Chapter I: Foreword

This book tells the story of the Woman Inspectorate of Factories and Workshops from its beginning in 1893, when the first Women Inspectors (Miss May Abraham and Miss Mary Paterson) made their first inspection, until the year 1921, when thirty Women Inspectors saw the fruits of the work of their branch, not only in greatly developed protection for the woman worker, but also in her own increased capacity to help herself.

It was a story worth the telling, for it is a chronicle of a steady and dogged campaign, of few defeats and many victories. The adversaries to be met were all the ills which threaten the “factory girl”—poisoning by lead or phosphorus or arsenic or mercury, insanitary or unventilated rooms, accidents from unsafe machinery, phthisis, anthrax, overstrain, truck and sweating, and more besides. Readers who like a “thrill” will perhaps begin with the chapters on “Dangerous Trades” and on the War; and if their imagination serves them, they may read between the lines of those brief records stories of suffering, of endurance, and of rescue, which will set them wondering why our predecessors so long grudged to the woman worker the help which only a woman can give.

But the whole book, with its documented record of steady grinding effort and hard-won success, is well worth reading.

Dame Adelaide Anderson went through it all, and for twenty-four out of the twenty-eight years with which the volume is concerned filled the responsible position of Chief Woman Inspector with untiring devotion and conspicuous success. It was plainly “up to” her to write the history of the struggle; and all will like to read it who honour our working women for their work and value their welfare.

(_Signed_) CAVE.

RICHMOND,
_March 30, 1922_.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

The writing of the following story of what Women Inspectors did for women and girl workers under the Factory Acts and Truck Acts was undertaken in response to the wish of friends and colleagues that it should be told, while memory was fresh, by one who had seen the largest part of the conditions and immediate effects of the work—a work carried on under aims and organisation that are now undergoing change.

The aims and the starting-point of the past organisation are shown in the Introduction, and the outcome, down to 1921, is unfolded in the following chapters.

The material available in official reports for those who wish to study the facts more closely is so full of incident that, with the best will to be brief, it has been difficult to tell the tale shortly. Keeping entirely to published official records the whole could be told over again with fresh illustrations. And yet much that was significant and enlightening can only be seen in innumerable notices in the daily and weekly press and monthly reviews of the period; a fairly full collection of these exists, but they could only be quoted occasionally in these pages. Their correspondence in general tendency with the outlook shown in Parliamentary Debates—of which an account is given in Chapter VI.—is noteworthy.

Next to the breadth of the field of action of the Women Inspectorate, and the variety of their contacts with local administration and the courts, as well as with industry, the smallness of their numbers from 1893 to 1914 strikes the mind. The strength of the impulse that sustained and carried them through their years of labour may be traced to conditions summed up in words spoken to one of them by a woman toiling at a heavy task, “Is it right that I should have to do this work and only have eight shillings a week for it?”

There was a dominating impulse towards relieving the hardships and sufferings of working women that drew all the women who entered the Factory Department into a real unity of endeavour—whatever their social or political outlook before entering.

It is in the same spirit that they have lent me indispensable help in the completing of this little book. I wish gratefully to acknowledge the time and thought freely given to it by those who have long worked with me. Miss Martindale has critically read through all the typed manuscript, Miss Squire the chapter on Wages and the Truck Acts. Miss Squire has also most kindly revised the Appendix I. on Special Regulations for Dangerous Trades, written in 1913, and brought the details up to the present time. Miss Escreet supplied me with most helpful summaries from the mass of material in Annual Reports on child labour, heavy weights, and religious and charitable institutions. Miss Maura Brooke-Gwynne has devoted much time and skill to a literary criticism of the text. Miss Paterson and Mrs. Drury have kindly written special contributions, the former on mothers and child labour—subjects of special appeal to Women Inspectors—the latter on a stirring day in the life of a Factory Inspector. Finally, I wish to thank Mr. Gerald Bellhouse for some figures in the Introduction, and Dr. Legge for kindly reading through the chapter on Dangerous Trades, for his helpful comments, and for the tabulation of reported cases of industrial poisoning. They are in no way responsible, however, for my facts or opinions.

A. M. A.

UNIVERSITY WOMEN’S CLUB,
2, AUDLEY SQUARE, W.
_April 2, 1922_.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE
I. INTRODUCTION: HOW WOMEN INSPECTORS CAME, AND WHAT THEY
CAME TO DO 1
II. THE WOMEN WORKERS AND THEIR APPEAL; EXCESSIVE HOURS,
INSANITATION, AND OTHER UNCIVILISED CONDITIONS 22
III. WOMEN’S WAGES AND THE TRUCK ACTS; THE PIECEWORKER AND HER
PAY 58
IV. DANGEROUS AND INJURIOUS TRADES; ACCIDENTS AND SAFETY 94
V. EMPLOYMENT OF MOTHERS; CHILD LABOUR; CHARITABLE
INSTITUTIONS 149
VI. THE LIFE OF THE INSPECTOR AND ITS INFLUENCE ON
LEGISLATION; EXPERIENCES IN COURTS 190
VII. THE WAR AND WOMEN “SUBSTITUTES”; NEW LIGHT ON HOURS,
LABOUR-SAVING, FATIGUE, FOOD, AND EFFICIENCY 224
VIII. DEVELOPMENT OF FACTORY WELFARE AND ITS RECOGNITION BY
PARLIAMENT; WORKS’ COMMITTEES AND WELFARE MANAGEMENT 250
APPENDIX I. SPECIAL REGULATIONS FOR DANGEROUS TRADES 287
APPENDIX II. REPORTED CASES OF INDUSTRIAL POISONING AND ANTHRAX 306
INDEX 308

WOMEN IN THE FACTORY