The Royal Commission into Children’s Employment in Mines 1842, a Halifax example

In the 1830’s there was a movement towards social reform, especially towards the employment of children in the burgeoning industries of England. In 1833 Parliament enacted the Factory Act which prevented the employment of children under nine from working in textile mills. Following this was a campaign to offer similar protection to children, and women employed below ground in mines. Catherine Howe in her book ‘Halifax 1842’ believes that the attention of the public was at least partially drawn to the employment of children in mines due to an accident in a coal mine in Barnsley in 1838 when 11 girls and 15 boys were accidentally drowned.

In 1840, Parliament established the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Children’s Employment in Mines. The Commission was established by Anthony Ashley Cooper, the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury, with the report compiled by Richard Henry Horne, a friend of Charles Dickens and sometime contributor to Dickens’s Daily News. The result of a three-year investigation into working conditions in mines and factories in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, the Report of the Children’s Employment Commission is one of the most important documents in British industrial history. Comprising thousands of pages of oral testimony (sometimes from children as young as five), the report’s findings shocked society and swiftly led to legislation to secure minimum safety standards in mines and factories, as well as general controls on the employment of children (British Library). The commission report also used illustrations, which probably helped the report make a decisive impact on Victorian Society.

Halifax

28 children had died in the Halifax, Huddersfield, and Low Moor coal mines between 1838 and 1841 (Howe, C 2014). Women and children were regularly employed in mines in the area. Children were on average five times cheaper to employ than adults and were expected to work the same hours which, in mining communities, could mean a 14-hour day.

The Commission was carried out by Mr Samuel Scriven in the Halifax, Huddersfield and Bradford areas. Luckily for researchers, Mr Scriven used a different script to other inspectors in different areas, enabling us to get a much more detailed look into the lives of the children and miners interviewed. He was helped in his task in Halifax by the local Surgeon James Holroyd who knew the local mine and mill owners well. Scriven interviewed the miners and children inside the mines, wearing suitable clothing and talked to them when they were on their limited rest breaks. Sometimes he would crawl in tunnels just 20 inches tall. He was shocked by the adult miner’s appearance when working naked and that they were ‘mashed up’ by the physical work by their 40s. The children interviewed by Scriven in Halifax tended to be muscular but stunted in growth, attributed by Scriven to ‘severe labour exacted from them during a period of infancy and adolescence’. Both girls and boys did identical work, the girls often as ‘vulgar’ and ‘obscene in language’ as the boys.

The Results

The Commission published its findings early in 1842 for everyone to read and the public were both fascinated and appalled. The reported conditions shocked much of Victorian society, especially the revelation that women miners wore trousers and, as conditions were often hot, sometimes worked naked from the waist up in the presence of men and boys. The report inspired protest literature from the likes of Benjamin Disraeli, Elizabeth Gaskell, Elizabeth Barrett Browning (‘The Cry of the Children’) and Dickens himself – most notably in A Christmas Carol. (British Library).

By August 1842 a Bill to prohibit the employment of children and women in mines was passed (the Mines and Collieries Regulation Act 1842) which made it illegal to employ a female to work underground, or a boy under the age of ten. Following the 1842 act, generally more children aged ten and up were employed in mines, and there was gradually more use made of horses or pit ponies. Children and women were still employed in collieries, but above ground.

A Halifax Example

Image taken from the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Children’s Employment in Mines 1842 (Vol8)

One of the most interesting aspects of the Commissions reports are the illustrations used to show the work carried out by the children (see above). The most famous of the children interviewed from Halifax is Patience Kershaw, her life has been well researched and she has even inspired songs.

Another girl highlighted by the Commission was an Elland girl named Ann Ambler and she also featured in an illustration (see below). After reading descriptions of Ann, we decided to look into her life a little further.

Image taken from the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Children’s Employment in Mines 1842 (Vol8)

The illustration is intended to represent Ann Ambler and William Dyson, witnesses no 7, hurriers in Messrs Ditchforth and Clays colliery at Elland, in the act of being drawn up cross-lapped upon the clatch-iron by a woman. As soon as they arrived at the top the handle was made fast by a bolt drawn from the upright post; the woman then grasped the hand of both at the same time and by main force brought them to land.

Ann Amblers father, John Ambler, aged 35, was interviewed May 1st 1841 (Vol 8 p101). He worked at Binns Bottom Colliery as a collier. In his interview with Mr Scriven, he explained that he had a daughter Ann (also known as Hannah) who worked at Holling-Haye colliery in Stainland, aged 13. She had begun work in the mines at 7 years old, she never went to day school but went to Sunday school.

Hannah was baptised 27th dec 1826.

Baptism Record with permission from WYAS Wakefield. WDP79/9 accessed via http://www.Ancestry.co.uk 03/08/2022

We find Ann again in the evidence given by William Dyson aged 14 (p102) working at Messrs Abraham and Charles Ditchforth and Clay at Blackley End (50 yds Deep). He described that ‘we have but one girl working with us, by name Ann Ambler, who goes down with us upon the clatch harness; she wears her breeches when she goes down and while at work, and comes up the pit cross-lapped with us in the clatch harness; when she is down she hurries with us in the same way as we do, without shoes or stockings; I have seen her thrashed many times when she does not please them, they rap her in the face and knock her down; I repeat I have seen this many times. The men swear at her often; she says she will be killed before she leaves the coal-pit. I have never seen the boys behave rude to her, if they did George Armitage would thrash them; I have heard of girls being ill-treated at Jagger Green Pit which is not now in work. She gets 6s a week, she hurries by herself, and has to hurry the same distance and the same weight as I have; there is not a bit of difference between any of us’.

Mr Scriven the inspector commented ‘I visited this pit in company with Mr Brook, surgeon, and Mr Holroyd, and saw the girl above alluded to ascend the pit in the manner described viz across the lap of a boy. She appeared about 15 years of age; could not read or write; had an intelligent countenance and was extremely tender and delicate. I was perfectly shocked at her style of dress; she was without stockings or shoes, her legs and thighs, which were exposed, being black and filthy’.

In researching Ann, we find her in the 1841 census, living with her parents in Elland, and was one of at least 9 children.

Census Returns of England and Wales 1841 Accessed via http://www.Ancestry.co.uk 3rd August 2022

By the 1851 census we can see Ann Ambler, aged 24, no longer worked in the mines, instead she was working as a warper in a worsted textile factory and lived with her family, still in Elland. Her father, no longer a collier, is occupied as a labourer.

Census Returns of England and Wales 1841 Accessed via http://www.Ancestry.co.uk 3rd August 2022

Evidently the commission had done its job, ensuring children like Ann and her female siblings no longer worked in mines. By 1848 Ann would also have been positively affected by the passing of the Ten Hours Act, limiting the length of time women and children would be made to work in a day in the mills.

However, we lose track of Ann after this. Do you know what happened to her? Let us know!

#children #mining #Halifax #employment #1800s