By Lynne Ann Hartnett, Villanova University
In 1851, Prince Albert showcased Britain’s prowess as a pioneer of the Industrial Revolution. A public fair, known as the Great Exhibition, assembled in an engineering marvel built of glass and iron known as the Crystal Palace. Huge crowds lined up and filtered through to gaze at—and admire—Britain’s triumphs in raw materials, machinery, manufacturing, and the fine arts.
Industrial Revolution and Britain’s Working Class
Were the lives of Britons better off than they had been before the Industrial Revolution? By the middle of the 19th century, real income was essentially double what it had been just a century before. But what about the people’s standard of living?
While aggregate wealth expanded exponentially, the fruits of industrialization weren’t equally shared. And some classic literature from the era suggests that the working poor were, in some ways, worse off than ever.
Charles Dickens’ novel Hard Times, published in 1854, highlighted the downsides of industrialization even as Prince Albert celebrated its triumphs. Dickens set his story in the bleak industrial environs of a fictional Coketown, filled with “machinery and tall chimneys, out of which interminable serpents of smoke trailed themselves for ever and ever, and never got uncoiled. It had a black canal in it, and a river that ran purple with ill-smelling dye”.
Hard Times wrestled with the question of whether Britain’s industrial progress benefited the working classes.
This article comes directly from content in the video series The Great Revolutions of Modern History. Watch it now, on Wondrium.
The Peterloo Massacre
In 1811, workers in England’s industrial north began to destroy machines used in the cotton and wool industries, believing that the machines were costing them their jobs. Parliament quickly made clear it had no sympathy by making the sabotage of these machines a crime punishable by death. In 1813, no fewer than 17 English men were found guilty and hanged for this crime.
A few years later, in August 1819, tens of thousands of peaceful protestors in Manchester demonstrated for parliamentary reform. Only the wealthy were enfranchised at this point. Workers believed that if they could exercise power at the ballot box, Parliament would pass legislation beneficial not only to factory owners and industrialists, but also to employees. But as the meeting got under way, volunteer soldiers broke up the protest in a violent clash that resulted in at least 11 deaths, and hundreds more being injured.
Known afterward as the Peterloo Massacre, the government claimed that the crowd had demonstrated violent intentions, and that the soldiers were justified in their actions. This was met with widespread outrage. So, the government limited public meetings and curtailed press freedoms. Of course, the alignment of lawmakers with the owners of capital was quite typical.
The Combination Acts
Parliament passed the Combination Acts at the end of the 18th century, making strikes illegal. And four years after the Peterloo Massacre, lawmakers passed the Master and Servant Act, under which household servants could be held criminally liable for breach of contract with their employer.
Still, as the numbers of the working poor became more prominent in overcrowded cities, it became harder for the middle and upper classes to shut their eyes to social inequity and turmoil.
In the 1830s, the government began to restrict child labor, and protective legislation for women and children in factories and mines expanded as the century wore on.
Legal Safeguards against Child Labor
Oxford historian Jane Humphries places the number of child workers in early 19th century Britain at more than a million. Of these, 350,000 were between ages of seven and 10. They constituted 15% of the British industrial work force. The reason for so many children being employed was that factory owners viewed them as useful and cheap.
However, investigations exposed child labor as harmful to children and to society at large. In response, Parliament passed the Factory Act of 1833, prohibiting factory employment under the age of nine, and limiting the hours when children up to the age of 13 could work.
However, the new legal safeguards created a massive childcare problem. Some children, even very young ones, were now left at home to fend for themselves. Desperate parents sometimes resorted to putting opium in the milk bottles of infants and toddlers, hoping they’d spend much of the day asleep.
Industrial Revolution and Prediction by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels
In 1848, two men living in London predicted that the continued exploitation of the working class would lead to a violent revolution, in which capitalists and the state would be overthrown. These men were Karl Marx and Frederick Engels.
The vast majority of British workers didn’t share this viewpoint. Most workers didn’t object to capitalism as such. They just wanted a greater share of the proceeds. And when this seemed to be within reach, workers became supporters of the general status quo.
Britain ultimately saw the wisdom of reform. Through the 1867 and 1884 Reform Acts, Parliament extended the voting franchise to male heads of households.
However, political and economic tranquility proved elusive on the European continent. Revolution erupted in France in 1830, and throughout much of Europe in 1848.
Common Questions about Downsides and Triumphs of the Industrial Revolution
In 1811, workers in England’s industrial north began to destroy machines used in the cotton and wool industries, believing that the machines were costing them their jobs. Parliament quickly made clear it had no sympathy by making the sabotage of these machines a crime punishable by death. In 1813, no fewer than 17 English men were found guilty and hanged for this crime.
Parliament passed the Factory Act of 1833, prohibiting factory employment under the age of nine, and limiting the hours when children up to the age of 13 could work.
Oxford historian Jane Humphries places the number of child workers in early 19th century Britain at more than a million. Of these, 350,000 were between ages of seven and 10. They constituted 15% of the British industrial workforce.
