A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



the seed sown in the twenties and thirties. Education and humanitarian 

 efforts had their reward in the self-restraint and patience which the workers 

 exhibited in this time of trial. The evidence of the relieving officer who 

 accompanied the visitor to the cotton districts is entirely to this effect : — 



I have gone into the room of the English operatives when they have not had a 

 mouthful of bread under the roof . . . and nothing but shavings to sleep on through the 

 night, yet talking as cheerfully and resignedly as if there was every prospect of employment 

 on the morrow. 



'Of the patience arid noble endurance of the people in Ashton ' during 

 the trouble the writer says it was ' beyond praise . . . with every induce- 

 ment to crime the returns show that it is not on the increase,' In Preston 

 also he observed that ' crime is decreasing although the inducements to 

 crime are daily on the increase.' The people ' bear their misfortunes with 

 wonderful patience and endurance. Here, as in every other town, there is a 

 great reluctance to receive relief . . . and readiness to do any honest work 

 which is not degrading.'*'' 



The Blackburn people seem to have suffered the extremity of misery. 

 In one house where the writer called ' there were twenty inmates or their 

 families occupying two rooms and an outhouse.' The place, he says, ' was 

 scrupulously clean and tidy.' The occupiers had been neighbours in times 

 of prosperity, and had ' agreed to take their present habitation and to share 

 the ups and down together.'"' In Blackburn and the district evidence 

 was given that ' the Relief Committees have frequently to seek out cases 

 and compel them as it were to apply for relief, so reluctant are they to 

 accept it.' 



These evidences sufficiently testify to the fact that the characteristic 

 sturdy manliness and independence of the Lancashire people had not been 

 destroyed by even a century of continual privation. Possibly, too, the 

 reorganization of the Poor Law had helped to brace up the moral character 

 of the people, which it can hardly be a matter of surprise that the misery of 

 ' the twenties ' had somewhat worn down. Certain it is that when their 

 greatest trouble came upon them the spirit and courage of the Lancashire 

 populace never failed. They bore themselves with what the writer styles 

 ' manly dignity,' and seem to have taken as their watchword the words, 

 ' Never give up.' *" 



Sources of amelioration in the distress were the savings banks, the 

 building societies, and the co-operative stores. The run upon these was 

 very great, particularly in Blackburn, where 'from 1855 to 1861 the annual 

 deposits in the savings banks had risen from ^18,118 to ^49,943, a satis- 

 factory proof that habits of saving were on the increase.*" It was also a 

 proof that food was cheaper and wages higher, or no margin could have 

 been saved. The weavers were, in fact, the most numerous depositors, 

 next to them came the carders, and lastly the mechanics and others. 



The co-operative societies met and stood the strain in a most success- 

 ful manner, except where, as in Blackburn, they were just commencing 

 operations, and consequently had to be abandoned. Elsewhere, however, 



*" A Visit to the Cotton Districts, 43. «« Ibid. 51. 



'" ^'='<^- *" The Times correspondent, quoted ibid. 



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