The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844: with a Preface written in 1892Engels, Friedrich
History
The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844: with a Preface written in 1892
Engels, Friedrich
Great Britain -- Economic conditions; Working class -- Great Britain
North of the iron district of Staffordshire lies an industrial region to
which we shall now turn our attention, the Potteries, whose headquarters
are in the borough of Stoke, embracing Henley, Burslem, Lane End, Lane
Delph, Etruria, Coleridge, Langport, Tunstall, and Golden Hill,
containing together 60,000 inhabitants. The Children's Employment
Commission reports upon this subject that in some branches of this
industry, in the production of stoneware, the children have light
employment in warm, airy rooms; in others, on the contrary, hard, wearing
labour is required, while they receive neither sufficient food nor good
clothing. Many children complain: "Don't get enough to eat, get mostly
potatoes with salt, never meat, never bread, don't go to school, haven't
got no clothes." "Haven't got nothin' to eat to-day for dinner, don't
never have dinner at home, get mostly potatoes and salt, sometimes
bread." "These is all the clothes I have, no Sunday suit at home." Among
the children whose work is especially injurious are the mould-runners,
who have to carry the moulded article with the form to the drying-room,
and afterwards bring back the empty form, when the article is properly
dried. Thus they must go to and fro the whole day, carrying burdens
heavy in proportion to their age, while the high temperature in which
they have to do this increases very considerably the exhaustiveness of
the work. These children, with scarcely a single exception, are lean,
pale, feeble, stunted; nearly all suffer from stomach troubles, nausea,
want of appetite, and many of them die of consumption. Almost as
delicate are the boys called "jiggers," from the "jigger" wheel which
they turn. But by far the most injurious is the work of those who dip
the finished article into a fluid containing great quantities of lead,
and often of arsenic, or have to take the freshly-dipped article up with
the hand. The hands and clothing of these workers, adults and children,
are always wet with this fluid, the skin softens and falls off under the
constant contact with rough objects, so that the fingers often bleed, and
are constantly in a state most favourable for the absorption of this
dangerous substance. The consequence is violent pain, and serious
disease of the stomach and intestines, obstinate constipation, colic,
sometimes consumption, and, most common of all, epilepsy among children.
Among men, partial paralysis of the hand muscles, colica pictorum, and
paralysis of whole limbs are ordinary phenomena. One witness relates
that two children who worked with him died of convulsions at their work;
another who had helped with the dipping two years while a boy, relates
that he had violent pains in the bowels at first, then convulsions, in
consequence of which he was confined to his bed two months, since when
the attacks of convulsions have increased in frequency, are now daily,
accompanied often by ten to twenty epileptic fits, his right arm is
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