THE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND

THE INDUSTRIAL
HISTORY OF ENGLAND

BY

H. DE B. GIBBINS,

LITT.D., M.A.

SOMETIME SCHOLAR OF WADHAM COLLEGE, OXFORD AND UNIVERSITY (COBDEN) PRIZEMAN IN POLITICAL ECONOMY

WITH FIVE MAPS AND A PLAN

TWENTY-SEVENTH EDITION

METHUEN & CO. LTD.

36 ESSEX STREET W.C.

LONDON

PREFACE

This little book is an attempt to relate in a short, concise, and simple form the main outlines of England’s economic and industrial history. It is meant to serve as an introduction to a fuller study of the subject and as a preliminary sketch which the reader can afterwards, if he wishes, fill in for himself from larger volumes dealing with special periods. At the same time it is hoped that this outline may succeed in giving not only to the student but to the ordinary reader a general view of a side of history too frequently neglected, but of the utmost importance to a proper understanding of the story of the English nation. I have endeavoured, as far as possible in the brief limits of a work like this, to connect economic and industrial questions with social, political, and military movements, believing as I do that only in some such mutual relation as this can historical events obtain their full significance.

The paramount necessity of simplicity and conciseness in an outline of this kind has compelled me to omit or mention very briefly many points which those who are familiar with my subject might well expect to be included. I have not, for instance, given elaborate statistical figures or voluminous footnotes upon the actual condition of our trade at various periods. Nor have I given more than an outline of the old and new Poor Laws, of financial measures, or of Banking; and with much reluctance I have omitted a discussion of Colonial Trade. But all these points, except perhaps the last, may be reserved by a student till he comes to much larger works; though a proper economic history of our Colonies yet remains to be written. Such as it is, however, I trust that this general view of the broad outlines of the growth of our wealth and industry in their relation to the general history of England may have its uses.

I have preferred not to weary my reader by constant references to authorities in footnotes, but have acknowledged my obligations to the various authorities consulted in an appendix, where suggestions for further reading will be found.

PREFACE TO THE EIGHTEENTH EDITION

Since the original publication of this book in 1890, twenty-one years have elapsed, and the author, whose untimely death all scholars deplore, was able to embody various corrections which made this book harmonize more completely with his larger work Industry in England. On certain points he was led to modify his opinions—a course inevitable in a book covering so large a ground.

In the Preface to the Fifth Edition he wrote: “It has been said that I write with a prejudice against the owners of land: but this is not the case. The landed gentry of England happen for some centuries to have held the predominant power in the State and in society, and used it, not unnaturally, in many cases to further their own interests. It is the duty of an historian to point this out, but it need not therefore be thought that he had any special bias against the class. Any other class would certainly have done the same, as, for instance, mill-owners did among their own employées at the beginning of this century, and as, in all probability, the working classes will do when a further extension of democratic government shall have given them the opportunity.

“It is a fault of human nature that it can rarely be trusted with irresponsible power, and unless the influence of one class of society is counterbalanced more or less by that of another, there will always be a tendency to some injustice. I trust that my readers will bear this in mind when reading the following pages, and will believe that I intend no unfairness to the landed gentry of England, who have done much to promote the glory and stability of their country.”

The present, or eighteenth edition, has been carefully revised by Miss M. E. Hirst, M.A., and in addition to such revision she has written a new chapter (Chapter VIII.) which treats of the New Age of Industrial Expansion. The Industrial History of England is thus continued from the point at which the author left it and is carried up to the year 1911.

THE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND

PERIOD I ENGLAND BEFORE THE NORMAN CONQUEST

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY—THE ROMANS AND THEIR SUCCESSORS—TRADE

§ 1.

Under Roman sway Britain reached a high level of prosperity, and there is abundant evidence of this fact from Roman writers. They speak of the rich natural productions of Britain, of its numerous flocks and herds, of its minerals, of its various commercial facilities, and of the revenues derived from these sources. {2}

We know that there were no less than fifty-nine cities in Britain in the middle of the third century A.D., and the population was probably fairly large, though we have no certain statistics upon this point.[1] Large quantities of corn were exported from the land, as many as 800 vessels being sent on one occasion to procure corn for the Roman cities in Germany. This shows a fairly advanced agriculture. Tin also was another important export, as indeed it has always been; and British slaves were constantly sent to the market at Rome. In the country itself great material works, such as walled towns, paved roads, aqueducts, and great public buildings were undertaken, and remained to testify to the greatness of their builders long after their name had become a distant memory. The military system of the Romans helped to produce industrial results, for the Roman soldiers took a prominent part in road-making, building dykes, working mines, and the great engineering operations that marked the Roman rule. The chief towns very largely owed their origin to their importance as military stations; and most of them, such as York, London, Chester, Lincoln, Bath, and Colchester, have continued ever since to be considerable centres of population, though of course with occasional fluctuations. When, however, the Romans finally left Britain (in A.D. 410), both trade and agriculture began to sink; the towns decayed; and for centuries England became the battle-ground of various predatory tribes from the Continent, who gradually effected a settlement, first in many kingdoms, but finally in one, and became known as “the English,” or the Anglo-Saxon nationality (A.D. 827).

[ 1] See note 1, p. [243,] on Population of Roman Britain.

§ 2. Trade in the Anglo-Saxon period

[ 2] See next chapter.

§ 3. Internal Trade. Money

[ 3] See note 2, p. [243,] on Markets on Boundaries.

Mere barter, however, is tedious and cumbersome; and although, up to the time of Alfred (A.D. 870), a large proportion, though not the whole, of English internal trade was carried on in this fashion, the use of metals for exchange begins to become common in the ninth century; and in A.D. 900 regular money payments by tenants are found recorded. And when we come to the levy of the Danegeld (A.D. 991)—the tax raised by Ethelred as a bribe to the Danes—it is clear that money coinage must have been widely diffused and in general circulation.

§ 4. Foreign Trade

[ 4] See note 3, p. [243,] on Danish Influence on Commerce.

§ 5. General Summary

CHAPTER II THE LAND: ITS OWNERS AND CULTIVATORS

§ 1. The Mark

[ 5] For a criticism of the mark theory see Industry in England, pp. 47–61.

§ 2. The Manor

[ 6] i.e. supposing it ever existed.

§ 3. Combined Agriculture

The distinctive feature of this combined agriculture was the three-field system. All the arable land near a village was divided into three strips, and was sown in the following manner:—A field was sown with wheat or rye in the autumn of one year; but owing to the slowness of primitive farming this crop would not be reaped in time for autumn sowing the next year, so the sowing took place in the following spring, the next crop being oats or barley; after this crop the land lay fallow for a year. Hence, of these three strips, every year one had wheat or rye, another oats or barley, while the third was fallow. The land of each individual was necessarily scattered between the various plots of his neighbours, so that each might have a fair share in land of good quality. This style of agriculture, of course, produced very meagre results, but it seems to have been sufficient for the simple wants of the occupiers of that epoch.

§ 4. The Feudal System

NOTE.—The theory of the mark (which is now regarded as very doubtful) is dealt with more fully in ch. iv. of my Industry in England, where also the evidences of communal village life are discussed; and I must refer my readers to this for more recent views.

PERIOD II FROM THE NORMAN CONQUEST TO THE REIGN OF HENRY III. (A.D. 1066–1216)

CHAPTER I DOMESDAY BOOK AND THE MANORS

§ 1. Domesday Book

[ 7] For recent works on Domesday Book, see p. [242.]

§ 2. Economic condition of the country as shown in Domesday

[ 8] V. Industry in England, p. 69.

§ 3. The Manors and their owners

[ 9] Or, in capite.

[10] i.e. sub-tenants.

§ 4. The inhabitants of the manors

§ 5. The condition of these inhabitants

§ 6. Services due to the lord from his tenants in villeinage

§ 7. Money payments and rents

§ 8. Free Tenants. Soke-men

In Domesday, we find that the Eastern and East-central counties were those in which “free” tenants or soke-men were most prevalent. There they form from 27 to 45 per cent. of the inhabitants of those parts, though, taking all England into view, they only form 4 per cent. of the total population. The number of free tenants, however, was constantly increasing, even among tenants in villeinage, for the lord often found it more useful to have money, and was willing to allow commutation of services; or again, he might prefer not to cultivate all his own land (his demesne), but to let it for a fixed money rent to a villein to do what he could with it; and thus the villein became a free man, while the lord was sure of a fixed sum from his land every year, whether the harvest were good or bad.

§ 9. Illustrations of old manors. (1) Estone

First we will take a manor in Warwickshire in the Domesday Survey (1089)—Estone, now Aston, near Birmingham. It was one of a number belonging to William, the son of Ansculf, who was tenant in chief, but had let it to one Godmund, a sub-tenant in mesne. The Survey runs: “William Fitz-Ansculf holds of the King Estone, and Godmund of him. There are 8 hides.[11] The arable employs 20 ploughs; in the demesne the arable employs 6 ploughs, but now there are no ploughs. There are 30 villeins with a priest, and 1 bondsman, and 12 bordars [i.e. cottars]. They have 18 ploughs. A mill pays 3 {17} shillings. The woodland is 3 miles long and half a mile broad. It was worth £4; now 100 shillings.”

[11] A hide varied in size, and was (after the Conquest) equal to a carucate, which might be anything from 80 to 120 or 180 acres. Perhaps 120 is a fair average, though some say 80.

Here we have a good example of a manor held by a sub-tenant, and containing all the three classes mentioned in § 4 of this chapter—villeins, cottars, and slaves (i.e. bondsmen). The whole manor must have been about 5000 acres, of which 1000 were probably arable land, which was of course parcelled out in strips among the villeins, the lord, and the priest. As there were only 18 ploughs among 30 villeins, it is evident some of them at least had to use a plough and oxen in common. The demesne land does not seem to have been well cultivated by Godmund the lord, for there were no ploughs on it, though it was large enough to employ six. Perhaps Godmund, being an Englishman, had been fighting the Normans in the days of Harold, and had let it go out of cultivation, or perhaps the former owner had died in the war, and Godmund had rented the land from the Norman noble to whom William gave it.

§ 10. Cuxham Manor in the eleventh and thirteenth centuries

[12] In his Six Centuries of Work and Wages.

§ 11. Description of a manor village

[13] See note 4. p. [243,] on Manorial Courts.

§ 12. The kinds of land in a manor

DIAGRAM OF A MANOR

THE KING (supreme landlord)

TENANT IN CHIEF, owning various manors.

A SUB-TENANT, or tenant in mesne, the lord of the manor below.

perhaps be some (6) Meadow land, as at Cuxham; but this always belonged to the lord, and if he let it out, he always charged an extra rent (say eightpence instead of sixpence an acre), for it was very valuable as affording a good supply of hay for the winter. Lastly, if the tenant could afford it, and wanted to have other land besides the common fields, where he could let his cattle lie, or to cultivate the ground more carefully, he could occupy (7) a close, or a portion of land specially marked off and let separately. The lord always had a close on his demesne, and the chief tenants would generally have one or two as well. The close land was of course rented more highly than land in the common fields.

The accompanying diagram shows a typical manor, held by a sub-tenant from a tenant in chief, who holds it of the king. It contains all the different kinds of land, though of course they did not always exist all in one manor. It also shows the manor-house, church, mill and village.[14]

[14] See note 5, p. [244,] on Decay of Manorial System.

CHAPTER II THE TOWNS AND THE GILDS

§ 1. The origin of towns

§ 2. Rise of towns in England

§ 3. Towns in Domesday: London

Now, in the Domesday Book there is mention made of forty-one provincial cities or boroughs, most of them being the county towns of the present day. There are also ten fortified towns of greater importance than the others. They are Canterbury, York, Nottingham, Oxford, Hereford, Leicester, Lincoln, Stafford, Chester, and Colchester. London was a town apart, as it had always been, and was the only town which had a civic constitution, being regulated by a port-reeve and a bishop, and having a kind of charter, though afterwards the privileges of this charter were much increased. London was of course a great port and trading centre, and had many foreign merchants in it. It was then, as well as in subsequent centuries, the centre of English national life, and {25} the voice of its citizens counted for something in national affairs. The other great ports of England at that time were Bristol, Southampton, and Norwich, and as trade grew and prospered, many other ports rose into prominence (see p. [64]).

§ 4. Special privileges of towns

§ 5. How the towns obtained their charters

§ 6. The gilds and the towns. Various kinds of gilds

§ 7. How the Merchant Gilds helped the growth of towns

§ 8. How the Craft Gilds helped industry

We must now look for a moment at the work of the artisans’ gilds, or craft gilds, which afterwards became very important. These gilds are found not only in London, but in provincial towns. The London weavers are mentioned as a craft gild in the time of Henry I. (A.D. 1100), and most of these gilds seemed to have existed already for a long period. The Goldsmiths’ Gild claimed to have possessed land before the Norman Conquest, and it was fairly powerful in the days of Henry II. (A.D. 1154), for he found it convenient to try and suppress it. But it did not receive the public recognition of a charter till the fourteenth century. They arose, of course, first in the towns, and originally seem to have consisted of a small body of the leading men of a particular craft, to whom was confided the regulation of a particular industry, probably as soon as that industry was thought of sufficient importance to be regulated. The gild tried to secure good work on the part of its members, and attempted to suppress the production of wares by irresponsible persons who were not members of the craft. Their fundamental principle was, that a member should work not only for his own private advantage, but for the reputation and good of his trade; hence bad work was punished, and it is curious to note that night-work is prohibited as leading to poor work. The gild took care to secure a supply of competent workmen for the future by training young people in its particular industry, and hence arose the apprentice system, which at first, at any rate, had considerable advantages.

The gild, moreover, exercised a moral control over its members, and secured their good behaviour, thus forming an effective branch of the social police. On the other hand, it had many of the characteristics of a benefit {30} society, providing against sickness and death among those belonging to it, as indeed all gilds did.

These institutions, however, did not only belong to the towns, but were found in country districts also; thus we hear of the carpenters’ and masons’ rural gilds in the reign of Edward III. Even the peasant labourers, according to Professor Thorold Rogers, possessed these associations, which in all cases served many of the functions of the modern trade unions. Later on (1381) we shall come to a very remarkable instance of the power of these peasants’ unions in the matter of Tyler’s rebellion.

§ 9. Life in the towns of this time

[15] V. Industry in England, p. [96;] and Green, History, I. 212.

CHAPTER III MANUFACTURES AND TRADE: ELEVENTH TO THIRTEENTH CENTURIES

§ 1. Economic effects of the Feudal System

[16] Quoted by Green; History, I. 155.

But even when we come to look at the feudal system in a time of peace, we see that it did not tend to any great growth of industry. For it encouraged rather than diminished that spirit of isolation and self-sufficiency {32} which was so marked a feature of the earlier manors and townships, where, again, little scope was afforded to individual enterprise, from the fact that the consent of the lord of a manor or town was often necessary for the most ordinary purposes of industrial life. It is true, as we have seen, that when the noble owner was in pecuniary difficulties the towns profited thereby to obtain their charters; and perhaps we may not find it altogether a matter for regret that the barons, through their internecine struggles, thus unwittingly helped on the industry of the land. It may be admitted also, that though the isolation of communities consequent upon the prevalent manorial system did not encourage trade and traffic between separate communities, it yet tended to diffuse a knowledge of domestic manufactures throughout the land generally, because each place had largely to provide for itself.

The constant taxation, however, entailed by the feudal system in the shape of tallages, aids, and fines, both to king and nobles, made it difficult for the lower classes to accumulate capital, more especially as in the civil wars they were constantly plundered of it openly. The upper classes merely squandered it in fighting. Agriculture suffered similarly; for the villeins, however well off, were bound to the land, especially in the earlier period soon after the Conquest, and before commutation of services for money rents became so common as it did subsequently; nor could they leave their manor without incurring a distinct loss, both of social status and—what is more important—of the means of livelihood. The systems of constant services to the lord of the manor, and of the collective methods of cultivation, were also drawbacks to good agriculture. Again, in trade, prices were settled by authority, competition was unduly checked, {33} and merchants had to pay heavy fines for royal “protection.”

§ 2. Foreign Trade. The Crusades

§ 3. The trading clauses in the Great Charter

§ 4. The Jews in England: their economic position

[17] See note 6, p. [244,] on their return.

§ 5. Manufactures in this period: Flemish weavers

§ 6. Economic appearance of England in this Period. Population

ENGLAND SHORTLY AFTER TIME OF DOMESDAY, A.D. 1100–1200

DARK GREEN: Density of population greater. RED BROWN: Forest. YELLOW: Marsh.

The chief colour is Green to show that whole country was chiefly agricultural. Part of Yorks Pale to show it was waste.

The ten chief towns: 1—York.* 2—Bristol.* 3—Lincoln.* 4—Norwich.* 5—Coventry.* 6—Oxford. 7—Colchester. 8—Nottingham. 9—Winchester. And 10—London.

*Population over 5000.

§ 7. General condition of the Period

Yet with all these evils the economic condition of England, although depressed, was by no means absolutely unhealthy; and the following reign (Henry III., 1216–1272), with its comparative peace and leisure, afforded, as we shall see, sufficient opportunity to enable the people to regain a position of general opulence and prosperity. This time of quiet progress and industrial growth forms a fitting occasion for the marking out of a new epoch.

PERIOD III FROM THE THIRTEENTH TO THE END OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY, INCLUDING THE GREAT PLAGUE (1216–1500)

CHAPTER I AGRICULTURE IN MEDIÆVAL ENGLAND

§ 1. Introductory. Rise of a wage-earning class

§ 2. Agriculture the chief occupation of the people

§ 3. Methods of cultivation. The capitalist landlord and his bailiff. The “stock and land” lease

§ 4. The tenant’s communal land and closes

§ 5. Ploughing

An average yield of six bushels per acre is what Walter de Henley thinks necessary to secure profitable farming.

§ 6. Stock, Pigs and Poultry

§ 7. Sheep

§ 8. Increase of sheep farming

§ 9. Consequent increase of enclosures

CHAPTER II THE WOOLLEN TRADE AND MANUFACTURES

§ 1. England’s monopoly of wool

§ 2. Wool and Politics

[18] See note 7, p. [244,] on Flanders and England.

[19] See note 8, p. [243,] on Other Sources of Income.

§ 3. Prices and brands of English wool

§ 4. English manufactures

§ 5. Foreign manufacture of fine goods

§ 6. Flemish settlers teach the English weavers. Norwich

§ 7. The worsted industry

§ 8. Gilds in the cloth trade

§ 9. The dyeing of cloth

§ 10. The great transition in English industry

A proof of the growing importance of manufacture in this period is the noticeable lack of labourers and the high wages they get, as set forth in the Act 7 Henry IV. (i.e. 1406), which points to an increase of weavers in all parts of the kingdom, that takes labourers from other employments.

§ 11. The manufacturing class and politics

CHAPTER III THE TOWNS, INDUSTRIAL VILLAGES, AND FAIRS

§ 1. The chief manufacturing towns

The following table gives the name of the town, and its manufacture or articles of sale.

This list is obviously incomplete, for it omits towns like Sheffield and Winchester, both of which were important as manufacturing towns from very early times, though the woollen manufactures of the latter were soon outstripped by those of Hull, York, Beverley, Lincoln, and especially Norwich. But such as it is the list is curious, chiefly as showing how manufactures have long since deserted their original abodes, and have been transferred to towns of quite recent origin.

§ 2. Staple towns and the merchants

§ 3. Markets

§ 4. The great fairs

[20] See note 9, p. [245,] on Assize of Bread and Ale.

§ 5. The fairs of Winchester and Stourbridge

“To Wye and to Winchester I went to the fair.”

But it declined from the time of Edward III., chiefly owing to the fact that the woollen trade of Norwich and {63} other eastern towns had become far more important, while on the other hand Southampton was found to be a more convenient spot for the Venetian traders’ fleet (p. [93]) to do business.

(2) Stourbridge Fair—But the greatest of all English fairs, and that which kept its reputation and importance the longest, was the Fair of Stourbridge, near Cambridge.[21] It was of European renown, and lasted for a whole month, from the end of August to the end of September. Its importance was due to the fact that it was within easy reach of the ports of the east coast, which at that time were very accessible and much frequented. Hither came the Venetian, and Genoese merchants, with stores of Eastern produce—silks and velvets, cotton, and precious stones. The Flemish merchants brought the fine linens and cloths of Bruges, Liège, and Ghent, and other manufacturing towns. Frenchmen and Spaniards were present with their wines; Norwegian sailors with tar and pitch; and the mighty traders of the Hanse towns exposed to sale furs and amber for the rich, iron and copper for the farmers, flax for their wives; while homely fustian, buckram, wax, herrings, and canvas mingled incongruously in their booths with strange, far-off Eastern spices and ornaments. And in return the English farmers—or traders on their behalf—carried to the fair hundreds of huge wool-sacks, wherewith to clothe the nations of Europe; or barley for the Flemish breweries, with corn and horses and cattle also. Lead was brought from the mines of Derbyshire, and tin from Cornwall; even some iron from Sussex, but this was accounted inferior to the imported metal. All these wares were, as at Winchester, exposed in stalls and tents in long streets, some named after the various nations that congregated {64} there, and others after the kind of goods on sale. This vast fair lasted down to the eighteenth century in unabated vigour, and was at that time described by Daniel Defoe, in a work now easily accessible to all,[22] which contains a most interesting description of all the proceedings of this busy month. It is not much more than a hundred years since the Lancashire merchants alone used to send their goods to Stourbridge, upon a thousand pack-horses, but now the pack-horses and fairs have gone, and the telegraph and railway have taken their place.

[21] See note 10, p. [246,] on Stourbridge Fair.

[22] Tour through the Eastern Counties (Cassell’s National Library, 3d.).

§ 6. English mediæval ports

§ 7. The temporary decay of manufacturing towns

§ 8. Growth of industrial villages. The germs of the modern factory system

CHAPTER IV THE GREAT PLAGUE AND ITS ECONOMIC EFFECTS

§ 1. Material progress of the country

§ 2. Social changes. The villeins and wage-paid labourers

There is another feature which is also of importance, and which had come more and more into prominence during the past two centuries. I refer to the increase in the numbers of those who lived upon the labour of their hands, and were employed and paid wages like labourers of the present day. It has been mentioned before that they arose from the cottar class, who had not enough land to occupy their whole time, and who were therefore ready to sell their labour to an employer. These two features, the commutation of labour-dues for money payments, and the rise of a wage-paid labouring class, are closely connected, for it was natural that, when the lord of a manor had agreed to receive money from his tenants in villeinage instead of labour, he should have to obtain other labour from elsewhere and pay for it in the money thus received by commutation. The tendency of these social changes was greatly in favour of the villeins, whose social condition had steadily improved, and whose tenancy in villeinage was more and more becoming a “free” tenancy. Neither were the villeins, whether comparatively well-to-do yeomen or agricultural labourers, so much bound to the manor as formerly, for in proportion as their labour services were no longer necessary, their lord would let them leave the manor and seek employment, or take up some manufacturing industry, elsewhere. It had always been possible for the villeins (or serfs) to do this on payment of a small fine (capitagium), and it is certain that as money payments {70} became increasingly the fashion, the lord would not object to receiving this further payment, unless perchance he would require a good deal of labour done upon his own land.

§ 3. The Famine and the Plague

§ 4. The effects of the Plague on wages

[23] It was asserted by the fourteenth-century chroniclers, and has often been repeated since, that nearly 60,000 people died in Norwich alone. As a matter of fact, the whole county of Norfolk, including that city, hardly contained 30,000 people.

§ 5. Prices of provisions

§ 6. Effects of the Plague upon the land-owners

§ 7. Rise of the tenant farmer or yeoman class

§ 8. The emancipation of the villeins

[24] See note 11, p. [246,] on Survivals.

CHAPTER V THE PEASANTS’ REVOLT OF 1381, AND THE SUBSEQUENT PROSPERITY OF THE WORKING CLASSES

§ 1. New social doctrines

§ 2. The coming of the Friars. Wiklif

[25] The Black Friars of Dominic came in 1221, and the Grey Friars of Francis in 1224.

§ 3. The renewed exactions of the landlords

§ 4. The Peasants’ Revolt

[26] For other views of this Revolt see my Industry in England, ch. xii.

[27] For survivals see note 11, p. [246.]

§ 5. The Condition of the English labourer

§ 6. Drawbacks

[28] The question is more fully treated in Industry in England, ch. xii. (end).

§ 7. The close of the Middle Ages

[29] Cf. note 7, p. [244.]

But before the next century was completed part of the nation was impoverished, the labourers were degraded and despoiled, and a long legacy of pauperism and misery was bequeathed to the country by the wastefulness and extravagance of Henry VIII.

PERIOD IV FROM THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY TO THE EVE OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION (1509–1760)

CHAPTER I THE MISDEEDS OF HENRY VIII., AND ECONOMIC CHANGES IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

§ 1. Henry VIII.’s wastefulness

§ 2. The dissolution of the monasteries

§ 3. Results of the suppression

[30] e.g. “The Pilgrimage of Grace,” 1536.

§ 4. The issuing of base coin

§ 5. The confiscation of the gild lands

One other method of robbing the industrial classes still remained, and though Henry died, his ministers were not slow to take advantage of it. This step was the confiscation of the gild lands, planned by Henry VIII. but finally carried out by his son’s guardian, Somerset. These lands had been acquired by the craft gilds both in town and country, partly by bequests from members, and partly by purchase from the funds of the gilds. The revenues of these lands were used for lending, without usury, to poorer members of the gilds, for apprenticing poor children, for {87} widows’ pensions, and, above all, for the relief of destitute members of the craft. Thus the labourer of that time had in the funds of the gild a kind of insurance money, while the gild itself fulfilled all the functions of a benefit society. Now, Henry VIII. got an Act passed for the confiscation of this and other property, but died before his scheme was carried out. It was then Somerset who procured the Act for perpetrating this offence—on the plea that these lands were associated with superstitious uses. Only the property of the London gilds was left untouched. The gilds had relieved pauperism in the Middle Ages, assisted in steadying the price of labour, and formed a centre for associations that fulfilled a want now only partially supplied by modern trade unions. Their abolition was a heavy blow to the English labourer.

Why this abolition was not more generally resented is a point of some interest. In the first place, the religious gilds and craft gilds were suppressed together on the plea above mentioned, and thus the difference between them was confused. Then again, the London gilds were spared because of their power, and thus it was made their interest not to interfere with the destruction of their provincial brethren. The nobles were bought off with presents gained from the funds of the gilds. Moreover, the craft gilds in the country towns were becoming close corporations, whose advantages were often monopolized by a few powerful members. This led, as we saw, to the manufacture of cloth being spread from the towns into industrial villages in the rural districts, where perhaps the mass of the population, not perceiving the full significance of the act, did not object to a measure which struck a blow at the town “mysteries.” But, nevertheless, a great deal of discontent was aroused. Somerset became very unpopular, and insurrections broke out in many {88} parts of the country, the most dangerous being in Cornwall, Devonshire, and in the West. They were caused not only by this spoliation but by agrarian discontent as well, but German and Italian mercenaries were introduced to put them down, and the protests of the people were everywhere choked in their blood.

§ 6. The agrarian situation

The most important of these risings took place in Norfolk, where enclosures had been made upon a tremendous scale. Ket, a wealthy tanner of Norwich, took the lead (in 1549) of a large body of some 16,000 tenants and labourers, who demanded the abolition of the late enclosures and the reform of other local abuses. The Earl of Warwick defeated the petitioners in a battle, put down the rising, and hanged Ket at Norwich Castle. The farmers and peasantry were thus cowed into submission.

§ 7. Other economic changes

Many labourers, too, could be found wandering from place to place, begging or robbing. The old steady village life, with its isolation and strong home ties, was undergoing a violent transition. Constant work and regular wages were becoming things of the past. The labourer’s wages would not purchase the former quantity of provisions under the new high prices caused by the debasement of the currency, and the discoveries of silver from 1540–1600; for wages, though they ultimately follow prices, do so very slowly, and not always even then proportionately.

§ 8. Summary of the changes of the sixteenth century

CHAPTER II THE GROWTH OF FOREIGN TRADE

§ 1. The expansion of commerce. The new spirit

§ 2. Foreign trade in the fifteenth century

A fair amount of trade was done with Portugal and Spain, which sent us iron and war-horses; Gascony and other parts of France sent their wines; rich velvets, linens, and fine cloths were imported from Ghent, Liège, Bruges, and other Flemish manufacturing towns. The ships of the Hanse merchants brought herrings, wax, timber, fur and amber from the Baltic countries; and Genoese traders came with silks and velvets and glass of Italy. And all met one another, as we saw before, in the great fairs, as at Stourbridge, or in the great trading centre of the Western world, London.

§ 3. The Venetian fleet

[31] Hence the Venetians themselves called it the “Flanders fleet.”

§ 4. The Hanseatic League’s station in London

§ 5. Our trade with Flanders. Antwerp in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries

This list is sufficient to show an extensive trade, and we shall comment upon one or two items of it in the next chapter. Here we need only remark upon the great growth of English manufactures of cloth.

§ 6. The decay of Antwerp and rise of London as the Western emporium

§ 7. The merchants and sea-captains of the Elizabethan age in the New World

This reign witnessed also the rise of the great commercial Companies. The company of Merchant Adventurers had indeed existed since Henry VII.’s time, having been formed in imitation of the Hanseatic League. The Russian Company of 1554 was formed upon the model of this earlier company; and then came the foundation of the great East India Company. It was due to the results of Drake’s far-famed voyage round the world, which took three years, 1577–80. Shortly after {99} his return it was proposed to found “a company for such as trade beyond the equinoctial line,” but a long delay took place, and finally a company was incorporated for the more definite object of trading with the East Indies. The date of this famous incorporation was 1600, and in 1601 Captain Lancaster made the first regular trading voyage on its behalf. To this modest beginning we owe our present Indian Empire.

§ 8. Remarks on the signs and causes of the expansion of trade

[32] They had always been important (cf. p. [64]).

CHAPTER III ELIZABETHAN ENGLAND

§ 1. Prosperity and pauperism

§ 2. The growth of manufactures

§ 3. Monopolies of manufacturing towns

In the same reign (1534), the inhabitants of Worcester, Evesham, Droitwich, Kidderminster, and Bromsgrove, then the only towns in Worcestershire, complained that “divers persons dwelling in the hamlets, thorps, and villages of the county made all manner of cloths, and exercised shearing, fulling, and weaving within their own houses, to the great depopulation of the city and towns.” A monopoly was granted to the towns, the only result of which was that they became worse off than before, a great portion of the local industry being transferred to Leeds. A little later (1544) the citizens of York complain of the competition of “sundry evil-disposed persons and apprentices,” who had “withdrawn themselves out of the city into the country,” and competed with York in the manufacture of coverlets and blanketings. York got a monopoly, but her manufactures gained nothing thereby. Again, in 1552 Edward VI. enacted that the manufacture of hats, coverlets, and diapers should be confined to Norwich and the market towns of Norfolk. Elizabeth granted numerous trading monopolies[33] for the sale of special articles, but the monopoly system was opposed to the new competitive spirit of the age. In 1601 a great many of the most obnoxious were withdrawn, and by that time few remained imposed upon the manufacture of goods. The above illustrations, however, are interesting as showing the growth of manufactures in all parts of the kingdom, and in rural districts (cf. p. [65]). {103} They are useful also as glaring instances of the folly of protective enactments.

[33] See note 11a, p. [246,] on Monopolies.

§ 4. Our exports of manufactures

§ 5. The Flemish immigration in this reign

An interesting testimony to the influence of these refugees is afforded by Harrison in his Description of England (in the time of Elizabeth). He says about our wool: “In time past the use of this commodity consisted for the most part in cloth and woolsteds; but now, by means of strangers succoured here from domestic persecution, the same hath been employed unto sundry other uses; as mockados, bays, vellures, grograines, &c., whereby the makers have reaped no small commodity.”

§ 6. Agriculture

[34] The malt liquor, of course, had been in general use at a much earlier period.

§ 7. Social comforts

§ 8. The condition of the labourers

§ 9. Assessment of wages by justices. The first Poor Law

[35] Commonly known as the Act of Apprenticeship (cf. note 12, p. [247]).

[36] See note 12, p [247,] on Intention of Act.

§ 10. Population

CHAPTER IV PROGRESS OF AGRICULTURE IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

§ 1. Résumé of progress since thirteenth century

§ 2. Progress in James I.’s reign. Influence of landlords

§ 3. Writers on agriculture. Improvements. Game

§ 4. Drainage of the fens

§ 5. Rise of price of corn, and of rent

§ 6. Special features of the eighteenth century. Popularity of agriculture

§ 7. Improvements of cattle, and in the productiveness of land. Statistics

§ 8. Wrong done to small land-owners by the Statute of Frauds

§ 9. Causes of the decay of the yeomanry

§ 10. Great increase of enclosures

§ 11. Benefits of enclosures as compared with the old common fields

§ 12. The rise in rent

§ 13. The fall in wages

[37] As to the alleged futility of these assessments see Industry in England, p. 257.

CHAPTER V COMMERCE AND WAR IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

§ 1. England a commercial power

§ 2. The beginnings of the struggle with Spain

§ 3. Cromwell’s commercial wars

§ 4. The wars of William III. and of Anne

§ 5. Expansion of English trade after these wars

[38] See note 16, p. [249,] on Union with Scotland, Darien Scheme and Methuen Treaty.

All this mania for investing capital, however, shows how prosperous England had now become, and how great a quantity of wealth had been accumulated, partly by trade, but also by the growth of manufactures and improvements in agriculture. Englishmen now felt strong enough to have another struggle for the monopoly of trade, with the result that fresh wars were undertaken, and the country was heavily burdened with debt. But the wars were on the whole a success, though the wish for a monopoly was a mistake.

§ 6. Further wars with France and Spain

After a few years, however, we entered upon another war, the Seven Years’ War (1756–63), in which England and Prussia fought side by side against the rest of Europe, and attacked France in particular in all parts of the world. The war was largely caused by the quarrels of the French and English colonists in America, and of rival traders in India. We cannot here go into the details of it. It is sufficient to say that, after a bad beginning, we won various victories by sea and land, and at the close (1763) found ourselves in possession of Canada, Florida, and all the French possessions east of the Mississippi except New Orleans, and had gained the upper hand in India. We held almost undisputed sway over the seas, and our trade grew by leaps and bounds. Unfortunately we afterwards engaged in other wars of a less necessary character, and wasted a great deal of our wealth before the end of the century. But the short peace which ensued after 1763 gave us an opportunity which we did not neglect of increasing our national industries, and practically gave us the great start in manufactures to which we owe our present wealth. In this war, too, we gained our Indian Empire and Canada, to which we must devote a few short remarks.

§ 7. The struggle for India

§ 8. The conquest of Canada

INDIA IN THE TIME OF CLIVE SHOWING ENGLISH FACTORIES AND DISTRICTS UNDER OUR INFLUENCE.

§ 9. Survey of commercial progress during these wars

[39] See note 13, p. [247,] on Banking and the Stop of the Exchequer.

[40] See also my Commerce in Europe, pp. 137–147.

CHAPTER VI MANUFACTURES AND MINING

§ 1. Circumstances favourable to English manufactures

§ 2. Wool trade. Home manufactures. Dyeing

[41] This Company, by charters from James I. in 1604 and 1617, had the exclusive privilege of exporting the woollen cloths of England to the Netherlands and Germany. It included some 4000 merchants.

§ 3. Other influences favourable to England. The Huguenot immigration

[42] Anderson’s Chron. of Commerce, ii. 569.

1700–50 INDUSTRIAL ENGLAND

Showing Population in first half of 18^th Century, chief towns and manufactures. The most populous counties are dark green.

The majority of the population was in the west and south central counties (dark green); but Lancs. and the West Riding of Yorks. were increasing. The chief manufacturing centres in (1) Eastern counties, (2) Wilts, (3) Yorks, &c., are shown thus

but it must be remembered that manufactures were very scattered and carried on side by side with agriculture. Several other counties are therefore marked with slanting lines.

§ 4. Distribution of the cloth trade

§ 5. Coal-mines

§ 6. Development of coal trade: seventeenth and eighteenth centuries

But although the coal trade was fairly extensive for that period, it was utterly insignificant compared with its present dimensions, and that for a very good reason. There was no means of pumping water out of the mines, except by the old-fashioned air-pump, which was of course utterly inadequate. Nor was a suitable invention discovered till the very end of the seventeenth century, when Thomas Savery in 1698 invented a kind of pump, worked by the condensation of steam. This rather clumsy invention, however, was soon superseded in 1705 by Newcomen’s steam pump. But it was not till after the commencement of the Industrial Revolution that steam power was scientifically applied to coal-mines by the inventions of Watt and Boulton (1765 and 1774), which we shall notice in their proper place. Up to that time, also, it was difficult to transport coal into inland districts by road, Newcastle coal being carried to London in ships, and then carried up inland rivers in barges. But these barges could not go high up many rivers at that time, and canals were not yet made. It was difficult for instance to get coal to Oxford, for it had to come to London, and then part way up the Thames, which was not then navigable so far. But at Cambridge it was easily procurable, for barges could come right up to the town from eastern ports. Hence it was much cheaper at Cambridge than at Oxford.

§ 7. The iron trade

But early in the seventeenth century (1619) Dud Dudley, son of Lord Dudley, began to make use of sea and pit coal for smelting iron, and obtained a monopoly “of the mystery and art of smelting iron-ore, and of making the same into cast works or bars, in furnaces, with bellows.” Dudley sold this cast-iron at £12 a ton, and made a good profit out of it. He actually produced seven tons a week, which was considered a large supply, and shows the comparative insignificance of the industry then. However, it was only comparatively insignificant, for before the close of the century it was calculated that 180,000 tons of iron were produced in England yearly; and in the eighteenth century (1719) iron came third in the list of English manufactures, and the trade gave employment to 200,000 people. There was, however, still great {140} waste of wood, since a great many ironmasters did not use coal, and therefore the export and even the manufacture of iron was discouraged by legislation to such an extent that by 1740 the output had been reduced to 17,350 tons per annum, barely a tenth of the previous amount quoted. The waste of timber was most noticeable in the Sussex Wealden, the forests of which owe their destruction almost entirely to the iron and glass manufactures.

But about this time another inventor, Darby, discovered the secret of the large blast furnace in which pit coal and charcoal were used. He began his experiments as early as 1730, but did not do much for some twenty years. In 1756, however, his works were “at the top pinnacle of prosperity; twenty and twenty-two tons per week sold off as fast as made, and profit enough.”

After Darby came Smeaton, and other inventors, and the Industrial Revolution spread to the iron trade. We shall see it in operation in our next period.

§ 8. Pottery

§ 9. Other mining industries

In this place, too, we may mention that brickmaking was a lost art from the fifth to the fifteenth century, and bricks were not even imported. The first purchase of bricks to be recorded was at Cambridge, in 1449; but before the end of the fifteenth century it became a common building material in the eastern counties, and in the sixteenth century was generally used in London and in the counties along the lower course of the Thames.

§ 10. The close of the period of manual industries

But now this old order of things passes away, and a new order appears, ushered in by the whir and rattle of machinery and the mighty hiss of steam. A complete transformation takes place, and the life of England stirs anew in the great Industrial Revolution.

PERIOD V THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION AND MODERN ENGLAND

CHAPTER I THE EVE OF THE REVOLUTION

§ 1. Industry and politics. Land-owners and merchant princes

[43] See notes 13 and 14, pp. [247,] 248, for details.

In fact there has always been an extraordinary sentimentalism as regards land among all classes of the English people; and for some reason that has never been fully explained a man who has merely inherited a large amount of land (even if he has never attempted to cultivate it) is regarded as being superior to one who has amassed a fortune in the industrial or commercial world. And this feeling was stronger in the eighteenth century than it is at the present time. Hence commercial magnates bought land, and with it social prestige. The James Lowther who was created Earl of Lonsdale in 1784 was the descendant of a merchant engaged in the Levant trade; the first Earl of Tilney was the son of that eminent man of business, Sir Josiah Child. The daughters of merchant princes were even allowed to marry—and maintain—the scions of a needy aristocracy. Defoe actually discovered the amazing and revolutionary fact that a man engaged in commerce might be a gentleman, though no doubt this {146} bold supposition of his was at first looked upon with incredulity. He says: “Trade is so far from being inconsistent with a gentleman that in England trade makes a gentleman; for, after a generation or two, the tradesman’s children come to be as good gentlemen, statesmen, parliament men, judges, bishops, and noblemen as those of the highest birth and the most ancient families.” Dean Swift remarked “that the power which used to follow land had gone over to money.” Dr Johnson announced oracularly that “an English merchant was a new species of gentleman.”

Now, the Industrial Revolution went still further to gain social and political influence for the commercial classes. It succeeded in destroying the foolish idea that the land-owners alone were to be looked upon as the leaders of the nation. It gave the capitalists and manufacturers a new accession of power by enormously increasing their wealth. Moreover, it helped to undermine the landed interest by making the manufactures of England at first equal, and afterwards superior, to her agriculture, so that a rich mill-owner or ironmaster became as important as a large land-owner. The monopoly of the landed interest was broken by capital. Nowhere is the contrast between the old and new classes in the last century seen more closely than in Scott’s Rob Roy, where the old Tory squire who held fast to Church and king is contrasted with the new commercial magnate who supported the House of Hanover. One good we enjoyed from the rise of the commercial classes, and that was the final overthrow of the Stuarts, with all the follies which that unfortunate race represented.

§ 2. The coming of the capitalists

§ 3. The class of small manufacturers

§ 4. The condition of the manufacturing population

§ 5. Condition of the agricultural population

§ 6. Growth of population

§ 7. England still mainly agricultural