SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



of improving the conditions, nor of forming any sort of board to regulate 

 sanitation. 



In July the cholera attacked Tipton, and early in August appeared at 

 Bilston. There were sixty cases in the first week, and many deaths. One 

 hundred and forty-one died in the second week, and 309 in the third, out of 

 a population of 14,500. Panic seized the community, factories were closed, 

 business was at a standstill, and the pestilence swept everything before it. 



So great was the misery and destitution caused that a subscription of 

 more than 8,000 was raised from various parts of the country to alleviate 

 the distress. 18 ' 



Again, in 1848-9, cholera returned, and the whole county suffered 

 severely, 2,683 persons dying out of a population of 608,716. Bilston headed 

 the death-roll with 605 victims, and Willenhall came second, but a long way 

 after, with 281. The other towns to suffer most were Newcastle under 

 Lyme, Wednesbury, and Sedgeley, in each of which more than 200 persons 

 died. Even yet Bilston remains a town of too many courts and alleys, needing 

 to follow the example of its neighbour Wolverhampton in the sweeping 

 away of some of its unsanitary areas. 



The death-rate in the pottery towns was not nearly so high as in South 

 Staffordshire ; this may be accounted for partially by the fact that the 

 pottery industry was by this time organized on a factory system, and the 

 standard of life and health was higher than in the densely-populated area 

 of the iron district, with its domestic industries still flourishing. Not that 

 the conditions of work in the Potteries at this time were by any means 

 wholly satisfactory. Some of the more recent buildings, it is true, were 

 large, well-ventilated, and light, but the majority of them were old buildings, 

 gradually enlarged by adding room to room, and still remaining low, damp, 

 dark, and unhealthy. 190 



There were at this time some thousands of apprentices employed in 

 various branches of the pottery industry between the ages of thirteen and 

 twenty-one, bound for seven years, but not usually by legal indenture, so that 

 the masters had little control over them. The apprentice was usually paid 

 one-fourth of a journeyman's wage in the first years of his apprenticeship, 

 and in the later part two-thirds. 191 



From an indenture of apprenticeship of a certain Aaron Wood, appren- 

 ticed to Dr. Thomas Wedgwood in 1731, we learn something of the 

 eighteenth-century conditions in this matter. 193 The said Aaron, having 

 promised faithful and obedient service, is to be taught certain specified pro- 

 cesses, to wit, the art of turning the lathe, handling, and trimming. His 

 father is to provide him with food, lodging, and clothing, with the exception 

 of an annual pair of boots bestowed by his master. Aaron is to receive is. per 

 week for the first three years of his apprenticeship, is. 6d. for the next three, 

 and 4_r. in the seventh year, ' lawful money of Great Brittaine.' We also 

 learn that at the conclusion of his apprenticeship he is engaged as a 

 journeyman at the rate of 5^. per week for five years, and after that at 

 the rate of js. 



189 G. T. Lawley, A Hist, of Bilston (1893), 172-93. 



190 Children 1 ! Employment Com. Rep. ii, 1843, Rep. of Sub-Commissioners, xiii, 35. 



191 Harold Owen, The Staff. Potter (1899), 46. I91 L. Jewitt, The Wedgwoods, 66-7. 



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