Life in a Railway Factory

by Alfred Williams

When the men come back to work after the Whitsuntide holidays they usually find the official noticeboard in the shed covered with posters containing the preliminary announcements of the annual Trip, and, very soon, on the plates of the forges and walls, and even outside in the town, the words “Roll on, Trip,” or “Five weeks to Trip,” may be seen scrawled in big letters. As the time for the holiday draws near the spirits of the workmen — especially of the younger ones, who have no domestic responsibilities — rise considerably. Whichever way one turns he is greeted with the question — often asked in a jocular sense — “Wher’ gwain Trip?“ the reply to which usually is — ”Same old place,“ or ”Up in the smowk;” i.e., to London, or “Swindon by the Sea.” By the last-named place Weymouth is intended. That is a favourite haunt of the poorer workmen who have large families, and it is especially popular with the day trippers. Every year five or six thousand are conveyed to the Dorsetshire watering-place, the majority of whom return the same evening. Given fine weather an enjoyable day will be spent about the sands and upon the water, but if it happens to rain the outing will prove a wretched fiasco. Sometimes the trippers have left home in fine weather and found a deluge of rain setting in when they arrived at the seaside town. Under such circumstances they were obliged to stay in the trains all day for shelter, or implore the officials to send them home again before the stipulated time.

“Trip Day” is the most important day in the calendar at the railway town. For several months preceding it, fathers and mothers of families, young unmarried men, and juveniles have been saving up for the outing. Whatever new clothes are bought for the summer are usually worn for the first time at “Trip”; the trade of the town is at its zenith during the week before the holiday. Then the men don their new suits of shoddy, and the pinched or portly dames deck themselves out in all the glory of cheap, “fashionable” finery. The young girls are radiant with colour — white, red, pink, and blue — and the children come dressed in brand-new garments — all stiff from the warehouse — and equipped with spade and bucket and bags full of thin paper, cut the size of pennies, to throw out of the carriage windows as the train flies along. A general exodus from the town takes place that day and quite twenty-five thousand people will have been hurried off to all parts of the kingdom in the early hours of the morning, before the ordinary traffic begins to get thick on the line. About half the total number return the same night; the others stop away till the expiration of the holiday, which is of eight days’ duration.

The privilege of travelling free by the Trip trains is not granted to all workmen, but only to those who are members of the local Railway Institute and Library, and have contributed about six shillings per annum to the general fund. Moreover, no part of the holiday is free, but is counted as lost time. The prompt commencement of work after Trip is, therefore, highly necessary; the great majority of the workmen are reduced to a state of absolute penury. If they have been away and spent all their money — and perhaps incurred debt at home for rent and provisions beforehand in order to enjoy themselves the better on their trip — it will take them a considerable time to get square again; they will scarcely have done this before the Christmas holidays are announced.

At the end of the first week after the Trip holiday there will be no money to draw. When Friday comes round, bringing with it the usual hour for receiving the weekly wages, the men file out of the sheds with long faces. This is generally known at the works as “The Grand March Past,” because the toilers march past the pay-table and receive nothing that day. The living among the poorest of the workmen will be very meagre, and a great many will not have enough to eat until the next Friday comes round, bringing with it the first pay. The local tradesmen and shopkeepers look upon the Trip as a great nuisance because, they say, it takes money away from the town that ought to be spent in their warehouses; they do not take into consideration the fact that the men are confined like prisoners all the rest of the year.

Work in the sheds, for the first day or two after the Trip, goes very hard and painful; everyone is yearning towards the blue sea or the fresh open country, and thinking of friends and kindred left behind. This feeling very soon wears off, however. Long before the week is over the spirit of work will have taken possession of the men; they fall naturally into their places and the Trip becomes a thing of the past — a dream and a memory. Here and there you may see scrawled upon the wall somewhere or other, with a touch of humour, “51 weeks to Trip”; that is usually the last word in connection with it for another year.

There are three general moods and phases of feeling among the workmen, corresponding to the three periods of the year as measured out by the holidays. The period between Christmas and Easter is one of hope and rising spirits, of eager looking forward to brighter days, the long evening and the pleasant week-end. The dark and gloom of winter has weighed heavily upon the toilers, but this has reached its worst point by the end of December; after that the barometer begins to rise and a more cheerful spirit prevails everywhere.

From Easter till Trip and August Bank Holiday — notwithstanding the terrible trials of the summer weather in the case of those who work at the furnaces — the feeling is one of comparative ease and satisfaction. A series of little holidays is included in this period. The men are encouraged to bear with the heat and fatigue through the knowledge that it will not be for long; a holiday in sight goes far towards mitigating the hard punishment of the work in the shed. The summer sunshine and general bright weather, the occupations of gardening, and the prevalence of herbs and salads, fresh, sweet vegetables, flowers, and fruits all have a beneficial effect upon the workman and tend to distract his attention from the drabness of his employment and make the weeks go by more easily. The period is one of lightness. It is the time of realization, the fulfilling of dreams dreamed through the long, dark winter.

From August till Christmas the feeling is one almost of despair. Five whole months have to be borne without a break in the monotony of the labour. The time before the next holiday seems almost infinite; a tremendous amount of work must be done in the interval. Accordingly, the men settle down with grim faces and fixed determinations. The pleasures of the year are thrust behind and forgotten; day by day the battle must be fought and the ground gained inch by inch. The smoke towers up from the stacks and chimneys, the hammers pound away on the obstinate metal, the wheels whirl round and the din is incessant. Day after day the black army files in and out of the entrances with the regularity of clockwork; it is indeed the period of stern work — the great effort of the year. Whatever money the workmen save must be put aside now or never; the absence of holidays and lack of inducement to travel will provide them with the opportunity. Now is the time for purchasing new clothing and boots and for getting out of debt — if there is any desire to do that; it is in every sense of the word the great productive period.

It is also interesting to note the various moods and feelings common to the workmen during the passage of the week. Monday is always a flat, stale day, and especially is this true of the morning, before dinner-time. It might reasonably be supposed that the workmen, after an absence of a day, or a day and a half, would return to the shed rested and vigorous, and fit for new efforts, but this is far from being the actual case. As a matter of fact, Monday is an extremely dull day in the shed. Everyone seems surly and out of sorts, as though he had been routed up from sleep before time and had “got out of bed on the wrong side.” The foreman comes on the scene with a scowl; the chargeman is “huffy” and irritable; the stampers and hammermen bend to their work in stony silence, or snap at each other; even the youngsters are quiet and mopish. Work seems to go particularly hard and against the grain. It is as though everything were under a cloud; there is not a bit of life or soul in it. This feeling is so general on the first day of the week that the men have invented a term by which to express it; if you ask anyone how he is on that day he will be sure to tell you that he feels “rough” and “Monday-fied.” By dinner-time the cloud will have lifted somewhat, though not till towards the end of the afternoon will there be anything like real relief, with a degree of brightness. By that time the tediousness of the first day will have worn off; the men’s faces brighten up and a spirit of cheerfulness prevails. Now they speak to each other, laugh, whistle and jest, perhaps; they have won the first skirmish in the weekly battle.

Tuesday is the strong day, the day of vigorous activity, of tool- and also of record-breaking. The men come to work like lions. All the stiffness and sluggishness contracted at the week-end has vanished now. There is a great change, both in the temper and the physical condition of the men, visible about the place; they move more quickly, handle their tools better, and appear to be in perfect trim. The work made on Tuesdays is always the greatest in amount and usually the best in quality. Everyone, from the foreman to the office-boy, seems brighter and better, more fit, well, and energetic — great things are accomplished on Tuesdays at the works.