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Children's Employment Commission
Evidence Collected By Jelinger C. Symons, Esq.
Cumberland Coalfield.
No. 300. — Joseph Sharp, Under-steward to Messrs. Ross, Fletcher, and Co., at the Broughton Moor Collieries, near Maryport. Examined July 29:
We have two pits, and employ about 70 children and young persons. They are all trailers, and bring the coal from the forehead to the pit bottom; they are trailed on rails the whole way. The corves and coal weigh about 7 cwt. in one pit, and in the other 5½ cwt. The distances vary from 800 to 150 yards. The trailers have about 16 journeys backwards and forwards. We work a little to dip; but very little. The trailer will help to riddle a little, if he is a strong boy. The trailers are employed by the men who hag; they earn from 1s. 4d. to 1s. 6d. per day, and in the small pit from 1s. 3d. to 1s. 4d. per day. We have no horses in these pits. The roads are five feet and a half good in height; they are not lower anywhere where the seam is six feet; but where it is five feet the roads will be about four feet. We have another seam about three feet six, and the roads are about the same. In the thin pits they go as soon as 10 years old; perhaps a few at 9. We have no trappers, the trailers open the doors themselves. We have no fire-damp, and only a little black-damp. We work upwards to the rise, and let the roof fall behind in the workings. We leave the pillars about 10 yards in the end, and we leave about seven and a half yards when we get higher up. The boys go down from half-past 5 to 6 o'clock. They keep coming up from 3 to 5 o'clock. They don't often work much longer, except there is something particular the matter. They are generally well treated, and they are not overdone. The roads are kept dry.
No. 301. — Francis Lightfoot, aged 15¼. Examined at Broughton Moor Colliery July 29:
I've been four years in the pit. I'm a trailer. I've never been anything else. I find i hard work sometimes when I've much to trail. We don't trail regularly. Sometimes but a little on Mondays, and more on other days. I help to fill and riddle. I go down at half. past 5. I stop at 12 for my "corn" or feed, and stop 20 minutes or a quarter of an hour. I come out at about 4 o'clock, sometimes at 3, and sometimes as late as 5. I like my work. My back is sore where I hit it against the roof. I have not been much poorly. [He looks well, and is not ill-formed.] I always come away with the collier who employs me; it is my brother I work for. I used to go to day-school before I came to pit. I once went to a Sunday-school. I don't go to Sunday-school, I'd rather stop away, though I have clothes to go in. Sometimes I go to chapel. I can read, but I cannot write, I think, now. Christ was the son of David. He was crucified, that is, nailed to the cross. I was taught to pray, and I do sometimes. Christ died to save us. [He has a fair knowledge of multiplication and the pence-table, and reads tolerably.] There's no night-school for me to go to; and I go to bed when I've had my supper; but I'm not much tired.
No. 302. — William Gibbons, aged 11½. Examined at the same Colliery:
I trail, and have been at it a year. I trail by myself. It is not very bard, except when the corf gets off the road, and that's not often. It is not wet; it's dusty where I trail. I help to riddle and to fill. I never trail more than thirteen corves, and sometimes I trail only nine a day. I stop only 10 minutes. I get up at 4, and have my breakfast of porridge and milk, and a great bit of bread. I have a bit of bread and butter and cheese in the pit at 12 o'clock. I shall have potatoes and meat and beer, as much as I like when I come out at night. I have my face, neck, and legs washed every night, and then I go to bed about 8 o'clock. I never play; but I'm not tired. I once went to day-school. I never go to Sunday-school. My father and mother tell me to go to Sunday-school, but I don't; I like better to lake. [Does not know his letters.] I don't know where I shall go when I die, if I'm bad. I don't go to church or chapel. I have never been taught to pray. I never beard of Jesus Christ.
No. 303. — David Saul, aged 10½. Examined at the same Colliery:
I'm a trailer. My work does not tire me. I go to no school. I can read in Reading made Easy Christ died for us; he was nailed on a cross. My father and mother go to a Quaker meeting; I went with them. They are dead. I work for a man now who does not send me to school or to chapel. They use me well in the pit, and never beat me.
No. 304. — Joseph Fox, aged 13¾. Examined at the Cookson Colliery, Workington, August 2:
I go down at half-past 5 or 6 o'clock. I come out at between 6 and 7 o'clock. I am a trailer. My work tires me at times. I work for my father. I would rather work for him than any one else. The engine never stops, and we never stop more than 10 minutes at a time. We stop more than once; perhaps an hour altogether. We get bread, and nothing else. The hardest part of the work is to push the corves up the steep to get the coals up to throw into the baskets. I make as much as 2s. a-day. My father gives me a 6d. at the fortnight end. I don't go to school. I've never been at all to school. I don't go to Sundayschool, I've not clothes enough. My mother works outside, and she has 1s. a-day. I have a brother at sea. I can't read, and don't know my letters. I never go to church and chapel. I never heard of God. I don't know who made the world; and I never heard of Jesus Christ. I never say prayers — I don't know what prayers are. I don't know what 5 x 6 is — 4 x 5 is 20. [He measures 4 feet 11 inches. He has only been in a pit eight or nine months. He drove a waggon before in Whitehaven.]
No. 305. — William Fox, father of the last witness:
I don't send my boy to school — has not been at all. There are no Sunday-schools about here. I earn 5s. a-day with my son. I have another at sea, and three girls at home. [This family earn on an average 2l. weekly.]
No. 306. — Joseph Hodgson, 15 years old. Examined July 30, near Whitehaven:
I work at Lord Lonsdale's Countess Pit. This week I am on at night. I go down at 6 in the evening and come out at 6 in the morning. I get my breakfast of porridge and milk when I come out, and then go to bed, and get up between 2 and 4 o'clock. I get my dinner of potatoes and meat — always meat — and then we get ready to go to pit. I drive a horse. I used to trap. It's four years since I began to go. I like driving; I did not like trapping, it was such hard work. I had so many doors to trap, and to run before the horse to open six doors at once. They used me very well though; it was not very wet where I was. I had a lantern. I had no time to amuse myself. I was the same time in the pit. I earn 7s. a-week now. I had 6d. a-day as a trapper. It is hard work driving, only where we have to hold back the baskets going down hill. I feel tired in my right leg and arm when I've done work. We have our left shoulder against the horse's tail, and our right leg and right arm against the tram. There is no break to keep the trams back. I was lamed once, for a horse kicked me. We stop at 12 for supper; we have bread and coffee. I have never been to day-school since I went to the pits. I go to Sunday-school now. I can read the Bible. I can write a little now, but not much. I go to a meeting-house school. I like the night-work as well as the day-work, and we take it week and week about. [Has a fair knowledge of the Gospel; but very little of arithmetic. He looks well and strong.]
No. 307. — George Tait, aged 17¾. Examined at same time:
I work in the little pit bottom, and when the baskets come down I shove them along a few yards. It is not hard work, and does not tire me. I go to work at 5 in the evening, and come out at 6 in the morning. I stop at 12 o'clock for about an hour, and have bread and coffee to eat. I have the same for breakfast, and I have potatoes for dinner — I have generally meat with them. I have 8d. a-day. They treat me well. I go to Sunday-school, and can read in the Bible. I have learnt religion. [He has a fair knowledge of the Gospel. Spells tolerably well, has an indifferent knowledge of figures. He is under-sized, and has had some mesenteric disease, and is of a scrofulous habit; his brother was diseased.]
No. 308. — Joseph Davidson, 12 years old. Examined at same time:
I go to the pit at half-past 5. I have been working in pits a long time. I was a trapper till lately. I grease wheels. I used to go at the same time when I was a trapper as now, and came out between 5 and 6 in the evening. I used to trap at night every other week. I liked it as well by night as by day. They used me well enough. I had one door to open, but five checks to open. It tired me rather to run and open the cheeks and to mind the door. I had 3s. a-week for trapping. I had a lamp always. It was a dry place where I was. I liked it well enough. I never fought, or was leathered. I go to Sunday-school now. I read in the Testament, and they don't explain what I read at all; they just make us read it through. I don't know what sort of death Christ died; but he died to save us. Adam was the first man. I have not learnt figures. I have often been badly in my head and belly. [He appears to have had an affection of the hip-joint. He says he never was lame since he was in the pit.]
No. 309. — Anthony Fisher, aged 17½.
I am a driver. I have been a driver five years. We big ones help a little to riddle and fill when we like. We hag a little when we like, in order to learn. I shall begin to hag in about a year and a half. I work by night as well by day, week and week about. I like to work by day best, because I get more rest by night. I get to bed at about 5, and get up at 3 or 4 in the afternoon, when we work the night shift. We get plenty to eat, and have bacon every day for dinner. We get mutton or beef on Sundays. I was at school long since; but I don't go now at all. I can't read. We have to hold the baskets back going down hill, by putting my left shoulder against the horse, and my right arm and leg on the basket. I once lamed my right shoulder so. I was a trapper before. I didn't like it so well, because I had to run on before to mind so many checks; many more checks before than now. The boys don't fight in the pits, or get ill-used. I was crushed with the baskets. I got hurt by my own fault coming too fast down a brow. All the trappers have lanterns. I never knew a trapper leave a door; if he were to do it he would be licked. Lads have their wages stopped sometimes. I earn sometimes 24s. a-fortnight by extra work. My regular pay is 1s. 8d. a-day. My father had a free house, and was a long time ailing, and supported by the employers, and his widow has the free house now. We have two lodgers now, and my brother is the engine-man, and has 2s. 2d. a-day.
No. 310. — George Allen, 10 years old. Examined at same time:
I am a trapper, and have five doors to open and two pair of checks. I like it very well. I earn 6d. a-day. I go every Sunday to school, and can read in the Testament. I am a little tired when I come out of the pit. We play sometimes as we go along the road home. I have not been badly since I was in the pit.
No. 311. — Williamson Peile, Esq., Colliery Viewer, Whitehaven. Examined July 31:
In no one of Lord Lonsdale's collieries do the colliers themselves employ children — they are exclusively paid by us. Their work is first that of trapping; secondly, that of coupling, which, consists of linking and unlinking the trams of carriages, or greasing the axletrees of the carriages; and thirdly, of driving. The drivers have to hold back the carriages in descending, but I don't recollect any accident resulting from it. Girls do it very easily, and it is not hard work for boys; sometimes they are awkward in commencing it, but soon get accustomed to it. It is only the empty baskets that they push back in this way, never full ones ; with full ones they use a bit of stick put through the wheels, called burrs or breaks. We have no trailers. We carry the basket completely to the foreheads, or place of working, with the horses in general. In particular situations the haggers or colliers are employed to bring the coal down in wooden boxes from the forehead to the steer — a place in which the coal is removed into baskets, and then taken by the horses. The haggers are paid accordingly. The trappers begin at about 9, not often younger. When boys apply to be trappers we take them on, but we do not seek them. The hours of work are 12 hours regularly both day and night. It is quite common to work day and night here. The shifts are from 6 to 6, and take the night turn alternate weeks. The night shift is the heaviest week, especially for the children — they cannot get the same refreshment from sleep by day. The men themselves arrange to take the night shift alternately. The drivers will occasionally, being bigger boys, throw a part of their own work on to the trappers, and make them run on before to open and shut checks which they ought often to do themselves. I never saw a trapper the worse for his work. When they come out of the pit they are as lively as possible, and generally require being sent home; when they are out of the pit they like to stop and play. The drivers' work can only be done by young lads; it is fatiguing, but not too heavy for them. They ride far too often on the baskets. A healthier set never can be seen. From drivers they become haggers, at from 18 to 20, according to their strength. We have frequently made three shifts of eight hours each for the haggers alone, when their baskets could be got quicker to the shaft. They work faster in this way, and get out sooner; but the drivers and trappers remain the 12 hours serving as before. I have no doubt that the children are altogether better used, owing to the employer and not the workmen being their master. They get their wages better, and corporal punishments are prevented. No man is allowed to chastise a boy, and it is very seldom done even by the overmen. We never contract for boy's work for any length of time; we never take them as apprentices either.
Our system of ventilation is generally to divide the air into separate currents, carrying it through different districts of the colliery; but we invariably apportion the quantity taken into these courses by means of a partial stopping or partial trap-door placed in the shorter return air-course, because no one goes there but the overmen and ourselves, and it cannot be meddled with, being out of the way of the workmen and the traffic of the colliery. If there be no such stopping, ceteris paribus, the shorter air-course would take the whole of the air away from the longer. The air will always go the shortest possible distance to the upcast shaft, and it would not be prevented from doing so by having the downcast shaft large. I hold, however, the necessity of having a large up cast shaft. I consider it essential to the safety of the pits to have trappers; it would not do to have the doors to open themselves; they would be liable to be constantly propped open by the drivers. We adopt the system of guard-doors, which we fortify against a blast by casing the door-post by a round wall, which can offer no impediment to the course of a blast from explosion. We have no school attached to our colliery, but subscribe to all the existing local ones. We give free houses to nearly all our people. We always padlock Davy-lamps wherever we allow nothing else. We station a boy to stop every lamp that goes in to examine and padlock it. We allow no fresh females to go down the pits; we have a few still in.
No. 312. — Thomas Mitchell, Esq., Surgeon. Examined at Whitehaven, July 31:
I attend professionally the colliers, amounting to 600, employed on the Whingill side by the Earl of Lonsdale. The children are generally healthy and strong; their stature is partially decreased, but I perceive no other effect until they have been haggers for some time, and then they assume a cadaverous hue, and this I attribute to over-sweating and to breathing a not very pure atmosphere, which produces some constipation of the bowels and tardiness of liver. I don't consider 12 hours too much for either men or boys, considering the work they do. The colliers are not short-lived more than other labouring classes resident here, who are many of them mariners. Accidents have decreased materially during my practice here for 20 years, owing to better care in guarding against them, and the men too improve in their habits. The boys' accidents generally arise from the right leg slipping off the frame of the tram as they are stopping them going down hill, which fractures the fibula about three inches above the outer maleolus; but more frequently only lacerates the skin about the same part. The falls of roofs generally cause internal injuries, producing death within a few hours after a large fall; and in no one instance where death has occurred under these circumstances have there been sufficient external marks of violence to account for the speedy death after the accident. I speak from the accidents I have seen myself; but I wish to state that I have been compelled to judge solely from the countenance of the sufferers, combined with severe pains in the loins and elsewhere, and by retention of urine, that there were internal injuries thus produced; for in no one of these instances have I been required by the coroner to make a post mortem examination: and when the coroner does not require it, the families give us no chance of opening the body to ascertain the real cause of death.
At the time of the great explosion, when 24 persons were killed, in 1839, in the William Pit, I tried a new mode of treatment on the only man who was brought out alive, and with success. He was scarcely possessed of any vitality at all, and was in a state of asphyxia, and he had been under the treatment of brandy and emetics and hot bricks, and exposed to a pure atmosphere for three hours without effect, when I observed a bystander applying a bottle of Preston salts, containing carbonate of ammonia, to his nostrils. I immediately requested to be allowed to have the bottle, the contents of which were dissolved in warm water and administered internally. Immediately after the administration of it, vomiting was produced; and the stomach was emptied of a quantity of green vitiated fluid; he than began to rally, was placed in a warm bath for about ten minutes, was wrapped up in a pair of warm new blankets, and sent to the Earl of Lonsdale's private infirmary; where he was put to bed, and on the following morning he was able to return to his family, and might have returned to his work but that his foot had been burnt by a hot brick. He was not burnt externally, but was suffering under choke-damp, which follows the explosion of the carburetted hydrogen. Had he been burnt externally there would have been no difference: and I shall apply the same remedy next time whether they are burnt externally or not, giving two drams to each dose; repeating the dose every ten minutes. They must be treated otherwise as usual for burns. The ammonia stimulates, and is an emetic without producing lassitude and general debility as many emetics do. I since administered the same remedy in a slighter case with equal success. The carbonic acid gas has an effect preventing the blood from being decarbonised, and this is what produces asphyxia. The action of vomiting produced by the ammonia stimulates the action of the whole system. It is a rare occurrence for any falls to take place down the shaft, and I never recollect any owing to ropes breaking since I have been here.
No. 313. — Thomas Westray, Esq., Coal-owner, of Cookson Colliery, near Clifton. Examined at Workington, August 2:
I employ no children. I pay the haggers so much per ton for the coal, which they deliver at the steth, a point in the pit; and they employ the boys to trail the coal there. They are very often the children of the haggers, who have the entire control over them. I do not take the management of my colliery; I leave it exclusively to the under-ground steward, Mr. Percival. I am not aware whether they work longer than other pits or not. It is perfectly voluntary for them to work as long or as short a time as they think proper. We compel the engineman and banksmen to attend upon them as long as the haggers remain; we have no limitation whatever. I think it a very good plan for Government to regulate the labour of children. We attend well to ventilation. We never had a fatal accident from fire, and never from ropes breaking. Our pit is 54 fathoms. I am afraid that the children do not generally get sufficient education.
No. 314. — Mr. John Percival, Colliery Agent to Mr. Westray. Examined at Cookson Colliery, near Workington, August 2:
We have about 20 boys employed here; they are all employed by the haggers as trailers, except two drivers. They trail corves on railways. The coal weighs 4 cwt. The distances will run from 70 to 80 yards. They differ as to the times they go; some will trail four ton a-day, and go 24 times a distance of 30 or 40 yards. We do not work to dip at all. The boys begin at about half-past 6, but go down about 6 a-morning. In these country collieries they don't ride early as they do in sea-sale collieries. They come out at all hours, from 2 till 5 or 6 at night. Some time ago we did work till 7 o'clock at night, for about a month at furthest, and this was owing to the winding-engine being out of repair, and it could not do the work within the proper time now this is remedied, and she can draw all the coal required in nine hours. The men are very irregular indeed; they get a deal of money, and they will idle after they get paid, and then afterwards, at the end of the fortnight, they have to work longer hours than they otherwise would. I really think it would be a good plan to limit the time coal was drawn, it would make the men more regular. The men are masters here; they are free agents to work as long as they like. I don't think our colliery children are hurt by work. The men use the children well; they are most of them the sons of the colliers. I never allow them to be struck. We have never had girls in our pits. I am no advocate for womenfolk under ground. There is no fault in their working, but it leads to immoral conduct. The children don't get enough schooling here. They are far keener after the dancing lessons than the reading lessons. They learn to dance, and there is a dancing-master comes regularly all about here to teach them. The colliers are well off for food ; they make 30s. a-week do the adults, but there are few collieries where they are so well paid. There is a great deal of difference as to that. In a colliery I was in lately I found 16s. the usual week's wages. We don't use trappers; we make the drivers open and shut the doors. We have so little gas that it does not signify. We just let the men do as they like. They stop and hang on to get as much coal as they choose. The banksmen and engineer wait on them.
