Pit brow women
Pit brow women or pit brow lasses were female surface labourers at British collieries. They worked at the coal screens on the pit bank (or brow) at the shaft top until the 1960s. Their job was to pick stones from the coal after it was hauled to the surface. More women were employed in this capacity on the Lancashire Coalfield than in any other area.[1]
Background
In the early coal industry women and girls worked underground alongside men and boys in small coal pits. It was common practice in Lancashire and Cumberland, Yorkshire, the East of Scotland and South Wales.[2] The death of Elizabeth Higginson working underground was recorded in the register of Wigan Parish Church in 1641.[3] An article in the Gentleman's Magazine in 1795 described Betty Hodson aged nine who worked underground with her brother, aged seven, dragging baskets of coals for their father.[4]
From the 1600s in Lancashire it was common for whole families to be employed in the pits. Colliers relied on their wives, sons and daughters who were employed as drawers. The daughters of colliers usually married within the mining community. As the industry grew the population expanded and more members of extended mining families obtained work. Pitwork in south-west Lancashire resulted in the area around Wigan having the highest rates of female employment in the country in the 19th century.[5]
On 4 July 1838, a flash flood at the
After the 1842 Act
The prohibition of underground female labour caused much suffering and hardship and was greatly resented in south-west Lancashire.[5] The employment of women did not end abruptly in 1842; with the connivance of some employers, women dressed as men continued to work underground for several years. Penalties for employing women were small and inspectors were few and some women were so desperate for work they willingly worked illegally for less pay.[8] Children continued working underground at some pits. At Coppull Colliery's Burgh Pit, three females died after an explosion in November 1846; one was eleven years old.[9]
Not all women who had worked underground gained employment as surface workers. Lighter work on the surface had traditionally been reserved for older men and men who had been injured below ground and some colliery owners considered pits unsuitable places for women. Other colliery owners were happy to employ women who had proved themselves reliable and strong workers and were used to the language and habits of the miners.[10] Male surface workers earned twice the wages of the women who worked twelve-hour shifts, five days a week and a shorter shift on Saturdays.[8] Women surface workers were concentrated in Scotland, South Wales, Cumberland, Shropshire and South Staffordshire and Lancashire.[11]
Dress
Pit-brow women working outside in the cold and dirt developed a distinctive "uniform", they wore clogs, trousers covered with a skirt and apron, old flannel jackets or shawls and headscarfs to protect their hair from coal dust.[12] The women's unconventional but practical dress drew them to the attention of the public and
Victorian sensibilities were outraged by women working at pits and dressing in trousers was considered unfeminine and degenerate by society.
See also
- Bal maiden - women who worked the Cornish tin mines
- Victorian dress reform
References
Footnotes
- ^ Davies 2009, p. 7.
- ^ Davies 2006, p. 58.
- ^ Davies 2006, p. 10.
- ^ Davies 2006, p. 12.
- ^ JSTOR 623316.
- ^ The Husker Pit disaster, 1838 - why 26 children died, The BBC, retrieved 20 November 2016
- ^ The Mines Act, 1842, University of Paris, archived from the original on 21 July 2011, retrieved 30 June 2015
- ^ a b Women in mining communities (pdf), National Mining Museum, retrieved 20 November 2016
- ^ Nadin 2006, p. 18.
- ^ a b c Davies 2006, p. 26.
- ^ John 1984, p. 414.
- ^ Pit-brow girls, Wigan, 1893, retrieved 20 November 2016 – via National Archives
- ^ Davies 2006, p. 29.
- ^ Davies 2006, p. 30.
Bibliography
- Davies, Alan (2006), The Pit Brow Women of the Wigan Coalfield, Tempus, ISBN 0-7524-3912-X
- Davies, Alan (2009), Atherton Collieries, Amberley, ISBN 978-1-84868-489-8
- John, Angela V. (1984), By the sweat of their brow, Routledge and Keegan Paul, ISBN 0-7102-0142-7
- Nadin, Jack (2006), Lancashire Mining Disasters 1835-1910, Wharncliffe Books, ISBN 1-903425-95-6