Health & Safety Learning Journey
During the early years of the Industrial Revolution little heed was paid to health and safety within the working environment. Erecting safety fences, stopping machinery for cleaning, regulating temperatures in the work place, providing sanitation facilities and drinking water, allowing employees adequate breaks and time off, all cost money and received scant attention in an age when large profits were of foremost concern and working people were of little consequence.
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Health & Safety Learning Journey Step 3: Health and safety - early 19th century
The long hours (up to 78 hours per week) and lack of basic facilities, the unhealthy conditions and unsafe working practices in the mills took its toll on employees; particularly children who were still developing and who were often given the most dangerous jobs.The dusty environment meant that chest complaints were common; and often resulted in 'byssinosis', an occupational respiratory disease associated with inhalation of cotton dust which caused chest tightness, shortness of breath, and a cough. Stomach complaints and constipation were rife, caused by poor diet and contaminated drinking water; so too were headaches and ear ache caused by the sheer volume of noise, and also the heat (upwards of 82 degrees) generated by the machinery which many mill workers had to endure. At Quarry Bank Mill, the Physicians Prescription Books, kept by Dr Peter Holland whom the Gregs paid to treat sick apprentices, are full of remedies dished out for coughs (hore hound and 'white powders and pills'); constipation (rhubarb, ginger and senna); headaches (blisters and anodyne pills); wounds or open sores (poultices, leeches and 'plaisters'). Accidents were frequent, mainly due to unguarded machinery and the practice of cleaning machines without stopping them; but also to inattention caused by tiredness. Robert Blincoe in his 'Memoirs' (1828) describes how the apron of a nine year old girl was caught in by the shaft of a drawing frame '...the poor girl was...dashed on the floor...she uttered the most heart-rending shrieks...Blincoe...saw her whirled round and round...he heard the bones of her arms, legs, thighs successively snap asunder...her blood was scattered over the frame...her head dreadfully crushed...' See the sections on Health & Diet (under 'Living' in 'People') and Health and Safety (under 'Reform' in 'People') and read A Memoir of Robert Blincoe (1828) on this site. |
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