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Ellen Hooton was a ten-year-old girl from Wigan who gave testimony to the Central Board of His Majesty's Commissioners for inquiring into the Employment of Children in Factories, 1833. She had been working for several years at a spinning frame, in a cotton mill along with other children. She worked from 5.30 am till 8 pm, six days a week and nine hours on a Saturday. She absconded at least 10 times and was punished by her overseers.
She is of interest because of the insight it gives into factory conditions, and the relationship with her mother. The ensuing Royal Commission, acted on her evidence and the Factory Acts were changed to regulate the use of children in factories.
The decade of the 1820s was difficult for weavers. Mary did not work from home but in a Dandy loom shop where several of these looms were housed - this would mean she did not own her own loom, and was paid for piece work. The piece work rates were reduced by 33% in 1828 and by 29% in 1829, effectively almost halving Mary's income. Ellen's father was by then out of work and so could not assist. By Ellen's account she entered the factory when she was not quite eight - though her mother claimed she was 'close upon nine years old'. The Cotton Mills and Factories Act 1819 had prevented the employment of children under nine. For the first six months in the factory, Ellen received no wages and so was technically being trained, not employed.
Mary's earnings in 1828 would be around 5s. a week, with an extra 1s. coming from the father. This dropped to 3s. a week. The average spinner in Wigan paid 1s. 6d. for rent and taxes and 1s. 2d. for fuel, soap, and candles: this left 4d. to spend on food. This, however, did not entitle her to any support from the parish. As a spinner tenting half a side, Ellen would earn 10½d. which would rise to 1s. 9d. for a full side: some girls managed 2 sides, earning 3s. 6d.
Wigan's status as a centre for coal production, engineering and textiles in the 18th century had led to the Douglas Navigation in the 1740s, and later the diversion of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal to transport cloth and food grown on the West Lancashire Plain to the Port of Liverpool. With the expansion of industry coal became a valuable commodity.
As a mill town, Wigan was an important centre of textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution but it was the mill owners that profited.
The Handweavers' PlightTo put these prices into perspective, in 1826 a pound of bread cost 2d. and a pound of butter 1s."The cotton weavers who reside principally in the neighbourhood of Bolton, Chorley, Wigan, Blackburn, Haslingden, Padiham, Burnley, Colne and Todmorden are by far the most wretched body in this part of the country. The number of cotton weavers in the places above mentioned must exceed 60,000 and probably is near 100,000 and the utmost sum they can earn per week, on a fair average working diligently from six (am) till eight (pm), allowing out of that time an hour and a half for meals, is only 4 s., even if the loom be their own, but if they have to hire the loom, they pay 10d. a week for it, and they must also buy shuttles etc, and keep the loom in repair. Great numbers cannot earn two shillings and six pence, three shillings or three shillings and sixpence per week."
Extract from the Liverpool Commercial Chronicle, April 24th 1826
Traditionally, Wigan had been a linen weaving area, relying on the hand loom: by 1826 the fibre was cotton and wages were falling. To the east, in Blackburn there was loom smashing and riots as the men tried to reverse the tide.
By 1818 there were eight cotton mills in the Wallgate part of Wigan. In 1818 William Woods introduced the first power to the Wigan cotton mills. These mills swiftly became infamous for their dangerous and unbearable conditions, low pay and use of child labour. Wigan was always an important centre for coal production. By 1854 there were 54 collieries in and around the town, about a sixth of all collieries in Lancashire.
Work in the mine was seen by the working class community as being a far lower status job for a child than one in a cotton mill.
Ellen was expected to work from 5.30 am till 8.00 pm in the mill. Her job entailed looking after half a frame of throstles, this would probably be 32 ends. As she started, an experienced tenter (spinning operative) would have worked the other half, and been on hand to help her. In time she would have taken over the entire frame, with a consequent wage rise. Later this may have increased to two frames- or more as she trained up another youngster. There are three parts to the job: piecing any broken , rovings can break at any time. The two loose ends are twisted back together in a way that keeps lumps out of the yarn, it is best done by small young fingers rather than large old arthritic ones. The cops have to be creeled, and the new rovings threaded through the rollers and the flyer and secured to the bobbin. Taller workers find this task easy. Full bobbins have to be doffer and replaced with empty ones. The operative has a degree of control over the timing of these two latter tasks- and throughout the shift would try and balance the timing so roving bobbins did not all run out together, producing a smoother and less stressful work flow. Ellen complained to her mother that she couldn't do this and couldn't 'keep all her ends up'.
Ellen responded to the pressures by absconding, Mary responding by thinking Ellen was a bad child. Mary always returned Ellen to the mill where she would be punished. Mary sought the overseer to help her to discipline her child. She hoped he would act as a father figure. Mary felt she was out of control. While giving evidence to the examiner for the Central Board of His Majesty's Commissioners for inquiring into the Employment of Children in Factories, the overseer said:
Her mother has told me to take her to myself, and have her earnings, and keep her on bread and water, and put a lock of straw in one corner of the room for her to lie on.
Her mother, on cross examination said:
I told him to take her, and he might have her earnings, and let her lie in one corner of his room all night, to frighten her. I never said a lock of straw.
On other occasions, probably five times or more Ellen was weighted down with mill weights attached to her back by straps of the style used in the mines and had an oversized cap placed on her head and made to parade through the factory carrying a stick. This was designed to humiliate her, and send a message to other children. During the punishment the other workers were allowed to poke, punch and hit her.
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