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Child Labour in the British Industrial Revolution

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Children were widely used as labour in factories, mines, and agriculture during the British Industrial Revolution (1760-1840). Very often working the same 12-hour shifts that adults did, children as young as five years old were paid a pittance to climb under dangerous weaving machines, move coal through narrow mine shafts, and work in agricultural gangs.

It was very often the case that children's jobs were well-defined and specific to them, in other words, child labour was not merely an extra help for the adult workforce. The education of many children was replaced by a working day, a choice often made by parents to supplement a meagre family income. It was not until the 1820s that governments began to pass laws that restricted working hours and business owners were compelled to provide safer working conditions for everyone, men, women , and children. Even then a lack of inspectors meant many abuses still went on, a situation noted and publicised by charities, philanthropists, and authors with a social conscience like Charles Dickens (1812-1870).

A Lack of Education

As sending a child to school involved paying a fee – even the cheapest asked for a penny a day – most parents did not bother. Villages often had a small school, where each pupil's parents paid the teacher, but attendance was sometimes erratic and more often than not the education rudimentary in hopelessly overcrowded classes. There were some free schools run by charities, and churches often offered Sunday school. Not until 1844 were there more free schools available, such as the Ragged schools established by Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury (1801-1885). These schools concentrated on the basics, what became known as the 3 Rs of Reading, Writing , and Arithmetic. Compulsory education for 5 to 12-year-olds, and the institutions necessary to provide it, would not come along until the 1870s. Consequently, "at least half of nominally school-age children worked full-time during the industrial revolution " (Horn, 57).

Some factory owners were more generous than others to the children in their employ. An example is the Quarry Bank Mill in Styal in the county of Cheshire. Here the owner provided schooling after the long working day was over for 100 of its child workers in a dedicated building, the Apprentice House.

An indicator of better education, despite all the difficulties, is literacy rates, rather imperfectly measured by historians by recording the ability of a person to sign one's name on official documents such as marriage certificates. There was a great improvement in literacy, but by 1800, still only half of the adult population could sign their name to such documents.

For those children who could find work in the Industrial Revolution, and there were employers queueing up to offer it, there were no trade unions to protect them. For the vast majority of children, working life started at an early age – on average at 8 years old – but as nobody really cared about age, this could vary wildly. Working involved at best tedium and at worst an endless round of threats, fines, corporal punishment, and instant dismissal at any protest to such treatment. In one survey taken in 1833, it was found that the tactics used with child labourers were 95% negative. Instant dismissal accounted for 58%. In only 4% of cases was a reward given for good work, and a mere 1% of the strategies used involved a promotion or pay rise.

Traditional Child Work

In the traditional cottage industry of handweaving, children had always washed and carded raw wool so that their mother could spin it on a spinning wheel, which then was woven into fabric by the father using a handloom. Craftworkers often took on an apprentice or two. Apprentices were given their board and lodgings and taught a particular trade by their master. In return, the child not only worked for free but was expected to pay a large fee upfront before starting a contract that could last a year or several years or even up to seven years, depending on the trade. Then there were children who worked in their parents' or relations' small businesses, such as small-scale manufacturers like basket-weavers, blacksmiths, and potters.

Children worked in agriculture, still a significant area during the Industrial Revolution and one which involved 35% of Britain 's total workforce in 1800. Children, as they always had done, continued to tend herds of animals and flocks of fowl, and they essentially performed any task required that they were physically capable of. Many children joined agricultural gangs which moved around to where there was temporary or seasonal employment.

Children in Mines

Men, women, and children worked in Britain's mines, particularly in the coal mines, which boomed as they produced the fuel to feed the steam engines of the Industrial Revolution. All three groups had been involved in mining before the arrival of machines, but the industry's expansion meant that many more were now involved than previously. Children as young as five years old were found useful by mine owners since they were small enough to climb into narrow ventilation shafts where they could ensure that trapdoors were regularly opened and shut. Testimony like James Pearce's in 1842 was common:

I am 12 years of age. I went down to the pits about 7 years and a half to open doors. I had a candle and a fire beside me to show me light…I was 12 hours a-day, and got 6d a day. I attended and got the money. When I was paid I took it home to my mother. I was a year and a half at this work. I once fell asleep and was well threshed by a driver. (Shelley, 42)

Most children, as they got older, were then employed to either shift the coal from the working level to the surface or to sort it out from other debris before it was shipped away. Those who pulled the coal in carts using a harness were known as 'hurriers', and those who pushed were 'thrusters'. This was back-breaking work detrimental to the child's physical development. Many parents were not opposed to their children working, despite the health hazards, since they brought in much-needed earnings for the family. In addition, over half of the children working in mines kept their employment when they reached adulthood, so it was a good route to secure a job for life. From 1800 to 1850, children composed between 20-50% of the mining workforce.

The consequence of working at such an early age was that most children employed in mines never had more than three years of schooling. Children very often suffered health problems from the physical hard work and long, 12-hour shifts. Breathing in coal dust year after year caused many to develop lung diseases later in life. As the historian S. Yorke emphatically notes, "The coal mining industry must represent one of the worst exploitations of men, women and children ever to have taken place in Britain" (98).

Children in Factories

Factories with new steam-powered machines like power looms were the great development of the Industrial Revolution, but they came at a cost. These places, especially the textile mills, were dark and noisy, and they were deliberately kept damp so that the cotton threads were more supple and less likely to break. The new mechanization of manufacturing meant that few skills were needed anymore for the basic workforce. Children were required to go under the machines to clear up cotton waste for reuse or to repair broken threads or remove blockages from the machinery. This was often dangerous work as the machines could be unpredictable. A massive weaving machine might come to a crashing halt with heavy parts falling down and movable pieces like spindles flying around like bullets.

In the factories, children worked, just like the adults around them, long 12-hour shifts six days a week. 12 hours nicely split the day in two for employers. As the machines were operated 24 hours a day, one child would return to a warm bed after work as the occupant rolled out to start their own shift, a practice known as 'hot bedding'. Children were the cheapest labour to be found, and employers were not slow to use them. A child worker was about 80% cheaper than a man and 50% cheaper than a woman. Children had the advantage of having nimble fingers and smaller bodies that could get into places and under machinery that adults could not. They could also be bullied and threatened by supervisors much more easily than an adult, and they could not fight back.

Children were also apprenticed to factory owners in a system similar to indenture. Parents were given money by their parish to allow their children to work in factories. The practice was common, and it was not until 1816 that a limit was put on how far away the children were required to work – 64 km (40 mi).

Children made up around one-third of the workforce in Britain's factories. In 1832, as the Industrial Revolution reached its final decade, these children were still subject to appalling working conditions in factories, as here described by the MP Michael Sadler, who pressed for reform:

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Even, at this moment, while I am thus speaking on behalf of these oppressed children, what numbers of them are still at their toil, confined to heated rooms, bathed in perspiration, stunned with the roar of revolving wheels, poisoned with the noxious effluvia of grease and gas, til at last, weary and exhausted, they turn out almost naked, plunge into the inclement air, and creep shivering to beds from which a relay of their young work-fellows have just risen; and such is the fate of many of them at the best while in numbers of instances, they are diseased, stunted, crippled, depraved, destroyed. (Shelley, 18)

The Poor & Orphans

Children without homes and a paid position elsewhere were, if boys, often trained to become a Shoe Black, that is someone who shined shoes in the street. These paupers were given this opportunity by charitable organisations so that they would not have to go to the infamous workhouse. The workhouse was brought into existence in 1834 and was deliberately intended to be such an awful place that it did little more than keep its inhabitants alive in the belief that any more charity than that would simply encourage the poor not to bother looking for paid work. The workhouse involved what its name suggests – work, but it was tedious work indeed, typically unpleasant and repetitive tasks like crushing bones to make glue or cleaning the workhouse itself. No wonder, then, given the squalid life in the workhouse, that many children worked in factories and mines.

Government Labour Reforms

Eventually, governments did what the fledgling trade unions had struggled to achieve, and from the 1830s, the situation for workers in factories and mines, including for children, began to slowly improve. Previously, governments had always been reluctant to restrict trade in principle, preferring a laissez-faire approach to economics. It did not help that many members of Parliament were themselves large-scale employers. Nevertheless, several acts of Parliament were passed to try, although not always successfully, to limit employers' exploitation of their workforce and lay down minimum standards.

The first industry to receive restrictions on worker exploitation was the cotton industry, but soon the new laws applied to workers of any kind. The 1802 Health and Morals of Apprentices Act stipulated that child apprentices should not work more than 12 hours a day, they must be given a basic education, and they must attend church services no fewer than two times each month. More acts followed, and this time they applied to all working children. The 1819 Cotton Mills and Factories Act limited work to children 9 years or over, and they could not work for more than 12 hours per day if under 16 years of age. Possible working hours for children were established as between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m. The 1833 Factory Act stipulated that children in any industry could not be legally employed under 9 years of age and could not be asked to work for more than 8 hours each day if aged 9 to 13, or no more than 12 hours each day if aged between 14 and 18. The same act prohibited all children from working at night and made it obligatory for children to attend a minimum of two hours of education each day.

Although there were many abuses of the new regulations, there were government inspectors tasked with ensuring they were followed. These officials could demand, for example, age certificates for any child employee or a certificate from a schoolmaster that the required number of hours of education had been given to a specific child.

Progressive changes followed the earlier acts. The 1842 Mines Act stipulated that no child under 10 years of age could be employed in underground work. The 1844 Factory Act limited anyone's working day to 12 hours, dangerous machines had to be placed in a separate workspace, and sanitary regulations were imposed on employers. The 1847 Factory Act further limited the working day to a maximum of 10 hours, a reduction that campaigners had long been lobbying the government to make. There were still many abusers of the new laws, and many parents still desperately needed the extra income their working children brought, but attitudes were finally changing in wider society in regard to using children for labour.

Authors like Charles Dickens wrote such damning works as Oliver Twist (1837) that pointed out the plight of poorer children. In the moralism of the Victorian period, many people now wanted children to preserve their innocence longer and not be so early exposed to the temptations and moral pitfalls of adult life. The idea that childhood was worth keeping but could be lost if not protected saw the foundation of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in 1889. The arts continued to prick people's consciences. J. M. Barries' character of Peter Pan , which first appeared in 1901, confirmed this shifting of attitudes and the realisation and recognition that childhood was a thing of value in and of itself, a precious thing that should not be obliterated in the daily grind of mines and factories.

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Bibliography

• Allen, Robert C. The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective . Cambridge University Press, 2009.
• Corey, Melinda & Ochoa, George. The Encyclopedia of the Victorian World. Henry Holt & Co, 1996.
• Dugan, Sally & Dugan, David. The Day the World Took Off. Channel 4 Book, 2023.
• Hepplewhite, Peter. Industrial Revolution. Wayland, 2016.
• Horn, Jeff. The Industrial Revolution . Greenwood, 2007.
• Humphries, Jane. Childhood and Child Labour in the British Industrial Revolution . Cambridge University Press, 2011.
• Shelley, C et al. Industrialisation and Social Change in Britain. PEARSON SCHOOLS, 2016.

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Child Labor

By: History.com Editors

Updated: August 24, 2022 | Original: October 27, 2009

Child labor, or the use of children as workers, servants and apprentices, has been practiced throughout most of human history, but reached its zenith during the Industrial Revolution. Miserable working conditions including crowded and unclean factories, a lack of safety codes and long hours were the norm. Children could be paid less and were less likely to organize into unions. Working children were typically unable to attend school, creating a cycle of poverty that was difficult to break. Nineteenth century reformers and labor organizers sought to restrict child labor and improve working conditions to uplift the masses, but it took the Great Depression—a time when Americans were desperate for employment—to shake long-held practices of child labor in the United States.

Child Labor in the United States

The Puritan work ethic of the 13 colonies and their founders valued hard work over idleness, and this ethos applied to children as well. Through the first half of the 1800s, child labor was an essential part of the agricultural and handicraft economy of the United States. Children worked on family farms and as indentured servants for others. To learn a trade, boys often began their apprenticeships between the ages of ten and fourteen.

Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution saw the rise of factories and mines in need of workers. Children were ideal employees because they could be paid less, were often of smaller size so could attend to tasks in tight spaces and were less likely to organize and strike against their pitiable working conditions.

Before the Civil War , women and children played a critical role in American manufacturing, though it was still a relatively small part of the economy. Advances in manufacturing techniques after the war increased the number of jobs—and therefore increased the number of child laborers.

Did you know? In 1900, 18 percent of all American workers were under the age of 16.

Immigration and Child Labor

Immigration to the United States coincidentally peaked during the Industrial Revolution and led to a new source of labor—and child labor. When the Irish Potato Famine struck in the 1840s, Irish immigrants moved to fill lower-level factory jobs.

In the 1880s, groups from southern and eastern Europe arrived, provided a new pool of child workers. The trend continues today, as many immigrant children work in agriculture, which is exempt from certain labor laws.

National Child Labor Committee

Educational reformers of the mid-nineteenth century attempted to convince the public that a primary school education was a necessity if the nation were to advance as a whole. Several states established a minimum wage for labor and requirements for school attendance—though many of these laws were full of loopholes that were readily exploited by employers hungry for cheap labor.

Beginning in 1900, efforts to regulate or eliminate child labor became central to social reform in the United States. The National Child Labor Committee , organized in 1904, and state child labor committees led the charge.

These organizations employed flexible methods in the face of slow progress. They pioneered tactics like investigations by experts; the use of photographs of child laborers to spark outrage at the poor conditions of children at work, and persuasive lobbying efforts. They used written pamphlets, leaflets and mass mailings to reach the public.

From 1902 to 1915, child labor committees emphasized reform through state legislatures. Many laws restricting child labor were passed as part of the Progressive Era reform movement . But many Southern states resisted, leading to the decision to work for a federal child labor law. While Congress passed such laws in 1916 and 1918, the Supreme Court declared them unconstitutional.

The supporters of child labor laws sought a constitutional amendment authorizing federal child labor legislation and it passed in 1924, though states were not keen to ratify it; the conservative political climate of the 1920s, together with opposition from farm and church organizations fearing increased federal power over children, acted as roadblocks.

Depression-Era Child Labor

The Great Depression left thousands of Americans without jobs and led to sweeping reforms under the New Deal programs of Franklin Delano Roosevelt . These focused on increasing federal oversight of the workplace and giving out-of-work adults jobs—thereby creating a powerful motive to remove children from the workforce.

Almost all of the codes developed under the National Industrial Recovery Act served to reduce child labor. The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 set a national minimum wage for the first time, a maximum number of hour for workers in interstate commerce—and placed limitations on child labor. In effect, the employment of children under sixteen years of age was prohibited in manufacturing and mining.

‘Orphan Trains’ Brought Homeless NYC Children to Work On Farms Out West

Over a 75‑year period, up to 200,000 indigent children went from city to farm.

Mormons Tried to Stop Native Child Slavery in Utah. They Ended Up Encouraging It

Children were purchased in an attempt to save them from being degraded, but soon became a vital source of labor for early Mormon settlers.

When a Millionaire Married a Teen And Sparked Opposition to U.S. Child Marriage

Before meeting his young wife, 51‑year‑old New York real estate titan Edward Browning had taken out newspaper ads saying he wanted to adopt a 14‑year‑old girl.

Automatization and Education

Changing attitudes toward work and social reform weren’t the only factors reducing child labor; the invention of improved machinery that mechanized many of the repetitive tasks previously given to children led to a decrease of children in the workforce. Semiskilled adults took their place for more complex tasks.

Education underwent reforms, too. Many states increasing the number of years of schooling required to hold certain jobs, lengthened the school year and began to more strictly enforce truancy laws. In 1949, Congress amended the child labor law to include businesses not covered in 1938 like transportation, communications and public utilities.

Does Child Labor Exist Today?

Although child labor has been significantly stalled in the United States, it lingers in certain areas of the economy like agriculture, where migrant workers are more difficult to regulate. Since 1938, federal laws have excluded child farm workers from labor protections provided to other working children. For example, children 12 and younger can legally work in farm fields, despite the risks posed by exposure to pesticides and farm machinery.

Employers in the garment industry have turned to the children of illegal immigrants in an effort to compete with imports from low-wage nations. Despite laws limiting the number of hours of work for children and teens still attending school, the increasing cost of education means many are working longer hours to make ends meet. State-by-state enforcement of child labor laws varies to this day.

Youth Employment Laws. The University of Iowa Center . History of Child Labor in the United States. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics . Children in the Fields. National Farm Worker Ministry .

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In This Article Expand or collapse the "in this article" section Children in the Industrial Revolution

Introduction, general overview.

• Anthologies
• Reference Works
• Pessimists on Child Labor
• Optimists on Child Labor
• Exploitation of Children
• Privileged versus Working Class
• Children as Protagonists
• Family Economy
• Labor Market Equilibrium
• The Factory Movement
• Effectiveness and Enforcement
• Apprenticeship
• Informal Education
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• United States
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Children in the Industrial Revolution by Carolyn Tuttle LAST REVIEWED: 13 January 2022 LAST MODIFIED: 22 February 2018 DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199791231-0197

Children aged six to sixteen who had worked on farms, in their homes, or in domestic workshops began to work away from home in textile mills and mines in the late 18th century. The novelty was not that they worked but whether the nature of their work changed and why it became a social problem. There is very little consensus among contemporaries and historians regarding the impact of industrialization on the lives of the working children. Did they benefit or were they harmed? The obvious place to begin is where the first “Industrial Revolution” occurred, Great Britain. Although it wasn’t entirely “industrial” in nature and certainly didn’t occur quickly, scholars concede that it was a time of dramatic change to industry and the economy. Contemporaries and historians disagree, however, on what role children played. Some claim that children constituted a large percentage of the workforce, their tasks were essential to the production process, they were independent wage earners, and their contribution to the family was significant. Other argue that idleness and unemployment was more the problem and that children had been contributing to the family income for decades. The most contentious debate revolves around whether or not children were exploited in the new industries. A few contemporaries were thrilled to see children hard at work while others were horrified and felt it had become a social problem. A group of concerned parliamentarians ordered reports on the conditions in the textile factories and mines, hoping to settle the debate. Factory and mining commissioners surveyed hundreds of working children, parents, and overseers to document the effects of employment on children. The evidence from these reports was used to develop labor legislation that would regulate child labor but not eliminate it. Pessimists used this evidence as well as personal observations to argue that children were exploited and must be protected. Optimists argued the evidence was biased and that factory children suffered no worse than those in domestic industry. As a consequence of the Factory Movement, legislation was passed but its effectiveness is disputable because enforcement proved difficult. Using data from other Parliamentary Papers historians have furthered the debate over children’s welfare by comparing health records of children in industry to others, with conflicting conclusions. There is consensus, however, that a formal education was logistically impossible and not particularly relevant for working-class children. Child labor persisted as other European and North American countries industrialized. History is repeating itself, as research by ethnographers, economists, and historians has documented substantial child labor in developing countries today.

There is considerable debate as to the novelty of child labor during the Industrial Revolution and whether it was dramatically different in the factories and mines than it had been on farms and in homes. Berg 1986 , Pinchbeck 1930 , and Wallace 2010 claim that the nature of child labor did not change by demonstrating that children had been working hard for centuries in the informal economy. Historically, child labor referred to any work children did, whether or not they were paid. This includes a diverse set of activities ranging from running errands to straw plaiting. Other scholars argue industrialization changed the nature of child labor by removing them from their home and parental supervision into factories and mines where they worked long hours in unhealthy conditions and were mistreated. There are a number of scholars who concentrate on child labor in the formal economy in the textile industry. Tuttle 1999 and Pollard 1965 conclude children’s work in textile factories was noticeably worse than in the cottage industry due to the new industrial regime. The textile industry became Britain’s leading industry as the extraordinary demands of the industrialists and their automated machinery placed new burdens on children. The arduous tasks children performed on the new spinning machines are meticulously described by Bolin-Hort 1989 and Chapman 1967 . There are other scholars who focus on children working in the formal economy in the coal and metallurgy mines. In the literature on children working in the mines there is a consensus that this work was dramatically different from work in the cottage industry and that children suffered. Leifchild 1853 and Leifchild 1857 provide extensive details (ages, numbers of children, working conditions) on children working underground in coal mines and above ground in metallurgy mines. Tuttle 1999 augments Leifchild’s data with information from the 1842 Report of the Mines to develop a comprehensive picture of the importance of child labor in coal and metallurgy mines.

Berg, Maxine. The Age of Manufactures: Industry, Innovation and Work in Britain, 1700–1820 . New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.

An in-depth examination of “the other Industrial Revolution” is developed by analyzing the life of artisans, their tools, and their skills to shed light on the variety of production types that co-existed during the Industrial Revolution. The extent and broad coverage of children in various cottage industries (metal, leather, silk, paper, and printing) with accompanying illustrations of the techniques they used fills a void in the literature.

Bolin-Hort, Per. Work, Family and the State: Child Labor and the Organization of Production in the British Cotton Industry . Lund, Sweden: Lund University Press, 1989.

This book offers a different perspective on the reason numerous children were employed in the textile mills. A comparative analysis of the new spinning machinery adopted in British, Scottish, and American textile factories casts doubt on a primarily technology-driven argument. Instead, the use of child labor was also driven by labor relations (subcontracting between the spinner and piecer) and union goals to limit the supply of spinners.

Chapman, Stanley D. Early Factory Masters: The Transition to the Factory System in the Midlands Textile Industry . Devon, UK: Newton Abbot, 1967.

The major problem facing industrialists was the recruitment and retention of a productive labor force for the textile mills. The organization of production under one roof and the adoption of machines that required unskilled labor increased the demand for women and children. A thorough examination of the labor requirements of each innovation beginning with the Spinning Jenny provides an explanation for the increased demand for children in the textile industry.

Leifchild, J. R. Our Coal and Our Coal-Pit: The People in Them and the Scenes around Them . London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans, 1853.

An extremely detailed description from a contemporary of the workings of a coal mine and the various tasks performed. Sketches of coal seams, methods of excavation, and personal observations below and above ground reveal the unhealthy and dangerous working conditions of trappers and putters. It also includes some statistics on the number of children employed and their wages.

Leifchild, J. R. Cornwall: Its Mines and Miners . London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans and Roberts, 1857.

A contemporary’s detailed description of the workings of tin and copper mines in Cornwall. In contrast to coal mines, children usually worked with their father and did not work underground. The largest number of children, mostly girls, worked as “bal-maidens” dressing the ores. Along with an analysis of the 1842 Report on the Mines, statistics on the number of children and the output of various mines are presented.

Pinchbeck, Ivy. Women Workers and the Industrial Revolution, 1750–1800 . London: George Routledge, 1930.

Pinchbeck offers a broad examination of the role of women and children in the family economy beginning in agricultural gangs, moving to cottage industries (lace makers, straw plaiting, glove making, and button making) and ending in textile factories and mines. She argues that the working conditions and exploitation of children in the cottage industry were far worse than they were in the factories and coal mines.

Pollard, Sidney. The Genesis of Modern Management . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965.

This book describes how the labor requirements for factory work were dramatically different from those in the cottage industries. It argues that industrialists hired children because they found it difficult to recruit adult workers to enter the factory system with its rules and discipline. The children because of their obedient nature made especially productive workers in this new industrial regime.

Tuttle, Carolyn. Hard at Work in Factories and Mines: The Economics of Child Labor during the Industrial Revolution . Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999.

A detailed economic analysis of child labor in the textile and mining industry. It makes the argument that child labor was driven by the demand for labor due to biased technological change. Considerable empirical data from the British Parliamentary Papers and qualitative data on the new automated machinery and underground tunnels offer support that children were preferred because of their physical, emotional, and psychological characteristics.

Wallace, Eileen. Children of the Labouring Poor: The Working Lives of Children in Nineteenth-Century Hertfordshire . Hatfield, UK: University of Hertfordshire Press, 2010.

Using testimony of children from factory inspectors, school log books, and newspaper accounts of living conditions, this book provides a thorough examination of the lives of working children during 19th-century Hertfordshire. It describes, and often illustrates, children working in agriculture, straw plaiting, brickfields, silk, papermaking, domestic service, textile mills, and chimneys. Wallace concludes that children in brickfields and chimneys suffered the most (not the factory children).

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The cruel reality for children during the Industrial Revolution

In the early days of the Industrial Revolution, child labour was common in factories.  Young children were often forced to work long hours in dangerous conditions for little or no pay.

This was because factory owners believed that children were cheap and expendable, and that they could get away with paying them less than adults.

In this article, we will explore the issue of child workers in the Industrial Revolution and discuss why it was so prevalent during that time period.

The Industrial Revolution was a time of great change in Britain. New technologies and factories were being developed, and this led to a boom in the manufacturing industry.

Factory owners were looking for workers who could operate the new machines, and they turned to children because they were small and nimble enough to do so.

In addition, children were much cheaper to hire than adults, which made them an attractive option for factory owners.

Many of the children who worked in factories came from poor families who could not afford to support them.

These families often sent their children to work in order to help make ends meet.

Others were orphaned or abandoned and had no one else to care for them.

Factory owners knew that these children were desperate and they exploited them by paying them very low wages.

Children in factories

The working conditions in factories were often dangerous and unhealthy. Children worked long hours, sometimes up to 16 hours a day, with few breaks.

They were often exposed to harmful chemicals and fumes, which could lead to serious health problems.

In addition, there was a risk of accidents, as the machines were often poorly maintained.

In some factories, children were responsible for piecing together cloth that had been torn by the machines.

This was a very difficult and dangerous job, as the children had to work quickly, and they were often cut by the machines.

Children in the mines

While most child labourers worked in factories, some were sent to work in the mines.

This was one of the most dangerous jobs during the Industrial Revolution, as there were constant risks of collapse, poisoning, and fire.

Children who worked in the mines often did not live to see their tenth birthday.

Some children were employed in the mines as 'trappers', which meant that they had to open and close the doorways that allowed air to flow into the tunnels.

Others were 'putters', which meant that they pushed carts of coal along the narrow tunnels.

This was a very difficult job, as the tunnels were often wet and slippery.

Chimney sweeps

Chimney sweeping was another dangerous job that was often carried out by children.

Sweeps had to climb up the narrow chimneys to clean them, and they were at risk of being crushed if the bricks collapsed.

They also breathed in a lot of soot, which could damage their lungs.

Children were considered the only workers suitable for this job as they were small enough to fit into the chimneys.

They often started working when they were just five or six years old, and many of them died before they reached adulthood.

Health impacts

The use of child workers was a major problem during the Industrial Revolution, as it often led to poor health and even death for the children involved.

Many of them worked long hours in dangerous and unhealthy conditions, which took a toll on their physical and mental health.

In addition, they often did not have enough to eat, which made them susceptible to illness.

Some of the more gruesome injuries that children received while working included lost fingers, severe burns, and crushed limbs.

In the mines, they were also at risk of being killed by falling rocks or being poisoned by gas fumes.

The government did little to protect children from the dangers of child labour.

Factory owners and mine operators were not required to provide safety equipment or make sure that their premises were safe.

Despite the risks, many families continued to use child labour as they could not afford to send their children to school or pay for their food and lodging.

In some cases, children were even sold into employment in order to pay off debts.

The working conditions for child labourers were extremely poor, and many people spoke out against it. 

One of the most well-known was Lord Shaftesbury, who advocated for the Factory Act of 1833 in the UK.

These reformers argued that children should not have to work in such dangerous and unhealthy conditions.

They also believed that education was important, and that children should be given the opportunity to go to school instead of working.

A previous act had been enacted in the UK, the Factory Act of 1819, but it wasn't enforced and was aimed specifically at cotton mills. 

After  a long campaign by reformers, the 1833 legislation  made it illegal for children under the age of nine to work in factories, and restricted the hours that older children could work.

While the 1833 Factory Act did set some regulations for child labor, it didn't completely abolish child labor.

It was not until the 1870s, with the introduction of compulsory education laws, that the use of child labor in Britain started to decline significantly.

Even then, it took many more years for child labor to be eradicated.

The issue of child labour is still relevant today. Unfortunately, there are still many children around the world who are forced to work in factories and other hazardous conditions.

We need to continue to fight for the rights of these children and ensure that they are given a childhood instead of being exploited for labour.

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Child Labor, Social History, and the Industrial Revolution: A Methodological Inquiry

Child labor during the British Industrial Revolution is a phenomenon that has, at times, been neglected by historians. That’s not to say that little ink has been spilled about industrialization and child labor over the past two centuries; quite the opposite. Industrialism’s role in child labor and its intensification of misery and exploitation of children has been a consistent theme since industrialization itself. This essay centers on two more recent, but pivotal texts in the history of child labor during the Industrial Revolution, namely Clark Nardinelli’s Child Labor and the Industrial Revolution (1990) and Jane Humphries’s Childhood and Child Labour in the British Industrial Revolution (2010). While each historian had taken an economic approach to the social history of the period, the differences between their approaches, using both quantitative and qualitative methods, are instructive. Interspersed with these two texts on child labor will be E.P. Thompson’s celebrated The Making of the English Working Class (1963), to examine the way historians have went about constructing their social histories of the British Industrial Revolution. We will also touch on the standard of living debate, for this touches on important methodological disputes as well. Finally, this essay will offer a different approach to examining these historical problems, an approach to the social sciences pioneered by economist Ludwig von Mises in his magnum opus on economics, entitled Human Action: A Treatise on Economics (1949). This approach will not resolve every question of methodology and interpretation advanced by the authors we will be reviewing here, but it will be applied to a few concrete examples to illustrate its usefulness in resolving some of the historical controversy, or at least clarify it.

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HIST363: Global Perspectives on Industrialization

Child labor during the british industrial revolution.

Read this article about the historical debate surrounding child labor. Of particular interest is the perspective that "the nature of children's work changed so dramatically that child labor became seen as a social problem and a political issue".

During the late 18th and early 19th centuries Great Britain became the first country to industrialize. Because of this, it was also the first country where the nature of children's work changed so dramatically that child labor became seen as a social problem and a political issue. This article examines the historical debate about child labor in Britain, Britain's political response to problems with child labor, quantitative evidence about child labor during the 1800s, and economic explanations of the practice of child labor.

The Historical Debate about Child Labor in Britain

Child labor before industrialization.

Children of poor and working-class families had worked for centuries before industrialization – helping around the house or assisting in the family's enterprise when they were able. The practice of putting children to work was first documented in the Medieval era when fathers had their children spin thread for them to weave on the loom. Children performed a variety of tasks that were auxiliary to their parents but critical to the family economy. The family's household needs determined the family's supply of labor and "the interdependence of work and residence, of household labor needs, subsidence requirements, and family relationships constituted the 'family economy'" [Tilly and Scott (1978, 12)].

Definitions of Child Labor

The term "child labor" generally refers to children who work to produce a good or a service which can be sold for money in the marketplace regardless of whether or not they are paid for their work. A "child" is usually defined as a person who is dependent upon other individuals (parents, relatives, or government officials) for his or her livelihood. The exact ages of "childhood" differ by country and time period.

Preindustrial Jobs

Children who lived on farms worked with the animals or in the fields planting seeds, pulling weeds and picking the ripe crop. Ann Kussmaul's (1981) research uncovered a high percentage of youths working as servants in husbandry in the sixteenth century. Boys looked after the draught animals, cattle and sheep while girls milked the cows and cared for the chickens. Children who worked in homes were either apprentices, chimney sweeps, domestic servants, or assistants in the family business. As apprentices, children lived and worked with their master who established a workshop in his home or attached to the back of his cottage. The children received training in the trade instead of wages. Once they became fairly skilled in the trade they became journeymen. By the time they reached the age of twenty-one, most could start their own business because they had become highly skilled masters. Both parents and children considered this a fair arrangement unless the master was abusive. The infamous chimney sweeps, however, had apprenticeships considered especially harmful and exploitative. Boys as young as four would work for a master sweep who would send them up the narrow chimneys of British homes to scrape the soot off the sides. The first labor law passed in Britain to protect children from poor working conditions, the Act of 1788, attempted to improve the plight of these "climbing boys". Around age twelve many girls left home to become domestic servants in the homes of artisans, traders, shopkeepers and manufacturers. They received a low wage, and room and board in exchange for doing household chores (cleaning, cooking, caring for children and shopping). Children who were employed as assistants in domestic production (or what is also called the cottage industry) were in the best situation because they worked at home for their parents. Children who were helpers in the family business received training in a trade and their work directly increased the productivity of the family and hence the family's income. Girls helped with dressmaking, hat making and button making while boys assisted with shoemaking, pottery making and horse shoeing. Although hours varied from trade to trade and family to family, children usually worked twelve hours per day with time out for meals and tea. These hours, moreover, were not regular over the year or consistent from day-to-day. The weather and family events affected the number of hours in a month children worked. This form of child labor was not viewed by society as cruel or abusive but was accepted as necessary for the survival of the family and development of the child.

Early Industrial Work

Once the first rural textile mills were built (1769) and child apprentices were hired as primary workers, the connotation of "child labor" began to change. E.J. Hobsbawn called these places of work "the dark satanic mills" and E. P. Thompson described them as "places of sexual license, foul language, cruelty, violent accidents, and alien manners" (1966, 307). Although long hours had been the custom for agricultural and domestic workers for generations, the factory system was criticized for strict discipline, harsh punishment, unhealthy working conditions, low wages, and inflexible work hours. The factory depersonalized the employer-employee relationship and was attacked for stripping the worker's freedom, dignity and creativity. These child apprentices were paupers taken from orphanages and workhouses and were housed, clothed and fed but received no wages for their long day of work in the mill. A conservative estimate is that around 1784 one-third of the total workers in country mills were apprentices and that their numbers reached 80 to 90% in some individual mills (Collier, 1964). Despite the First Factory Act of 1802 (which attempted to improve the conditions of parish apprentices), several mill owners were in the same situation as Sir Robert Peel and Samuel Greg who solved their labor shortage by employing parish apprentices. After the invention and adoption of Watt's steam engine, mills no longer had to locate near water and rely on apprenticed orphans - hundreds of factory towns and villages developed in Lancashire, Manchester, Yorkshire and Cheshire. The factory owners began to hire children from poor and working-class families to work in these factories preparing and spinning cotton, flax, wool and silk.

The Child Labor Debate

What happened to children within these factory walls became a matter of intense social and political debate that continues today. Pessimists such as Alfred (1857), Engels (1926), Marx (1909), and Webb and Webb (1898) argued that children worked under deplorable conditions and were being exploited by the industrialists. A picture was painted of the "dark satanic mill" where children as young as five and six years old worked for twelve to sixteen hours a day, six days a week without recess for meals in hot, stuffy, poorly lit, overcrowded factories to earn as little as four shillings per week. Reformers called for child labor laws and after considerable debate, Parliament took action and set up a Royal Commission of Inquiry into children's employment. Optimists, on the other hand, argued that the employment of children in these factories was beneficial to the child, family and country and that the conditions were no worse than they had been on farms, in cottages or up chimneys. Ure (1835) and Clapham (1926) argued that the work was easy for children and helped them make a necessary contribution to their family's income. Many factory owners claimed that employing children was necessary for production to run smoothly and for their products to remain competitive. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, recommended child labor as a means of preventing youthful idleness and vice. Ivy Pinchbeck (1930) pointed out, moreover, that working hours and conditions had been as bad in the older domestic industries as they were in the industrial factories.

Factory Acts

Although the debate over whether children were exploited during the British Industrial Revolution continues today [see Nardinelli (1988) and Tuttle (1998)], Parliament passed several child labor laws after hearing the evidence collected. The three laws which most impacted the employment of children in the textile industry were the Cotton Factories Regulation Act of 1819 (which set the minimum working age at 9 and maximum working hours at 12), the Regulation of Child Labor Law of 1833 (which established paid inspectors to enforce the laws) and the Ten Hours Bill of 1847 (which limited working hours to 10 for children and women).

The Extent of Child Labor

The significance of child labor during the Industrial Revolution was attached to both the changes in the nature of child labor and the extent to which children were employed in the factories. Cunningham (1990) argues that the idleness of children was more a problem during the Industrial Revolution than the exploitation resulting from employment. He examines the Report on the Poor Laws in 1834 and finds that in parish after parish there was very little employment for children. In contrast, Cruickshank (1981), Hammond and Hammond (1937), Nardinelli (1990), Redford (1926), Rule (1981), and Tuttle (1999) claim that a large number of children were employed in the textile factories. These two seemingly contradictory claims can be reconciled because the labor market for child labor was not a national market. Instead, child labor was a regional phenomenon where a high incidence of child labor existed in the manufacturing districts while a low incidence of children were employed in rural and farming districts. Since the first reliable British Census that inquired about children's work was in 1841, it is impossible to compare the number of children employed on the farms and in cottage industry with the number of children employed in the factories during the heart of the British industrial revolution. It is possible, however, to get a sense of how many children were employed by the industries considered the "leaders" of the Industrial Revolution - textiles and coal mining. Although there is still not a consensus on the degree to which industrial manufacturers depended on child labor, research by several economic historians have uncovered several facts.

Estimates of Child Labor in Textiles

Using data from an early British Parliamentary Report (1819[HL.24]CX), Freuenberger, Mather and Nardinelli concluded that "children formed a substantial part of the labor force" in the textile mills (1984, 1087). They calculated that while only 4.5% of the cotton workers were under 10, 54.5% were under the age of 19 - confirmation that the employment of children and youths was pervasive in cotton textile factories (1984, 1087). Tuttle's research using a later British Parliamentary Report (1834(167)XIX) shows this trend continued. She calculated that children under 13 comprised roughly 10 to 20 % of the work forces in the cotton, wool, flax, and silk mills in 1833. The employment of youths between the age of 13 and 18 was higher than for younger children, comprising roughly 23 to 57% of the work forces in cotton, wool, flax, and silk mills. Cruickshank also confirms that the contribution of children to textile work forces was significant. She showed that the growth of the factory system meant that from one-sixth to one-fifth of the total work force in the textile towns in 1833 were children under 14. There were 4,000 children in the mills of Manchester; 1,600 in Stockport; 1,500 in Bolton and 1,300 in Hyde (1981, 51). The employment of children in textile factories continued to be high until mid-nineteenth century. According to the British Census, in 1841 the three most common occupations of boys were Agricultural Labourer, Domestic Servant and Cotton Manufacture with 196,640; 90,464 and 44,833 boys under 20 employed, respectively. Similarly for girls the three most common occupations include Cotton Manufacture. In 1841, 346,079 girls were Domestic Servants; 62,131 were employed in Cotton Manufacture and 22,174 were Dress-makers. By 1851 the three most common occupations for boys under 15 were Agricultural Labourer (82,259), Messenger (43,922) and Cotton Manufacture (33,228) and for girls it was Domestic Servant (58,933), Cotton Manufacture (37,058) and Indoor Farm Servant (12,809) (1852-53[1691-I]LXXXVIII, pt.1). It is clear from these findings that children made up a large portion of the work force in textile mills during the nineteenth century. Using returns from the Factory Inspectors, S. J. Chapman's (1904) calculations reveal that the percentage of child operatives under 13 had a downward trend for the first half of the century from 13.4% in 1835 to 4.7% in 1838 to 5.8% in 1847 and 4.6% by 1850 and then rose again to 6.5% in 1856, 8.8% in 1867, 10.4% in 1869 and 9.6% in 1870 (1904, 112).

Estimates of Child Labor in Mining

Children and youth also comprised a relatively large proportion of the work forces in coal and metal mines in Britain. In 1842, the proportion of the work forces that were children and youth in coal and metal mines ranged from 19 to 40%. A larger proportion of the work forces of coal mines used child labor underground while more children were found on the surface of metal mines "dressing the ores" (a process of separating the ore from the dirt and rock). By 1842 one-third of the underground work force of coal mines was under the age of 18 and one-fourth of the work force of metal mines were children and youth (1842[380]XV). In 1851 children and youth (under 20) comprised 30% of the total population of coal miners in Great Britain. After the Mining Act of 1842 was passed which prohibited girls and women from working in mines, fewer children worked in mines. The Reports on Sessions 1847-48 and 1849 Mining Districts I (1847-48[993]XXVI and 1849[1109]XXII) and The Reports on Sessions 1850 and 1857-58 Mining Districts II (1850[1248]XXIII and 1857-58[2424]XXXII) contain statements from mining commissioners that the number of young children employed underground had diminished. In 1838, Jenkin (1927) estimates that roughly 5,000 children were employed in the metal mines of Cornwall and by 1842 the returns from The First Report show as many as 5,378 children and youth worked in the mines. In 1838 Lemon collected data from 124 tin, copper and lead mines in Cornwall and found that 85% employed children. In the 105 mines that employed child labor, children comprised from as little as 2% to as much as 50% of the work force with a mean of 20% (Lemon, 1838). According to Jenkin the employment of children in copper and tin mines in Cornwall began to decline by 1870 (1927, 309).

Explanations for Child Labor

The supply of child labor.

Given the role of child labor in the British Industrial Revolution, many economic historians have tried to explain why child labor became so prevalent. A competitive model of the labor market for children has been used to examine the factors that influenced the demand for children by employers and the supply of children from families. The majority of scholars argue that it was the plentiful supply of children that increased employment in industrial work places turning child labor into a social problem. The most common explanation for the increase in supply is poverty - the family sent their children to work because they desperately needed the income. Another common explanation is that work was a traditional and customary component of ordinary people's lives. Parents had worked when they were young and required their children to do the same. The prevailing view of childhood for the working-class was that children were considered "little adults" and were expected to contribute to the family's income or enterprise. Other less commonly argued sources of an increase in the supply of child labor were that parents either sent their children to work because they were greedy and wanted more income to spend on themselves or that children wanted out of the house because their parents were emotionally and physically abusive. Whatever the reason for the increase in supply, scholars agree that since mandatory schooling laws were not passed until 1876, even well-intentioned parents had few alternatives.

The Demand for Child Labor

Other compelling explanations argue that it was demand, not supply, that increased the use of child labor during the Industrial Revolution. One explanation came from the industrialists and factory owners - children were a cheap source of labor that allowed them to stay competitive. Managers and overseers saw other advantages to hiring children and pointed out that children were ideal factory workers because they were obedient, submissive, likely to respond to punishment and unlikely to form unions. In addition, since the machines had reduced many procedures to simple one-step tasks, unskilled workers could replace skilled workers. Finally, a few scholars argue that the nimble fingers, small stature and suppleness of children were especially suited to the new machinery and work situations. They argue children had a comparative advantage with the machines that were small and built low to the ground as well as in the narrow underground tunnels of coal and metal mines. The Industrial Revolution, in this case, increased the demand for child labor by creating work situations where they could be very productive.

Influence of Child Labor Laws

Whether it was an increase in demand or an increase in supply, the argument that child labor laws were not considered much of a deterrent to employers or families is fairly convincing. Since fines were not large and enforcement was not strict, the implicit tax placed on the employer or family was quite low in comparison to the wages or profits the children generated [Nardinelli (1980)]. On the other hand, some scholars believe that the laws reduced the number of younger children working and reduced labor hours in general [Chapman (1904) and Plener (1873)].

Despite the laws there were still many children and youth employed in textiles and mining by mid-century. Booth calculated there were still 58,900 boys and 82,600 girls under 15 employed in textiles and dyeing in 1881. In mining the number did not show a steady decline during this period, but by 1881 there were 30,400 boys under 15 still employed and 500 girls under 15. See Table 1 below.

Table 1 : Child Employment, 1851-1881

Explanations for the Decline in Child Labor

There are many opinions regarding the reason(s) for the diminished role of child labor in these industries. Social historians believe it was the rise of the domestic ideology of the father as breadwinner and the mother as housewife, that was imbedded in the upper and middle classes and spread to the working-class. Economic historians argue it was the rise in the standard of living that accompanied the Industrial Revolution that allowed parents to keep their children home.

Although mandatory schooling laws did not play a role because they were so late, other scholars argue that families started showing an interest in education and began sending their children to school voluntarily. Finally, others claim that it was the advances in technology and the new heavier and more complicated machinery, which required the strength of skilled adult males, that lead to the decline in child labor in Great Britain. Although child labor has become a fading memory for Britons, it still remains a social problem and political issue for developing countries today.

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child labour

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• Canadian Encyclopedia - Child Labour
• EH.net - Child Labor during the British Industrial Revolution
• Social Welfare History Project - Child Labor
• International Labour Organization - What is child labour
• Academia - Child Labour in India
• National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - Challenges and perspectives of child labor
• child labor - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11)
• child labor - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)

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child labour , employment of children of less than a legally specified age. In Europe , North America , Australia , and New Zealand , children under age 15 rarely work except in commercial agriculture, because of the effective enforcement of laws passed in the first half of the 20th century. In the United States , for example, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 set the minimum age at 14 for employment outside of school hours in nonmanufacturing jobs, at 16 for employment during school hours in interstate commerce , and at 18 for occupations deemed hazardous.

Child labour is far more prevalent in developing countries , where millions of children—some as young as seven—still toil in quarries, mines, factories, fields, and service enterprises. They make up more than 10 percent of the labour force in some countries in the Middle East and from 2 to 10 percent in much of Latin America and some parts of Asia. Few, if any, laws govern their employment or the conditions under which work is performed. Restrictive legislation is rendered impractical by family poverty and lack of schools.

The movement to regulate child labour began in Great Britain at the close of the 18th century, when the rapid development of large-scale manufacturing made possible the exploitation of young children in mining and industrial work. The first law, in 1802, which was aimed at controlling the apprenticeship of pauper children to cotton-mill owners, was ineffective because it did not provide for enforcement. In 1833 the Factory Act did provide a system of factory inspection.

Organized international efforts to regulate child labour began with the first International Labour Conference in Berlin in 1890. Although agreement on standards was not reached at that time, similar conferences and other international moves followed. In 1900 the International Association for Labour Legislation was established at Basel, Switzerland, to promote child labour provisions as part of other international labour legislation. A report published by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) of the United Nations in 1960 on law and practice among more than 70 member nations showed serious failures to protect young workers in nonindustrial jobs, including agriculture and handicrafts. One of the ILO’s current goals is to identify and resolve the “worst forms” of child labour; these are defined as any form of labour that negatively impacts a child’s normal development. In 1992 the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) was created as a new department of the ILO. Through programs it operates around the world, IPEC seeks the removal of children from hazardous working conditions and the ultimate elimination of child labour.