

SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



opinion of the Nottingham committee and its action pretty forcibly in a 

 proclamation in which they menaced death to anyone who gave information 

 concerning their doings, and suggested that the members of the committee in 

 question were only fit for the house on Sneinton Fields, i.e. the madhouse. 274 



The Luddites themselves were said to be organized into four gangs 

 and directed by a committee, and this committee was said to hire men to 

 destroy the frames. If this was the case the loyalty of the rioters to each 

 other was the more remarkable. 



For the next few years food riots and frame-breaking riots occurred 

 with monotonous frequency. It is probable that these disturbances may 

 have been connected with the rising in 1817 under Jeremiah Brandreth, 

 "the Nottingham captain," though the character of that attempt was probably 

 mainly political. At any rate, the Luddites ceased to be formidable about 

 that time, in consequence, according to Mr. Felkin, of the execution of one 

 of their number in i8i6. 275 That so long a period should have passed before 

 a conviction was secured is perhaps in itself a proof of the popular sympathy 

 with the movement. From this time onward, though riots were frequent, 

 they were generally either simple bread riots or else they assumed a political 

 character. Nottinghamshire sent a contingent to Peterloo, and the Reform 

 movement convulsed the county ; but the epidemic of frame-breaking was 

 abated. 



The misery of the time was probably enhanced by the maladminis- 

 tration of the Poor Law, which was, however, perhaps less mischievous 

 in Nottinghamshire than in many other places. To some extent parish help 

 may have been less needed ; benefit clubs and sick clubs were common in the 

 county. Eighty pounds of club money was lent out in Kirkby in 1772 4, 276 

 and in 1794 fifty-six clubs joined in an annual procession at Nottingham. 277 



The practice of apprenticing poor children was in itself an evil ; it 

 had resulted in supplying employers with labourers over whom their power 

 was almost absolute and for whom they were responsible to no one. 278 

 Apart from this, however, there appears previous to the French war to 

 have been a certain effort to give relief by setting the applicants to work. 

 At Collingham, for instance, flax was bought for the pauper women to 

 spin, weave, and make up into garments. In 17835 money was expended 

 in setting the poor to work in about a hundred and twenty-two parishes. 

 These efforts must have been slight, however, since only about 479 out of 

 21,520 raised by the poor rate was annually expended in the process. 

 This, however, was an improvement on the state of things in 1776, when 

 only about 68 was so expended. 279 The increase of distress, however, 

 made the plan of setting the poor to work less and less practicable, and many 

 parishes adopted the plan of paying a rate in aid of wages. Relief was 

 also given according to the number of children possessed by the applicant, 

 and in many cases cottages belonging to the town were assigned to the 

 paupers for their dwellings. 



280 



"' J. Russell, The Luddites ' (Thornton Soc. Trans, x). 

 175 W. Felkin, Hist, of Machine-wrought Hosiery, &c. 238. 



" 6 Add. MSS. i855z. "' S. and B. Webb, Hist, of Trade Unionism, 23. 



" 8 This was specially the case with the ' London apprentices,' pauper children who were brought from 

 London and bound to the Nottingham manufacturers, and who were of course completely without friends. 

 *" Returns of the Overseers of the Poor in 1783-5. 18 Report of the Poor Law Commission, 210. 



301 



