Pit Brow Lasses

Pit Brow Lasses PDF

Author: Dave Lane

Publisher:

Published: 2008-08-01

Total Pages: 132

ISBN-13: 9781409218708

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In 1842 the employment of women and children working underground in the UK was forbidden. As a result of this legislation, many families within the coal industry fell upon hard times. One result of this change in the law, was that coal mine owners started to employ females working at the surface of their mines. Thus was born the "Pit Brow Lasses" of the North West UK - particularly in the county of Lancashire. This publication attempts to bring to life those women who toiled at the pit brow (the top of the mine shafts) through articles, press clippings and photographs. These lasses or women were years ahead of their time, insisting on their right to wear what THEY wanted and to conduct their lives as THEY thought fit and decent. This publication is a celebration of their independent spirit, their determination to stand up for their rights, to do what THEY wanted to do. This was quite unique in the Victorian Age in which many of them lived.

Pit Lasses

Pit Lasses PDF

Author: Denise Bates

Publisher: Pen and Sword History

Published: 2024-01-30

Total Pages: 202

ISBN-13: 1399078046

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Women have long been recognized as the backbone of coalmining communities, supporting their men. Less well known is the role which they played as the industry developed, working underground alongside their husband or father, moving the coal which he had cut. The year 2012 is significant as it is the 170th anniversary of the publication of the Report of the Commission into the Employment of Children and Young People in Coal Mines (May 1842). The report findings included the revelation that in some mines half-dressed women worked alongside naked men. The resulting outrage led to the banning of females working underground three months later. The Report of the Commission has been neglected as a source for many decades with the same few quotations regularly being used to illustrate the same headline points. And yet about 500 women and girls gave statements about what mining was like in 1841 and in earlier years in different parts of the country. In conjunction with the 1841 census it paints a comprehensive, though previously unexplored picture of the work of a female miner, how she lived when not at work, how she was regarded by the wider community and what she could achieve. Although banned from working underground, women were still allowed to work above ground after 1842. In the second half of the nineteenth century around 3,000 women continued to be employed at the pit head though this was increasingly confined to the pit brow lasses of Lancashire. This book examines the life of the female miner in the nineteenth century through to the outbreak of the Great War, both at work and away from it, drawing out the largely untapped evidence within contemporary sources - and challenging received wisdoms.

By the Sweat of Their Brow

By the Sweat of Their Brow PDF

Author: Angela V. John

Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional

Published: 2005-11-03

Total Pages: 280

ISBN-13: 9780415380096

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First Published in 2005. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Pit Lasses

Pit Lasses PDF

Author: Denise Bates

Publisher: Pen and Sword History

Published: 2024-01-30

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1399078038

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Women have long been recognized as the backbone of coalmining communities, supporting their men. Less well known is the role which they played as the industry developed, working underground alongside their husband or father, moving the coal which he had cut. The year 2012 is significant as it is the 170th anniversary of the publication of the Report of the Commission into the Employment of Children and Young People in Coal Mines (May 1842). The report findings included the revelation that in some mines half-dressed women worked alongside naked men. The resulting outrage led to the banning of females working underground three months later. The Report of the Commission has been neglected as a source for many decades with the same few quotations regularly being used to illustrate the same headline points. And yet about 500 women and girls gave statements about what mining was like in 1841 and in earlier years in different parts of the country. In conjunction with the 1841 census it paints a comprehensive, though previously unexplored picture of the work of a female miner, how she lived when not at work, how she was regarded by the wider community and what she could achieve. Although banned from working underground, women were still allowed to work above ground after 1842. In the second half of the nineteenth century around 3,000 women continued to be employed at the pit head though this was increasingly confined to the pit brow lasses of Lancashire. This book examines the life of the female miner in the nineteenth century through to the outbreak of the Great War, both at work and away from it, drawing out the largely untapped evidence within contemporary sources - and challenging received wisdoms.

By the Sweat of Their Brow

By the Sweat of Their Brow PDF

Author: Angela V. John

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-11-05

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 113659938X

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The pit brow lasses who sorted coal and performed a variety of jobs above ground at British coal mines prompted a violent debate about women’s work in the nineteenth century. Seen as the prime example of degraded womanhood, the pit brow woman was regarded as an aberration in a masculine domain, cruelly torn from her ‘natural sphere’, the home. The, attempt to restrict women’s work at the mines in the 1880s highlights the dichotomy between the fashionable ideal of womanhood and the necessity and reality of female manual labour. Although only a tiny percentage of the colliery labour force, the pit lasses aroused an interest out of all proportion to their numbers and their work became a test case for women’s outdoor manual employment. Angela John discusses the implications of this debate, showing how it encapsulates many of the ambivalences of late Victorian attitudes towards working-class female employment, and at the same time raises wider questions both about women’s work in industries seen as traditionally male enclaves, and about the ways in which women within the working community have been presented by historians.This book was first published in 1980.

The Pit Brow Women of the Wigan Coalfield

The Pit Brow Women of the Wigan Coalfield PDF

Author: Alan Davies

Publisher: Tempus Publishing, Limited

Published: 2002-09-30

Total Pages: 127

ISBN-13: 9780752439129

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This illustrated book tells the story of the female colliery surface workers, or pit brow women, of the Wigancoalfield. The numbers of women working in mines grew vastly after the expansion of the coal industry in the mid- to late eighteenth century. The practice continued until the Children's Employment Commission 1842 outlawed women working below ground, leading to many families suffering huge losses of earnings. In Lancashire, many women soon started working the colliery surface, grading the coal on conveyors or acting as general labourers. Illustrated newspapers fostered great interest in them from 1840, and Wigancoalfield employed more than any other area. In the 1840 a a hugephotographic collection studying the women was created by A.J. Munby, which forms a major source for this detailed study. The women themselves remain a fascinating and unique feature of both local and industrial history.

Wearing the Trousers

Wearing the Trousers PDF

Author: Don Chapman

Publisher: Amberley Publishing Limited

Published: 2017-09-15

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 144566951X

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The story of women's liberation as told by their changing dress – in the public gaze and in private

Eva Gore-Booth

Eva Gore-Booth PDF

Author: Sonja Tiernan

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2013-01-18

Total Pages: 357

ISBN-13: 1847795099

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This is the first dedicated biography of the extraordinary Irish woman, Eva Gore-Booth. Gore-Booth rejected her aristocratic heritage choosing to live and work amongst the poorest classes in industrial Manchester. Her work on behalf of barmaids, circus acrobats, flower sellers and pit-brow lasses is traced in this book. During one impressive campaign Gore-Booth orchestrated the defeat of Winston Churchill. Gore-Booth published volumes of poetry, philosophical prose and plays, becoming a respected and prolific author of her time and part of W.B. Yeats’ literary circle. The story of Gore-Booth’s life is captivating. Her close bond with her sister, an iconic Irish nationalist, provides a new insight into Countess Markievicz’s personal life. Gore-Booth’s life story vividly traces her experiences of issues such as militant pacifism during the Great War, the case for the reprieve of Roger Casement’s death sentence, sexual equality in the workplace and the struggle for Irish independence.

Rose

Rose PDF

Author: Martin Cruz Smith

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2013-10-10

Total Pages: 404

ISBN-13: 1849838283

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Don't miss the latest book in the Arkady Renko series, THE SIBERIAN DILEMMA by Martin Cruz Smith, ‘the master of the international thriller’ (New York Times) – available to order now! 'One of those writers that anyone who is serious about their craft views with respect bordering on awe' Val McDermid 'Makes tension rise through the page like a shark's fin’ Independent *** Not all secrets can stay buried. It's 1872 and mining engineer John Blair wants nothing more than to return to Africa. So when his commissioner asks him to investigate a disappearance in the English coal mining town of Wigan, he jumps on the opportunity in the hopes that a successful undertaking will help fund his next trip. But in a town where the very rich and the very poor live and work side by side, Blair's presence is mistrusted by many. And when he falls in love with Rose, a beautiful 'pit girl', things start to turn deadly. In a place where life is brutish, short and covered in coal dust, Blair must solve a mystery that will force him to confront his own heart of darkness . . . Praise for Martin Cruz Smith 'The story drips with atmosphere and authenticity – a literary triumph' David Young, bestselling author of Stasi Child 'One of those writers that anyone who is serious about their craft views with respect bordering on awe' Val McDermid ‘Cleverly and intelligently told, The Girl from Venice is a truly riveting tale of love, mystery and rampant danger. I loved it’ Kate Furnivall, author of The Liberation ‘Smith not only constructs grittily realistic plots, he also has a gift for characterisation of which most thriller writers can only dream' Mail on Sunday 'Smith was among the first of a new generation of writers who made thrillers literary' Guardian 'Brilliantly worked, marvellously written . . . an imaginative triumph' Sunday Times ‘Martin Cruz Smith’s Renko novels are superb’ William Ryan, author of The Constant Soldier