The intention of this document is to report on life in Manchester in the Industrial Revolution, using only written sources from the time (official reports and statistics, textual information from doctors and other professional persons, general information in newspapers, etc.). This has never been done before. The period investigated is from 1841 to 1851, in which the amount of official documentation increased considerably, and thus made this project possible.
The project has been successful, as a number of interesting data have been found, which do not appear in text books. These data may well affect the “image” that we have of Manchester. The totality of information collected should make it clear that there was a great distance between different segments of the working classes, as to incomes and housing/sanitary conditions.
It should be noted that life for the working classes in Manchester in 1841-1851 was much easier than in earlier decades. In those earlier times, the working day was much longer (more than 12 hours for adults and children), the physical force required from the human being was much more (the men who pushed the mules for finer threads, retired at maximal 30 years, and afterwards could not do any physical work), and the small children were horribly overworked (around 1820, young girls died of overwork before reaching puberty).
Further, the leisure possibilities reported by Mr. Reach of the Morning Chronicle in 1849, were considerably better than those of 1840-1846. This was due to the Ten Hours Act of 1847, which reduced the working day from twelve to ten hours. The working classes could now: clean their houses each day (“before, I just did not the strength to do it”), learn to read and write, and take part in cultural activities. But they had had time before 1847, to work in the political activities in support of the Anti-Corn Law League, the Ten Hours Bill, and the People’s Charter!
We should also put aside some facile beliefs:
The fact that the workers and their families lived in small houses with insufficient drainage and sanitary equipment, does not mean that they were all badly paid. It means that this situation was what there was, caused by the extreme density of the housing and very rapid growth of the town. The cotton workers particularly had wages of about 30 – 33 shillings per family per week (in the theoretical case that they used the money to buy only meat, that would be 50 pounds weight). There is no statement from the period 1800 to 1850, that the cotton workers were poor or suffering (only in the Depression of 1838-1842).
The fact that many of the workers lived in horrible housing, and thus that they gave an impression of being poor, does not mean that they could not have cultural or political interests. About 2,500 workers were members of Mechanics’ Institutes and Lyceums in Manchester.
The fact that the death rate in Manchester was over 3.0 % p. a. does not mean that the majority of the people died due to the insanitary cnditions. Half of the deaths were of children under 5 years old, and these, at least the half died because the mothers put them in hands of children of 8 to 10 years old (aprox.), because they had to be working in the factory; another segment died from being given opiate “cordials” or dangerous medicines by druggists.
The other half of the death statistics was of adults of whom the “cohorts” died off slowly. The young persons and adults in the “cohorts” from 5 to 40 years had a mortality rate of 1.0 % to 1.8 % each year.
The fact that in Manchester, there was a fairly large number of very poor people, does not mean that their presence and their condition were caused by the Industrial Revolution. The Irish, who were a large part of the poverty question, and who did a lot of informal work, were in Manchester because in front of Liverpool (which is close to Manchester) was a large island with many poor people, who decided to emigrate to England. The Irish and the criminal classes and the persons who had no fixed employment, were not necessary for the manufacturing processes and the service industries.
The workers were not uniformly bad people. But a large percentage were not used to a town life, and to constant work. Many did not save money, did drink a great deal, and had unhygienic circumstances in their houses. These were often Irish from the poorer parts of Ireland, or English persons from poor country regions who had recently arrived. The majority of the working classes (men and women), were hard-working people who wanted a life with enough food and good housing etc.
This document shows that the working-class (plus the non-workers) in Manchester in 1841-1851, can be divided into three blocks:
- The direct workers in the cotton mills (spinners, weavers, dressers, and overlookers) with their wives and children, and the specialised workers in the engineering companies;
- Semi-skilled and unskilled workers in the cotton mills, services (food, clothing and shoes, building, road works, etc.), the wives would be “taking in other people’s washing”, and the wives and daughters could be domestic servants;
- Informal jobs (Irish!), unemployed, criminal classes and prostitutes.
The first block would have been living in the suburbs (Hulme, Ardwick, Chorlton-upon-Medlock), or in the best houses in the Township. The second block would have been living in the average houses in the Township and Salford. The third block would have been living in houses with little or no furniture and inexistent drainage, or sleeping in common-lodging houses or in a bed in a charitable institution.
The first block and part of the second block were the people who went to concerts and/or sang in choirs, were members of Mechanics’ Institutes, read a lot of books, took part in charitable organisations and/or made donations, and took part in political fund-raising or meetings.
But we also have to, as it were, draw a vertical line through the second block. This would divide the “disciplined” and the “wasters”, as defined in the section of “Working Population” That is, between those who spend less than their wages and thus have enough food and a decent life, and those who spend all of their wages (drink!) and thus do not eat well and have little furniture.
The “waster” part of the second block, plus the third block, are those who give the negative image of the working classes in Manchester. But they are not 100 %!
