The Industrial Revolution was an era dedicated on the improvements of textile, transportation, agriculture, metal manufacture and economic policies with new forms of energy in the years 1760 to 1820. The goal was to transform the low productivity level by creating more intricate, efficient mechanisms. These fundamental developments first occurred in Britain, where their advantage was an easy access to coal - this was because the nearer the coal was to the surface, the cheaper it was to mine. Coal acted as their main energy source to power machines and to automate production, this drove Britain to their success. Subsequently, this idea influenced other regions of the Earth. While in the stages of progression, many machines were invented and …show more content…
Instead of abolishing child labour and making more practical improvements to their lifestyles by sharing a percentage of the nations wealth, the government accumulated all their wealth. Being educated was simply not an option, due to the fact that many families had no financial stability. Many children were sent to work in the factories to help gain extra money, and to forgo the chance of an education, thus stratifying a less intelligent generation. The young children ranging from the age of six and above were taken advantage of. The most advantageous aspect of a child servant, was that they only received one-third of an adults minimum wage, which meant the children were being treated without any respect. Members of the “Parish Apprentice Children” were orphans who were forced to work in the factories. In return of the owners providing them shelter, food and clothing, the orphans had to devote 19 hours of their day for manual labour. Their working conditions were harsh and environment was menacing. They were constantly surrounded by potentially detrimental equipment - which often lead to injury or a dreadful passing. The people that some assisted were very strict and expected high discipline, it was crucial for them to obey orders. Even the smallest incident would mean being punished with different methods of pain infliction, an example would be not being punctual. Not being on time would mean being ‘weighted’. This is the act of a heavy object being tethered around a child’s neck, for a solid hour by their supervisor. This resulted in the deterioration of their health/body conditions, such as back/neck pain. "I have seen my master, Luke Taylor, with a horse whip standing outside the mill when the children have come too late...he lashed them all the way to the mill." - John Fairbrother, interviewed in 1819 (Children in the Industrial Revolution). Working under the constant fear of
For the first time in history children were an important factor of the economic system, but at a terrible price. The master of the factories employed children for two reasons. One, because of their small body which can get inside the machines to clean it and use their nimble fingers. Second, the masters use to pay low wages to the children who could be easily manipulated. The average age for the parents to send their children to work was ten. Although, Conventional wisdom dictates that the age at which children started work was connected to the poverty of the family. Griffith presents two autobiographies to put across her point. Autobiography of Edward Davis who lacked even the basic necessities of life because of his father’s heavy drinking habit and was forced to join work at a small age of six, whereas the memoir of Richard Boswell tells the opposite. He was raised up in an affluent family who studied in a boarding school. He was taken out of school at the age of thirteen to become a draper’s apprentice. The author goes further and places child employees into three groups, according to the kind of jobs that were available in their neighbourhood. First group composed of children living in rural areas with no domestic industry to work in. Therefore, the average of a child to work in rural area was ten. Before that, farmers use to assign small jobs to the children such as scaring birds, keeping sheep
Many times the factory owner could get away with paying them nothing at all. The children obviously got little to no education. Many orphans were treated as slaves, they would say that the
In the late 1700’s and early 1800’s big business began to boom. For the first time companies were developing large factories to manufacture their goods. Due to the new mechanics and cheap labor, factory owners could now produce their goods at a cheaper rate. As big businesses brought wealth and capitalism, it also widened the gap between the wealthy elite and the poor. One class in particular was horribly affected by the growth of big factories. This class was the poor working class. According to the article “Child Labor in the United States” written by Robert Whaples, a big proportion of the labour work force was made up of children: “In 1820 children aged 15 and under made up 23 percent of the manufacturing labor force of the industrializing
Gaskell, Peter. The Manufacturing Population of England: Its Moral, Social, and Physical Conditions, and the Changes which have Arisen from the use of Steam Machinery; with an Examination of Infant Labour. 1833. New York: Arno Press, 1972.
Throughout history, children have always worked, either as apprentices or servants. However, child labor reached a whole new scale during the time period of the Industrial Revolution. Throughout the time frame of late 1800s-early 1900s, children worked long hours in dangerous factory conditions for very little wages. They were considered useful as laborers because their small stature allowed them to be cramped into smaller spaces, and they could be paid less for their services. Many worked to help support their families, and by doing so, they forwent their education. Numerous nineteenth century reformers and labor groups sought to restrict child labor and to improve working conditions.
The Industrial Revolution in Britain during the 18th Century required a higher demand for labourers which ultimately forced children part of the poor and working class to work in order to provide for themselves, or for their families in order to escape poverty. Further, “the economic and social difficulties associated with industrialization made the 1830s and 1840s a “Time of Troubles,” characterized by unemployment, desperate poverty, and rioting” (“The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Victorian Age: Review: Summary”). Charles Dickens’ journalistic sketch, “The Prisoner’s Van,” focuses primarily on two sisters forced into prostitution by their mother, and also touches on a number of boys caught for pickpocketing. Henry Mayhew’s journalistic sketch “Boy Crossing-Sweepers and Tumblers” focuses on the interview of a teenaged boy who works as a cross-sweep and tumbler in order to support himself,
In the beginning in the late 1700 and early 1800 hundreds when the Industrial Revolution when many families had to find someone to work or they wouldn 't survive in this decade this started child labor you might be asking yourself what is child labor, child labor is work that harms children or keep them from attending school or trying to get an education to better themselves. industrial labor organization made 215 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 had to work under the condition that are considered legal hazards or extremely exploitative in the environment that they worked in. underage children had to work also because usually their families were extremely poor and didn 't have enough money to support their selves for their children by them doing this there are many things that involved child labor when it came to the mistreating them. Such as them getting
Imagine waking up at five in the morning to walk over a mile to a factory where you work until noon where you get a half hour break for lunch, then it’s back to work until nine or ten at night, when you are finally allowed to go home and you are only eight years old. Today that seems unimaginable, but during the early 19th century it was the everyday life of thousands of children whose ages range from as young as five until you died. During the Industrial Revolution many children were required to work dangerous jobs to help their families.
Taking into consideration the conditions these children work in, they are obviously mistreated. They are not washed, fed or clothed, resulting in malnutrition and children “clad in rags” (597). Employers even use mistreatment to teach the children how to do their jobs. Hibbert describes that “you can’t be soft with them, you must use violence” (595). Chimney sweepers can sometimes go “fifteen months without being washed except the rain” (595), wearing the same shirt until it is worn thin. To harden the flesh of the sweepers, their elbows and knees are rubbed profusely with the strongest brine, leaving their limbs “streaming with blood” (596). Workers sometimes found themselves caught in a machine, crushed by a machine, or swung by a machine. They suffered multiple injuries that were always ignored, most of the time consequently becoming fatal. The workers were not only subjected to poor working conditions, but being mistreated within them. It wasn’t for long after laws were made that treatment of children laborers improved.
At the end of the 16 century and into the early 17 century Britain was striving. With an abundance of coal and a strong Navy they could transport their goods all around Europe. Britain could also produce goods extremely fast in there new factories and mills. Children were a prime target for Mill and factory owners because there small hands could unjam and fix things an adult hand wouldn't be able to. They were also severely unpaid and always in fear of losing their job. Factory owners forced children to work 14 hour days and they often beat the child if he took a break. Although the Industrial revolution brought fame and fortune to Britain, Its weak laws allowed children to be beat, underpaid, and controlled.
The United Kingdom experienced an Industrial Revolution in the beginning of the 19th century, hence the need for cheap and dangerous labor, jobs which adults did not qualify for, needed a specific type of worker. Instead of going to school and living freely, children were targeted as the form of labor, due to their smaller frames, they were physically capable to access any tasks in narrow places. Written by a 19th century-satirist author, “Chronic Unemployment”, addresses the issue of child labor using a satirical tone, irony, sarcasm, and grotesque or dark humor. The author is clearly mocking the supporters of child laborers, who view child labor as a opportunity to provide money for their families and be “productive”members of society rather
The age of the Industrial Revolution was a significant period in Western History. During the period from 1760-1850, profound economic change took place in Great Britain, as a result of a flood of technical innovations, increases in manufacturing production, a resurgence of world trade and rapid population growth in urban areas. The use of child labor was the crucial ingredient, which allowed Britain’s Industrial Revolution to succeed. Although children had been helping around the house or farm as well as in family businesses prior to this period, the young ages and long hours required of young children were never before seen. Edward Thompson alleged, “That the exploitation of little children, on this scale and with this intensity, was one
As factories grew in size and quantity a greater need for workers was acquired causing employers to resort to children and women. In the early 1860s, an estimated one fifth of the workers in Britain’s textile industry were under the age of 15 (History, 2015). Female and young workers were employed in unsafe conditions, operated without proper safety checks and were then exploited and treated brutally. Punishments were harsh and delivered regularly without mercy to those who failed to fulfil the high expectations. Although it is argued that the minimum age to work increased from seven to nine in 1833, this was still a ludicrously young age to begin work and only eleven years later this age reduced to eight years-old.
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to 19th centuries; that divided into three phases. During that time, Europe and America were predominantly agricultural and rural then became industrial and urban. Before the Industrial Revolution, laborers worked in homes and small workshops, and most of the machinery individually powered by animals, wind, falling water, or human labor. Industrialization brought about social and economic change. It transformed people from an agricultural society into an industrial society and reorganized the economy for the purpose of manufacturing goods. Machines for mass production replaced individual laborers, and assembly lines replaced artisans. The birth of iron, steam engines, and textile industries played an exceptional role in the Industrial Revolution, which improved, communication, banking, and transportation systems.
For a lot of families it was more important for their children to work and bring the wage home rather than them getting educated. This was risky and unsafe for the children as they were only young and was working the same hours as adults they did not get treated as a child they were working as hard as the other workings within the factories/mines. In the 19th century there was now law put in place for the children, the children were working without any protection for example if the child got hurt seriously there would not have been a policy/procedure in place for how to deal with this situation. However In the 19th century children were much cheaper for the factories and the mines to employ as they were children and were not getting paid the standard pay even though they were doing the same hours as the adults. Quote.