History

Whenever I read history, I am glad to live in modern times.

In the past, life was very hard for ordinary people. 
(See working conditions in the coal mines of England in the 18/19 century)

Whenever I read history, I am glad to live in modern times.

In the past, life was very hard for ordinary people. 
(See working conditions in the coal mines of England in the 18/19 century) 

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsehistory/2024/03/01/a-womans-work-coal-mining/

Beauty matters - Wannabe Polymath. Interested in art, music, history, philosophy and faith.

"From this view of the work performed by bearers in Scotland, some faint idea may be formed of the slavery and severity of the toil, particularly when it is considered that they are entered to this work when seven years of age, and frequently continue till they are upwards of fifty or even sixty years old."

Women were expected to work through pregnancy, which also meant that miscarriage and infant death were common. Isabel Wilson, 38, testified to a government investigation into mine work that she had had 10 children in 19 years of marriage and experienced five miscarriages due to the strain of carrying coal while pregnant.

Eventually in 1842 the Mines and Collieries Bill was passed by Parliament. This banned underground work for women and girls as well as boys under ten. However, many women still needed to earn a wage and consequently women took work on the pit surface instead. Nonetheless, the act benefitted children who were now able to go to school and stopped women from doing more physically dangerous work in the pits.

The full article…

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsehistory/2024/03/01/a-womans-work-coal-mining/

The weight a woman would carry in a day was in the region of 4,080 lbs (291 stone), according to Robert Bald’s calculations, but the wages she would receive for such a day’s work was only eight pence (to put in context, a loaf of bread was about 16p). Unmarried women not working in a family group became known as “fremit bearers” and could be easily mistreated by the male collier employing them. As Bald describes, the collier could force his fremit bearer to carry loads heavy enough to “break not only the spirit, but the back of any human being.”