(Describing factory work.) Page 56. “In these days of automaton machinery there are many moments in every hour when the varied and immense production of a cotton factory would continue though 95 per cent of the hands were suddenly withdrawn. The work is exciting but not laborious. It quickens the eye and the action of the brain to watch a thousand threads, being obliged to dart upon and repair any that break, lest even a single spindle should be idle; and it strengthens the brain to do this with bodily labour which is exercising but not exhausting. It polishes the mental faculties to work in continued contact with hundreds of others, in a discipline necessarily so severe and regular as that of a cotton factory. The bodily system becomes feverishly quickened by thus working in a high and moist temperature. Even the rattle of the machinery contributes to preserve the brain of the operative from that emptiness which so fatally contracts its power.”
The Surat Weaver’s Song
From Edwin Waugh’s Factory Folk, p. 238.
By Samuel Laycock.
Confound it! aw ne’er wur so woven afore;
My back’s welly broken, mi fingers are sore;
Aw’ve bin stannin’ an’ workin’ among this Surat
Till aw’m very neer gettin’ as blint as a bat.
Aw wish aw wur fur eneagh off, eawt o’ th’ road,
For o’ weaving this rubbitch aw’m gettin’ reet sto’d;
Aw’ve nowt i’ this world to lie deawn on but straw,
For aw’ve nobbut eight shillen’ this fortnit to draw.
Oh dear! if yon Yankees could nobbut just see
Heaw they’re clemmin’ an’ starvin’ poor weavers like me,
Aw think they’d soon settle their bother an’ strive
To send us some cotton to keep us alive.
There’s theawsan’s o’ folk, jist i’ th’ best o’ their days,
Wi’ traces of want plainly sin i’ their face;
An’ a future afore ’em as dreary as dark,
For when th’ cotton gets done we’s be o’ eawt o’ wark.
We’ve bin patient an’ quiet as long as we con;
Th’ bits of things we had by us are welly o’ gone;
Mi clogs an’ mi shoon are both gitten worn eawt,
An mi halliday cloaths are o’ gawn “up th’ speawt”!
Mony a toime i’ mi days aw’ve sin things lookin’ feaw
But never as awkard as what they are neaw;
If there is’nt some help for us factory folk soon,
Aw’m sure ’at we’s o’ be knock’d reet eawt o’ tune.
Darwen Weavers. Report, March 1911, The Driving Evil.
During the last few months we have experienced a decided improvement in the demand for cotton goods, and which has naturally provided fuller employment for those employed in the weaving branch. We regret, however, to state that this improvement has brought with it that curse of our industry—the driving evil. We still have a number of employers who resort to any artifice in order to exact the last ounce of effort out of their work-people. Very little regard appears to be paid to the possibility that the health of the operatives may be endangered by the process; nor is much consideration given to the difficulties that they have to contend with in the shape of inferior material in the loom and the higher standard of quality demanded in the warehouse. Indeed the only thing that seems to be of any importance is the average, and woe be to the unlucky individuals whose earnings fall below it. The weak and the strong are set in competition one with another, with the inevitable result that the weaker or less efficient work-people resort to such practices as working during the meal-hour, etc., in their efforts to keep up the unequal race, whilst on the top of all is the dread of what may happen after making up time. When the earnings of an overlooker’s set fall below the amount required by the management, pressure is brought to bear on the over-looker, and in turn they (sic) are expected to put more pressure on the weaver to increase the output. The methods of speeding-up the weaver are varied. Sometimes a hint is conveyed by a distinctive mark on their wage-tickets, in other cases the weavers are spoken to about their earnings, not always in the best manner or in the choicest language. This is far from being an ideal state of things for young persons or persons of a sensitive nature to be employed in, and has in the past been responsible for some of the tragedies that are a blot on the record of the cotton industry. We think it is high time that a number of employers should give this matter their careful consideration, and look upon their work-people as human beings and not as mere machines to be worked at the utmost speed. We hope that an early improvement will be made at some of the local concerns, otherwise there is every probability of serious trouble.
Extracts from Reports of the Principal Lady Inspector of Factories, and some of her Colleagues, illustrating the Present Position of the Woman Worker.[74]
1. Women and Girls show more Courage in voicing their Needs.
While we can see a great number and variety of deplorable contraventions of the actual requirements and spirit of the law and an amount of apparently preventable suffering and overstrain and injury to life, limb, and health that is grievous to dwell upon (except for action in the way of removal), we can see also, most clearly, signs of improvement and the promise of much more. The promise lies in the fact that the movement to secure better conditions is not confined to any one class or group. The women and girls at last begin to press their claims for a better life than the one they have, not only by increasing appeals to Inspectors to put the law in motion, but also by criticism of the limitations of the law and by signs of fresh courage in organising and voicing their needs to the employers. Employers are initiating reforms not only as outstanding individuals and firms, but are beginning to do so at last by associated action and effort. Without these two responsive sides of the movement the best efforts of social reformers and legislators would end but poorly. As strikingly illustrating the need of betterment, I would point not only to the instances of excessively long hours inside and outside the factories, insanitary conditions; lack of seats, mess-rooms; accidents and unfenced machinery; employment of young workers in operating and clothing dangerous machines; in excessively heavy weight carrying, but behind, and through, and over all, to the undermining influence for the real health of the nation in the grinding methods of payment and deductions from payment of women and girls. Even of industrial poisoning Miss Whitlock says: “Poverty with its attendant worry and lack of nourishment appeared to be a predisposing cause in many cases, and the youth of many of the workers affected was noticeable,” and when a woman heavily laden and worn asks, “Is it right I should have to do this kind of work and only have 8s. a week?” the Inspector can only listen and report. The sinister instances of use of homework after the legal factory day to reduce piece rates, of new deductions covering cost of employers’ contributions under the Insurance Act, of old-standing large non-payments for work done to punish small unpunctualities in arrival at the factory, and of fine added to entire loss of a hardly-earned week’s wage for alleged damage, are only outstanding illustrations of an extensive pressure on women’s wages that prevents them from developing their full natural vitality. In every direction the testimony of the Inspectors to the value of the spirit of the industrial girl or woman is the same. Of a girl of seventeen, partially scalped, Miss Martindale says: “Her pluck and bravery were noteworthy, in fact these qualities show themselves in a remarkable degree in working girls when they meet a severe physical shock”; of another, whose hand had to be amputated after vain attempts to save it, she says that the girl mastered her disappointment, and in two or three days after the operation began to practise writing with her left hand, and in a month had become almost as proficient in writing as with the right hand. The value they attach to inspection is obvious from what follows in this report, and is shrewdly summed up in a remark overheard by a Senior Lady Inspector in a northern mill: “Yon’s a Lady Inspector, nay, but it’s time we had one.”