to becoming weaker, the laborers were being treated worse. An additional fact that Cobbett noted was that there was more crime and pauperism, which negatively affected the living conditions of both the farmers and the laborers. The bad living and working conditions caused some farmers to quit, which Cobbett mentions in the beginning of “The Destruction of the Rural Economy.” 

Working-Class Life

1.       One feature of working-class life that posed as an urgent challenge for Great Britain was child labor. According to Peel Web, many working-class children in Europe were seen as a burden, and were therefore put to work to make money for their families. These children were forced to work from five o’clock in the morning until six o’clock at night and were only given a half an hour for breakfast and an hour for dinner. This created multiple problems. First, the children were exposed to dangerous environments which made it easier for children to injure themselves or have a negative effect on their physical growth. Peel Web compared the conditions of child labor to one of Dante’s hells and described it as torment. Second, the children were working so much that they didn’t have time to go to school or learn valuable skills. When girls stopped working to get married, they had none of the skills necessary to be a wife or a mother.

2. Another feature of working-class life that posed as an urgent challenge for Great Britain was the poor working conditions that the working-class was exposed to. This includes the workers in both factories and mines. According to Peel Web, mine workers were expected to pull heavy carts of coal through small, tight passages. Many times the carts had to be pushed uphill and coal had to be carried up ladders, which was very dangerous and risky for the workers involved. One mine worker stated “I have drawn till I have had the skin off me.” The dangerous conditions had negative effects on the health of the workers. The working conditions at the factories were dangerous as well. Peel Web stated that factory workers worked for about eleven to thirteen hours at a time and oftentimes people were forced to stand in the same position for a large period of time. They also worked in extremely dusty environments, which was bad for their health.

Ryan:

On Working Conditions in Mines and Factories (Peel Web):

On Rural Life (William Cobbett):

Maciej:

Working-Class Life:
 After reading the section on child labor in cotton factories, I found it interesting how the boss of the factory has realized that keeping kids at work all day is detrimental to society but does nothing to change child labor. He acknowledges the problem with kids at work, but then states that the problem is resolved due to the fact that the kids are forced to go to school immediately after work. "'These children then,' said I, 'have no time to receive instruction.' 'That, sir,' he replied 'is the evil which we have found. Girls are employed here from the age you see them till they marry, and then they know nothing about domestic work, not even how to mend a stocking or boil a potato. But we are remedying this now, and send the children to school for an hour after they have done work." When asked whether all this confinement is harmful to the children, the boss replies with a "no" saying that they are just like all other children. But without any freedom or opportunity to express creativity, play with friends, or cause mischief, these children will age without the necessary foundations that we learned as kids. This in turn would be harmful to the growth of society in the long run and the boss is turning a blind eye to the result. On the other hand, in another factory, some of the working conditions aren't as bad. "One of the witnesses, a proprietor, states that owing to the want of a due supply of water the workpeople sometimes cannot work more than three hours a day in summer; and that on an average they do not, in the summer season, work more than six hours a day. Another witness, an operative, deposes that his children in the factory in general go away after nine hours work, and that they play so much that he does not think they really work above four or six hours" In this case, the children act like children and are actually able to experience the wonders of being a kid.
Rural-Life
In comparison to working-class life, rural-life is also a struggle. Where it once was so that farmers would shelter their employees with a roof, food, and a place to sleep, they have now shifted to a method of paying their employees in wages. Therefore, instead of providing their workers with a comfortable means of living, they are now on their own and most likely living in sub-par conditions. On top of this, where the farmer's house was once wholly used, it is now up for sale because only the farmer uses it and his workers can't afford the rent with their wages."Why do not farmers now feed and lodge their work-people, as they did formerly? Because they cannot keep them upon so little as they give them in wages" Therefore, the working class in the rural areas are suffering because of the change that has occurred in the farming industry.