After treating of the ballast-labourers, I purpose inquiring into the condition and income of the stevedores, or men engaged in the stowing or unstowing of vessels; and of the lumpers and riggers, or those engaged in the rigging and unrigging of them. It is then my intention to pass to the corn-labourers, such as the corn-porters, corn-runners, and turners, touching incidentally upon the corn-meters. After this, I mean to devote my attention to the timber-labourers engaged at the different timber-docks—as, for instance, the Commercial, the Grand Surrey, and the East Country Docks. Then, in due course, I shall come to the wharf-labourers and porters, or men engaged at the different wharfs in London; thence I shall digress to the bargemen and lightermen, or men engaged in the transit of the different cargoes from the ships to their several points of destination up or down the river; and finally, I shall treat of the watermen, the steamboat-men, and pier-men, or those engaged in the transit of passengers along the Thames. These, with the dock-labourers, of whom I have before treated, will, I believe, exhaust the subject of the long-shore labourers; and the whole will, I trust, form, when completed, such a body of facts and information, in connexion with this particular branch of labour, as has never before been collected. I am happy to say, that, with some few exceptions, I have received from the different official gentlemen not only every courtesy and consideration, but all the assistance and co-operation that it lay in their power to afford me. Every class seems to look upon the present inquiry as an important undertaking, and all, save the Clerk of the Coal Exchange and the Deputy-Superintendent of the London Docks, have shown themselves not only willing, but anxious, to lend a hand towards expediting the result.

Before quitting the subject of the coal-market, let me endeavour to arrive at an estimate as to the amount of wealth annually brought into the port of London by means of the colliers, and to set forth, as far as possible, the proportion in which it is distributed. I have already given some statistics, which, notwithstanding the objections of a coal-merchant, who, in a letter to a journal, stated that I had reckoned the number of ships at twice the real quantity, were obtained from such sources, and, I may add, with so much care and caution, as to render them the most accurate information capable of being procured at present on the subject. The statistics of the number of tons of coals brought into the port of London in the year 1848, the number of vessels employed, of the voyages made by those vessels collectively, and of the seamen engaged in the traffic, were furnished by the Clerk of the Coal Exchange at the time of the opening of the new building. Had the coal-merchant, therefore, made it his duty to devote the same time and care to the investigation of the truth of my statements that I have to the collection of them, he would not only have avoided committing the very errors he condemns, but would have displayed a more comprehensive knowledge of his business.

In 1848 there were imported into the London coal market 3,418,340 tons of coal. These were sold to the public at an average rate all the year round of 22s. 6d. a ton. Hence the sum expended in the metropolis for coal in that year was 3,845,632l. 10s.

The area of all the coal-fields of Great Britain has been roughly estimated at 9000 square miles. The produce is supposed to be about 32,000,000 tons annually, of which 10,000,000 tons are consumed in the iron-works, 8,500,000 tons are shipped coastwise, 2,500,000 tons are exported to foreign countries, and 11,000,000 tons distributed inland for miscellaneous purposes. Near upon 4,000,000 tons were brought to London by ships and otherwise in the year 1848, and it is computed that about one-eighth part of this, or 500,000 tons, were consumed by the gas-works.

The price of coals as quoted in the London market is the price up to the time when the coals are whipped from the ships to the merchants’ barges. It includes, 1st. the value of the coals; 2d. the expense of transit from the pit to the ship; 3d. the freight of the ship to London; 4th. the Thames’ dues; and 5th. the whipping. The difference between the market price and that paid by the consumer is made up of the expense incurred by the coal-merchant for barges, wharfs, waggons, horses, wages, coal-porters, &c., to his profit and risk. In 1836 the expenses incurred by the merchant from the time he bought a ship-load of coals to the deposition of them in the cellars of his customers amounted, on an average, it was said, to 7s. a ton. These expenses comprise commission, lighterage, porterage, cartage, shooting, metage, market-dues, land-metage, and other items. At the present time the expenses must be considerably lower, the wages of the labourers and the meters having been lowered full 50 per cent, though the demand for and consumption of coal has increased at nearly the same rate; indeed the law of the coal-market appears to be, that in proportion as the demand for the article rises, so do the wages of the men engaged in the supply of it fall.

As the ballast-heavers are under the thraldom of the same demoralising and oppressive system as that which the coal-whippers recently suffered under, it may be as well, before going further, to lay before the reader the following concise account of the terms on which the latter were engaged before the Coal-whippers’ Office was established.

Until the last few years the coal-whippers suffered themselves to be duped in an extraordinary way by publicans and petty shopkeepers on shore. The custom was, for the captain of a coal-ship, when he required a cargo to be whipped, to apply to one of these publicans for a gang; and a gang was accordingly sent from the public-house. There was no professed or pre-arranged deduction from the price paid for the work; the captain paid the publican, and the publican paid the coal-whippers; but the middleman had his profit another way. The coal-whipper was expected to come to the public-house in the morning; to drink while waiting for work, to take drink with him to the ship, to drink again when the day’s work was over, and to linger about and in the public-house until almost bed-time before his day’s wages were paid. The consequence was, that an enormous ratio of his earnings went every week to the publican. The publicans were wont to divide their dependants into two classes—the constant men and the stragglers, of whom the former were first served whenever a cargo was to be whipped; in return for this they were expected to spend almost the whole of their spare time in the public-house, and even to take up their lodgings there.

The captains preferred applying to the publicans to engaging the men themselves, because it saved them trouble; and because (as was pretty well understood) the publicans curried favour with them by indirect means; grocers and small shopkeepers did the same, and the coal-whippers had then to buy bad and dear groceries instead of bad and dear beer and gin. The Legislature tried by various means to protect the coal-whippers, but the publicans contrived means to evade the law. At length, in 1843, an Act was passed, which has placed the coal-whippers in a far more advantageous position.

The transition from coal-labour to ballast-labour is gradual and easy, and would be even if the labourers were not kindred in suffering.

The coal-ships, when discharged by the whippers, must get back to the north; and as there are not cargoes enough from London to freight them, they must take in ballast to make the ships heavy enough to sail in safety. This ballast is chiefly ballast or sand, dredged up from the bed of the Thames at and near Woolwich Reach. The Trinity House takes upon itself this duty. The captain, when he requires to sail, applies to the Ballast Office, and the required weight of ballast is sent to the ship in lighters belonging to the Trinity House, the captain paying so much a ton for it. About 80 tons on an average are required for each vessel, and the quantity thus supplied by the Trinity House is about 10,000 tons per week. Some of the ships are ballasted with chalk taken from Purfleet; all ballast taken from higher up the river than that point must be supplied by the Trinity House. When the ship reaches the Tyne, the ballast is of no further use, but it must not be emptied into that river; it has, therefore, to be deposited on the banks, where huge mounds are now collected two or three hundred feet high.

New places on the banks of the river have to be discovered for this deposit as the ballast mounds keep increasing, for it must be recollected that the vessels leave these ports—no matter for what destination—with coal, and may return in ballast. Indeed a railway has been formed from the vicinity of South Shields to a waste place on the sea-shore, hard by the mouth of the Tyne, where the ballast may be conveyed at small cost, its further accumulation on the river bank being found an incumbrance. “It is really something more than a metaphor,” it has been said, “to designate this a transfer of the bed of the Thames to the banks of the Tyne.” We may add as another characteristic, that some of the older ballast mounds are overgrown with herbage. As the vessels from foreign ports returning to the coal-ports in ballast, have not unfrequently to take soil on board for ballast, in which roots and seeds are contained, some of there struggle into vegetation, so that Italian flowers not unfrequently attempt to bloom in Durham, Yorkshire, or Northumberland, while some have survived the climate and have spread around; and thus it is that botanists trace the history of plants which are called indigenous to the ballast-hills.

Before treating of the ballast labourers themselves I shall give a brief history of the ballast laws.

Ships are technically said to be in ballast when they sail without a cargo, having on board only the stores and other articles requisite for the use of the vessel and crew, as well as of any passengers who may be proceeding with her upon the voyage. In favour of vessels thus circumstanced it is usual to dispense with many formalities at the custom-houses of the ports, and to remit the payment of the dues and charges levied upon ships having cargoes on board. A foreign vessel proceeding from a British port may take chalk on board as ballast. Regulations have at various times been made in different ports and countries, determining the modes in which ships may be supplied with ballast, and in what manner they may discharge the same, such regulations being necessary to prevent injury to harbours. Charles I. published a proclamation in 1636, ordering that none shall buy any ballast out of the river Thames but a person appointed by him for that purpose. And this appointment was sold for the king’s profit. Since then the soil of the river Thames has been vested in the corporation of the Trinity House, and a fine of 10l. may be recovered for every ton of ballast taken out of the river without the authority of the corporation. Ships may take on board land-ballast from any quarries or pits east of Woolwich by paying 1d. per ton to the Trinity House. For river-ballast the corporation are authorised by Act of Parliament to make other charges. The receipts of the Trinity House from this source were 33,591l. in the year 1840, and their expenses were 31,622l., leaving a clear profit of 1969l. The ballast of all ships or vessels coming into the Thames must be unladen into a lighter, and if any ballast be thrown into the river the master of the vessel whence it is thrown is liable to a fine of 20l. Some such regulation is usually enforced at every port.

Before proceeding further with my present subject, it is proper that I should express my acknowledgments of the ready courtesy with which the official information necessary for the full elucidation of my subject was supplied to me by the Secretary of the principal Ballast Office at Trinity House, Tower Hill. I have always observed, that when the heads of a department willingly supply information to go before the public, I find in the further course of my investigations that under such departments the claims of the labourer are not only acknowledged but practically allowed. On the other hand, if official gentlemen neglect (which is to refuse) to supply the returns and other information, it is because the inquiry is unpalatable to them, as the public may find that in their departments the fair claims of the labourers are not allowed. Were the poor ballast-heavers taken under the protection of the corporation of the Trinity House (something in the same way that Parliament has placed the coal-whippers under the guardianship of a board of commissioners) the good done would be great indeed, and the injury would be none: for it cannot be called an injury to prevent a publican forcing a man to buy and swallow bad drink.

By charter of Queen Elizabeth in the 36th year of her reign, the lastage and ballastage, and office of lastage and ballastage, of all ships and other vessels betwixt the bridge of the city of London and the main sea, I am informed by the Secretary of the Trinity Company, was granted to the Master Wardens and Assistants of the Trinity House of Deptford Strond. This was renewed, and the gravel, sand, and soil of the river Thames granted to the said master wardens, &c. for the ballasting of ships and vessels in the 15th year of Charles II., and again in the 17th year of the reign of that monarch. This last-named charter remains in force, and has been confirmed by Acts of Parliament at different times; by which Acts also various regulations in relation to the conduct of the ballast service, the control of the persons employed therein, and the prices of the ballast supplied, have been established. The Act now in force is the 6th and 7th Vict. cap. 57.

The number of men employed in lighters as ballast-getters, or in barges conveying it from the dredgers, is 245, who are paid by the ton raised.

The number of vessels entered for ballast in the year 1848 was:

The total quantity of ballast supplied to shipping in the year 1848 was 615,619 tons, or thereabouts; such ballast being gravel raised from the bed of the river Thames and delivered alongside of vessels, either lying in the different docks or being afloat in the stream between London-bridge and Woolwich.

The number of vessels employed in this service is 69, viz:—

The ballast is delivered into the vessels from the lighters and barges by men called ballast-heavers, who are employed by the vessel, and are not in the service of the Trinity House.

I now come to the nature of the ballast labour itself. This is divisible into three classes: that performed by the ballast-getters, or those who are engaged in raising it from the bed of the Thames; by the ballast-lighters, or those who are engaged in carrying it from the getters to the ships requiring it; and by the ballast-heavers, or those who are engaged in putting it on board of such ships. The first and second of these classes have, according to their own account, “nothing to complain of,” being employed by gentlemen who, judging by the wanton neglect of labouring men by their masters, so general in London, certainly exhibit a most extraordinary consideration and regard for their work-people; and the change from the indifference and callousness of the coal-merchants to the kindness of the corporation of the Trinity House is most gratifying. The ballast-heavers constitute an entirely different class. They have every one, to a man, deep and atrocious wrongs to complain of, such as I am sure are unknown, and which, when once made public, will at once demand some remedy.

I must, however, first deal with

The Ballast-Getters.

Of these there are two sub-classes, viz. those engaged in obtaining the ballast by steam power, and those who still procure it as of old by muscular power.

Of seven dredging-engines employed in the collecting of ballast from the bed of the Thames there are three, the Hercules, the Goliath, and the Samson. These are now stationed respectively in Barking Reach, Half Reach near Dagenham, and the bottom of Half-way Reach off Rainham. Most persons who have proceeded up or down the Thames will have perceived black unshapely masses, with no visible indications that they may be classed with steam-vessels except a chimney and smoke. These are the dredging-vessels; they are of about 200 tons burden. The engines of the Hercules and the Samson are of 20-horse power,—those of the Goliath are 25. When the process of dredging is carried on, the use of the dredging-vessel is obvious to any spectator; but I believe that most persons imagine the object to be merely to deepen the river by removing inequalities in its bed, and so to render its navigation easier by equalizing its depth, and in some degrees checking the power of cross-currents. Few are aware that an ulterior object is gained. I visited one of these steam-dredgers, and was very courteously shown over it. The first feeling was an impression of the order, regularity, and trimness that prevailed. In the engineers’ department, too, there was an aspect, as well as a feeling, of extreme snugness, the more perceptible both to the eye and the body from its contrast with the intense cold on the muddy river outside, then running down in very strong ebb. In the engineers’ department there was more than cleanliness; there was a brightness about the brass-handles attached to the machinery, and, indeed, about every portion of the apparatus at all susceptible of brightness, which indicated a constant and systematic attention by well-skilled hands. Each dredger carries eight men, the master (called the captain, commonly enough, on the river), two engineers, an engineer’s assistant, two legsmen (who attend to the ladders), and three men for general purposes. They are all called engine-men. The master of the dredger I visited had the weather-beaten look of the experienced seaman, and the quiet way of talking of past voyages which is found generally in men who have really served, whether in the merchant service or royal navy. He resided on board the dredger with his wife and family, the principal cabin being a very comfortable parlour. All the men live on board, having their turns for visit to the shore from Saturday morning, noon, or evening (as their business permits), to Monday morning. Their sleeping-places are admirable for cleanliness. All the dredgers are under the control of the corporation of the Trinity House. They are, as it was worded to me, as strong as wood and iron can make them. But for secure anchorage these dredgers would soon go adrift. Colliers beating up or down occasionally run against the dredgers: this happens mostly in light winds, when the masters of these colliers are afraid to let go their anchors. The machinery consists of a steam-engine and spur-gear for directing the buckets. The application of the steam-power I need not minutely describe, as it does not differ from other applications where motion has to be communicated. It is connected with strong iron beams, having cogged and connected wheels, which when put into operation give upward and downward motion to the buckets. These buckets are placed on ladders as they are called, one on each side the vessel. These ladders (or shafts) consist of three heavy beams of wood, firmly bolted together and fitted with friction-wheels. To each ladder 29 buckets are attached, each bucket holding 2½ cwt. of gravel. Each bucket is attached by joints to the next, and a series of holes permits the water drawn up with the deposit to ooze out. When the bucket touches the bottom of the river it dips, as it is called. A rotary motion being communicated, the construction ensures the buckets being brought up flat on the ladder until a due height is attained, when the rotary (or circular) motion again comes into play, and the contents of the bucket are emptied into a lighter moored alongside, and the empty bucket is driven down to be refilled. The contents so drawn up are disposed of for ballast, which is the ulterior purpose I have alluded to. Upon an average the buckets revolve once in two minutes. That time, however, varies, from the nature of the bed of the river. The Goliath and the Samson being fitted up with marine engines drive the fastest. The three vessels have for the last year worked within a circle of a mile. The quantity of ballast raised depends upon the demand, as well as upon the character of the deposit at the bottom of the river. Between 900 and 1000 tons have been raised in 7½ hours, sometimes in a like period less than 300 tons have been raised. The dredger I was on board of has taken in a year from 180,000 to 190,000 tons. A stratum of mud 2½ feet had been raised, then 3 feet of gravel, and a chalk bottom was anticipated. In some places 15 feet have been so cleared away to a chalk bottom. In others 15 feet have been so worked off, and no bottom but gravel reached. The gravel lies in shoals. Sometimes the dredgers come to hard conglomerate gravel, as compact as a rock. No fossils have been found. In a few places a clay bottom has been met with. The men in the dredgers are paid according to the number of tons raised, the proceeds being duly apportioned. They work as frequently by night as by day, their labour depending upon the time when an order for a supply of ballast is received. Each lighter holds 60 tons of ballast. The dredgers above bridge are the property of individuals working with the concurrence of the civic corporation of London. Those below bridge are, as I have said, under the control of the corporation of the Trinity House. The Hercules was the first Trinity House dredger worked by steam. Private individuals, however, employed steam sooner than the Trinity House authorities to draw up materials to mix with lime for building purposes. The first Trinity House steam-dredger was started in 1827.

I had some conversation with a man employed on one of the steam-dredgers. He described the process carried on there as I have given it, estimating the tons of ballast raised at about 4000 a-week. He expressed a sense of his good fortune in having the employment he had; he was well used, and wouldn’t like to change. He declined stating his earnings (otherwise than that he had his fair share) until he saw his master, and of course I did not press him further on the subject.

The ballast-getters are men employed in raising ballast from the bed of the river by bodily labour. The apparatus by which this is effected consists of a long staff or pole, about thirty-five feet in length. At the end of this is an iron “spoon” or ring, underneath which is a leathern bag holding about 20 cwt. The ballast is raised on board the working-lighters by means of this spoon. The working-lighters carry six hands: that is, a staffsman whose duty it is to attend to the staff; a bagman, who empties the bag; a chainsman, who hauls at the chain; a heelsman, who lets go the pall of the winch; and two trimmers, who trim the ballast in the lighter as fast as it comes in. Previous to the men getting at work, the staffsman takes hold of the spoon to feel whereabout the ballast-bed lies. When this is found, he puts down his “sets,” as it is termed,—that is to say, he drives the iron-tipped spars that he has with him in the lighter into the ground, so as to steady the craft. This done, the staffsman seizes hold of the middle of the staff, while the bargeman takes the bag and the chainsman the chain, which is fastened to the iron ring or spoon; the staff is thus thrown overboard into the water, about midway of the lighter, and the tide carries the spoon down towards the stern. The staffsman then fastens the staff to the lighter by means of the gaff-string or rope attached to the side of the vessel. At the same time the men go forward to heave at the winch, round the roll of which the chain attached to the spoon itself is wound. All the men, with the exception of the staffsman, then heave away, and so drag the spoon along the bed of the river. When the staffsman feels that the bag is full, he leaves go of the gaff-string and goes forward to heave with the men as well. Immediately the gaff-string is undone the top part of the staff falls back on an oar that projects from the after-part of the vessel, and the bag is then raised by means of the winch and chain to the level of the gunwale of the craft; then the bagsman hauls it in and empties it into the lighter, while the two trimmers spread the ballast discharged. The spoon can only be worked when the tide is nearly down, because the water would be too deep for the set to bring the craft steady. To hoist the 20 cwt. of ballast in the bag will require the whole force of the six men; and none but the very strongest are of use. The ballast-getters are all very powerful men; they are mostly very tall, big-boned, and muscular. Many of them are upwards of six feet high, and have backs two feet broad. “I lifted seven half-hundredweights with one of my hands,” said one whom I saw. He was a man of thirty-nine years of age, and stood half an inch over six feet, while another was six feet two inches. They were indeed extraordinarily fine specimens of the English labourer, making our boasted Life-guardsman appear almost weak and effeminate in comparison with them. Before the steam dredging-engines were introduced, I am informed the ballast-getters were even bigger and heavier men than they are now. The ballast-getters seldom or never fish up anything besides ballast. Four or five years back they were lucky enough to haul up a box of silver plate; but they consider a bit of old iron or a bit of copper very good luck now. The six men generally raise sixty tons eighteen feet high in the course of the tide, which is at the rate of 22,400lbs. each man in three hours: this makes the quantity raised per hour by each man upwards of 7400 lbs. The price paid is 8d. per ton, or 2l. for sixty tons; this is shared equally among five of the men, who receive 8s. a-piece as their proportion, and out of this they pay 3s. 6d. a tide to the stern-trimmer, whom they employ—the Trinity Company allowing only five men and the ballast-getters engaging the sixth man themselves. Upon an average the ballast-getters do about three loads in the week throughout the year,—this, deducting the money paid to the sixth man, makes the earnings of each ballast-getter come to about 22s. throughout the year. The staffsman is allowed 20l. a-year to keep the craft in gear. The ballast-getters usually work above the dredging-engines, mostly about Woolwich; there the cleanest ballast is to be got. The Trinity Company they speak most highly of; indeed the corporation are universally spoken of as excellent masters: the men say they have nothing to complain of. They get their money on every Friday night, and have no call to spend a farthing of their earnings otherwise than as they please. They only wish, they add, that the ballast-heavers were as well off. “It would be a good job if they was, poor men,” say one and all.

The second class of ballast-labourers are

The Ballast-Lightermen.

These are men engaged by the Trinity Company to carry the ballast in the company’s barges and lighters from the steam dredging-engines to the ship’s side. The corporation has fifty-two lighters and fourteen barges, all sixty-ton craft. Each lighter carries four men, and there are two men in each barge; so that altogether 108 lightermen and 28 bargemen are employed in bringing the ballast from the engines. These men are not required to have a license from the Waterman’s Company, like other lightermen and bargemen on the Thames, and that is one of the reasons for my dealing with them at present. They form a class of labourers by themselves, and I treat of them here because it appears the fittest place for a statement of their condition and earnings. Besides the lightermen and bargemen engaged in carrying the ballast from the steam dredging-machines, there are others employed on board what are called the working-lighters; these are vessels in which ballast is got up from the bed of the river by muscular labour. There are ten of these working-lighters, and six men engaged in each, or in all sixty men employed in raising ballast by such means. There are three steam dredging-engines employing each eight men, or twenty-four in all; so that there are altogether 220 labouring men engaged in the ballast service of the Trinity Company. Each of the carrying lighters has a staffsman or master and three men. The lighters all carry sixty tons of ballast, and make upon an average between three and four voyages a-week, or about seven in the fortnight. There is no place of deposit for the ballast brought up the river from the engines; it is left in the lighter until required. The ballast chiefly consists of gravel; indeed the ships will mostly refuse anything else. When there is a plentiful supply of ballast they will refuse clay in particular. Clayey ballast is what is termed bad ballast. Upon an average there are thirty loads, or 1800 tons of ballast, brought up by the lighters every day from the engines. In the course of the year there are between 550,000 and 600,000 tons of ballast supplied by the three steam dredging-machines. “It is about three-and-twenty years since the steam dredging-engine first came out,” said the party who gave me the above information. “For the last twenty years I should think the company have been raising about 500,000 tons of gravel from the bed of the river. Thirty years ago I thought the ballast would soon be out, but there appears to be little or no difference; and yet the shoals do not fill up again after being once taken away. In Barking Reach I am sure there is six feet more water now than there was thirty years ago; there was at that time a large shoal in that part of the river, called Barking Shelf; it was certainly a mile long and half a mile wide. The vessels would ground upon it long before low water. At some tides it used to strip dry, and at low tide generally there was about six foot of water over it. That part of the river is now the deepest about Barking, and as deep as the best of places in the Thames. When I first came to London we were prevented from getting the ballast from anywhere else than Barking, on account of the great shoals there; but now the great ballast-bed is between four and five miles lower down. The river has been very nearly cleared of shoals by the dredging-engines, from Limehouse Reach to the bottom of Half Reach. The only shoal in the way of the navigation below the Pool is what is called Woolwich Shelf: there is indeed another shoal, but this consists of stiff clay or conglomerate, and the engines cannot work through it.” The men on board the carrying-lighters are paid 5d. a-ton for bringing the ballast from the dredging-engines to the ships; this is equally divided among the four men. The staffsman, in addition to his fourth share, receives 10l. a-year for his extra duties; but out of this he has to buy oars for the boat and lighter, locks, fenders, and shovels. Upon an average the cost of these will be about 30s. a-year. Each man’s share of the sixty-ton load is 6s. 3d.; and there are about seven loads brought up by each lighter in the fortnight. Some weeks the men can earn as much as 37s., but at others they cannot get more than 12s. 6d. “I did myself only two load last week,” said my informant. “When there is little or no ‘vent,’ as we call it, for the ballast—that is, but a slight demand for it—we have but little work. Upon an average, each lighterman makes from 21s. to 22s. a-week. At the time of the strike among the pitmen in the North, the lightermen, generally, only did about two load a-week throughout the year; but then the following year we had as much as we could do. The Trinity Company, whom I serve, and have served for thirty years, are excellent masters to us when we are sick or well. The corporation of the Trinity House allow the married lightermen in their service 10s. and the single ones 7s. 6d. a-week, as long as they are ill. I have known the allowance given to men for two years, and for this we pay nothing to any benefit society or provident fund. If we belong to any such society we have our sick money from them independent of that. The superannuation money is now 6l. a-year; but I understand,” continued the man, “that the company intend increasing it next Tuesday. Some of the old men were ordered up to the house a little while ago, and were asked what they could live comfortably upon, and one of the gentlemen there promised them that no more of us should go to the workhouse. They do not provide any school for our children; a great many of the lightermen neither read nor write. I never heard any talk of the company erecting a school, either for the instruction of their men or their men’s families. All I can say is, that in all my dealings with the Trinity Corporation I have found them very kind and considerate masters. They are always ready to listen to the men, and they have hospitals for the sick in their employ and midwives for the wives of the labourers; and they bury, free of expense, most of the men that die in their service. To the widows of their deceased servants they allow 6l. a-year; and if there be any children, they give 2s. a-month to each under fourteen years old. I never knew them to reduce the lightermen’s wages; they have rather increased than lowered them. After the introduction of the steam-dredging machines we were better off than we were before. Previous to that time the lightermen were getters as well, and then the labour was so hard that the expenses of the men for living were more than they are now.”

I now come in due order to

The Ballast-Heavers.

Of these I can at present give but a general description. The individual instances of oppression that I have sought out I must reserve for a subsequent page, when I most heartily hope that the publication of the iniquity of which these poor fellows are the victims, will be at least instrumental in putting an end to a most vile and wicked plan for the degradation and demoralization of our fellow-creatures. The tales I have to tell are such as must rouse every heart not positively indurated by the love of gain. I must, however, be here content, as I said before, with merely describing the system.

The duty of the ballast-heaver is to heave into the holds of the ship the ballast brought alongside the vessel by the Trinity-lighters from the dredging-engines. The ships take in ballast either in the docks or in the Pool. When the ship is cranky-built, and cannot stand steady after a portion of her cargo has been discharged, she usually takes in what is called shifting or stiffening ballast. The ballast is said to stiffen a cranky vessel, because it has the effect of making her firm or steady in the water. The quantity of ballast required by cranky vessels depends upon the build of the ships. Sixty tons of cargo will stiffen the most cranky vessel. I am informed by those who have been all their lives at the business, that they never knew a vessel, however cranky, but what 60 tons’ weight would stiffen her. Some vessels are so stiff-built, that they can discharge the whole of their cargo without taking in any ballast at all. These are generally flat-bottomed vessels, whereas cranky vessels are built sharp towards the keel. The colliers are mostly flat-bottomed vessels, and could in calm weather return to the north without either ballast or cargo in them. This, however, is not allowed by the owners. The generality of ships discharge all their cargo before they take in any ballast. The cranky-built ships form the exception, and begin taking in ballast when they are about three-parts discharged. When a ship requires ballast, the owner or one of his agents or servants applies to the Trinity House for the quantity needed. If the ship belong to the merchant service, and is lying in any of the docks, the owner has to pay 1s. 7d. per ton to the Trinity Company for the ballast supplied: but if the merchant vessel be lying in the Pool, then the price is 1s. 3d. per ton, and if the vessel be a collier, the price is 1s. per ton. On application being made at the Ballast Office, the party is supplied with a bill, specifying the name and situation of the vessel, the quantity of ballast required for her, and the price that has been paid for it. The bill is then taken to the Ruler’s Office, where it is entered in a book, and the ship supplied with the ballast, according to the place that she has on the books. If the weather is rough, a ship has often to remain three or four days without receiving the ballast she wants. The application for ballast is seldom made directly from the captain or shipowner himself. There are parties living in the neighbourhood of Wapping and Ratcliffe who undertake, for a certain sum per score of tons, to have the requisite quantity of ballast put aboard the ship. These parties are generally either publicans, grocers, butchers, lodging-house keepers or watermen, and they have a number of labourers dealing with them whom they employ to heave the ballast on board. The publicans, butchers, grocers, or lodging-house-keepers, are the ballast-contractors, and they only employ those parties who are customers at their houses. It is the owner or captain of the vessel who contracts with these “truckmen” for the ballasting of the ship at a certain price per score of tons, and the truckmen for that sum undertake not only to procure the ballast from the Trinity Company, and save the owner or captain all the trouble of so doing, but also to carry it from the Trinity-lighters on board the ship. The reason of the publicans, grocers, butchers, or lodging-house-keepers, undertaking the job is to increase the custom at their shops, for they make it a rule to employ no heavers but those who purchase their goods from them. The price paid to these truckmen varies considerably. Their principal profit, however, is made out of the labourers they employ. The highest price paid to the contractors for putting the ballast on board colliers (exclusive of the cost of the ballast itself) is 10s. per score tons. Many contractors charge less than this—not a few indeed undertake to do it for 9s., and there are one or two who will do it for 8s. the score. But these, I am informed, “are men who are trying to get the work away from the other contractors.” The highest price paid to the contractors for ballasting small merchant vessels is 12s. per score as well. For large vessels the price varies according to their size, and, consequently, the number of heavers required to put the ballast on board. The lowest price paid per score to the contractors for small merchant vessels is 10s. Eight or nine years ago the price for ballasting small merchant vessels was much higher. Then the highest price paid to the contractor was 15s. Since that time the prices both for merchant vessels and colliers have been continually falling. This, I am told, arises from the number of contractors increasing, and their continual endeavours to underwork one another. Before the establishment of the Coal-whippers’ Office, the contractors for ballast were solely publicans; and they not only undertook to put ballast on board, but to deliver the coals from the ships as well. At this time the publicans engaged in the business made rapid and large fortunes, and soon became shipowners themselves, but after the institution of the Coal-whippers’ Office, the business of the publicans, who had before been the contractors, declined. Since that period the contracts for ballasting ships have been undertaken by butchers and grocers, as well as publicans, and the number of these has increased every year, and according as the number of the contractors has increased, so have the prices decreased, for each one is anxious to undersell the other. In order to do this, the contractors have sought everywhere for fresh hands, and the lodging-house-keepers in particular have introduced labouring men from the country, who will do the work at a less price than those who have been regularly brought up to the business: and I am credibly informed, that whereas nine or ten years ago every ballast-heaver was known to his mates, now the strangers have increased to such an extent that at least two-thirds of the body are unacquainted with the rest. There is treble the number of hands at the work now, I am told, to what there was but a few years back. The prices paid by the contractors to the ballast-heavers are very little below what the owners pay to them, indeed some of the publicans pay the heavers the same price that they themselves receive, and make their profit solely out of the beer and spirits supplied to the workmen. The butchers and grocers generally pay the men 6d. and some 1s. in the score less than they themselves get; but, like the publican, their chief profit is made out of the goods they supply. The lodging-house-keepers seldom contract for the work. They are generally foremen employed by the publican, butcher, or grocer contracting, and they make it a rule that the ballast-heavers whom they hire shall lodge at their house, as well as procure their beer, meat, or grocery, as the case may be, from the shop of the contractor by whom they are employed. All the English ships that enter the port of London are supplied with ballast in this manner. The owners always make it a rule to contract with some publican, butcher, grocer, or lodging-house-keeper for the ballasting of their vessels, and it is impossible for the ballast-heaver to obtain employment at his calling but by dealing at the shops of some or other of these parties. According to the Government returns there were 170 ballast-heavers in the metropolis in 1841, and I am assured that there are more than double that number at present, or nearly 400 labourers engaged in the business. There are now 27 publicans who make a regular business of contracting for the supply of ballast. Besides these there are four butchers, the same number of grocers, and as many lodging-house-keepers. Further than this, there is a foreman attached to each of the public-houses, or butchers’ or grocers’ shops, and these foremen are mostly lodging-house-keepers as well. The foremen in general have the engagement of the heavers, and the first hands they employ are those who lodge at their houses: these hands are expected also to deal with the contractor under whose foreman they serve. The heavers generally, therefore, are obliged to lodge at the house of some foreman, and to obtain their meat, beer, and grocery from the different ballast-contractors, in order to obtain work; indeed, with the exception of clothing, the heaver is compelled to obtain almost every article he consumes through the medium of some contractor. The greater the number of contractors the heaver deals with, the greater is his chance of work. The rule with each of the contractors is to give credit to the hands they employ, and those who are the most in debt with them have the preference in labour. The butchers and grocers generally charge 1d. per lb. extra for everything they sell to the heavers, and the publicans make it up in adulteration. Each of the publicans, butchers, and grocers, who make a rule of contracting for the supply of ballast, has, on an average, two gangs of men dealing at his house, and if he have more ships to supply than his regular hands are capable of doing, then he sends the foreman to either of the places of call where the unemployed men wait for hire throughout the day. Each ship requires from four to six heavers to put the ballast on board, and the men generally ship about 50 tons in the course of the day. They often do as much as 100 tons, and sometimes only 20 in the day. The heavers are divided into constant and casualty men.

The constant men are the first gang working out of the public-house, or butchers’ or grocers’ shops. The constant men with the publicans are those that are the best customers. “If they didn’t drink,” said my informant, “they’d be thought of very little use.” These constant men make three times as much as the casualty men, or, in other words, they have three times as much to drink. Generally, one-fifth part of what the publican’s constant men earn is spent in drink. The casualty men are those who belong to no regular houses; but these, if taken on by a publican, are expected to spend the same amount in drink as the constant men. There are no ballast-heavers who are teetotalers. “Indeed it would be madness,” says my informant, “for a man to think of it, for to sign the pledge would be entirely to deprive himself and his family of bread.”

To complete the different classes of ballast-labourers, I will conclude with the statement of a casualty man:—

“I am about 57,” (said my informant, who was 6 feet high, and looked like a man far older than 57,) “and have been 35 years a ballast-heaver, with the exception of seven or eight years, when I had the care of some horses used in coal-waggons. When I first knew the trade, earnings was good. I might clear my 1l. a-week. On that I brought up four sons and one daughter—all now married. At that time, I mean when I first worked at ballast-heaving, the men were not so much employed by publicans and other tradesmen. A gang of men could then get work on their own account, a good deal easier than they can get it now through the tradesmen who supply the ballast. As the trade got more and more into the hands of the publicans and such-like, it grew worse and worse for such as me. We earned less, and were not anything like to call free men. Instead of my 1l. I had to stir myself to make 15s. or as low as 12s. a-week. Lately I have been what is called a casualty man. There’s constant men and casualties. Each publican has a foreman to look out, and get men, and see after them. These foremen—all of them that I know of—keeps lodgers, charging them 2s. 6d. or 3s. a-week for a room they could get but for this tie, for 2s.—ay, that they could. Suppose now a publican has a ship to supply with ballast, he acquaints his foreman, and the foreman calls on his lodgers, and sets them to work. These are the constant men. They have always the first turn out of the house. If they return from work at 4, and there’s another job at 5, they get it. That’s interest you see, sir. The more such men earn this way, the more they’re expected to spend with the publican. It’s only bad stuff they have to drink at a full price. It’s only when all the constant men are at work, and a job must be done at once, that me, and such as me, can get work. If I hear of a chance of a job I call on the foreman. If I have money, why, I must drink myself, and treat the foreman with a drop of gin, or what he fancies. If I haven’t the money, I have the worse chance for a job. Suppose I get a job and earn 6s. out of 60 tons of ballast; out of that 6s. I may have 4s., or, at most, 4s. 6d. to take home with me, after paying for what I must drink at the publican’s—what I’m forced to spend. Casualty men have sad trouble to get any work. Those that belong to the houses have all the call. Last week I was on the look-out every day, and couldn’t get a single job, nor earn a single farthing. Last night I had to get a bite of supper at my son’s, and a bite of breakfast this morning as well, and I had to borrow a pair of shoes to come out in. The best week’s work I’ve had this winter was 15s. I had five days in one ship. For that five days I was entitled, I fancy, to 20s., or may be 21s., so that the difference between that and the 15s. went for drink. I only wanted a pint of beer now and then at my work—two or three a day. The worst of it is, we don’t get drink at our work so much as at the public-house we’re employed from. If we want to go home, some of the constant men want to have more and more, and so the money goes. Other weeks I have carried home 10s., 8s., 5s., and many a week nothing, living as I could. It would be a deal better for poor men, like me, if tradesmen had nothing to do with ballast work. If the men that did the work were paid by the gentlemen what wants the ballast, there might then be a living for a poor man. As it is, it’s a very bad, hateful system, and makes people badly off. A ballast-man may sit in a tap-room, wet, and cold, and hungry, (I’ve felt it many a time,) and be forced to drink bad stuff, waiting to be paid. It always happens, unless they’re about shutting up, that we have to wait. We have no sick-fund or benefit societies. I declare to you, that if anything happened to me—if I was sick—I have nothing to call my own but what I’ve on; and not all that, as I’ve told you—and there’s nothing but the parish to look to. (Here the man somewhat shuddered.) I pay 2s. a-week rent.

“Then again, sir, there’s the basket-men at the docks—all the docks. They’re as bad to the poor man as the publican, or worse. The way they do is this. They’re not in any trade, and they make it their business to go on board ships—foreign ships—American generally. In better times, twenty or twenty-five years ago, there used to be 1s., and as high as 1s. 6d. paid for a ton from such ships to a gang of six ballast-men. I’ve earned six, seven, and eight shillings a-day myself then. We heaved the ballast out of the lighters with our shovels on to a stage, and from that it was heaved into the hold. Two men worked in the lighter, two on the stage, and two in the hold of the vessel. The basket-men manage to fill the hold now by heaving the ballast up from the lighter in baskets by means of a windlass. The basket-man contracts with the captain, and then puts us poor men at the lowest rate he can get; he picks them up anywhere, anything in the shape of men. For every half-crown he pays these men he’ll get 9s. for himself, and more. An American liner may require 300 tons of ballast, and, maybe, a captain will give a basket-man 8d. a-ton: that would be 10l. The basket-man employs six men, and he makes another. He never works himself—never—not a blow: but he goes swaggering about the ship when his men are at work, and he’s on the look-out in the streets at other times. For the 10l. he’ll get for the 300 tons, he’ll pay his men each 2s. 6d. for 60 tons, that is 3l. 15s., and so there’s 6l. 5s. profit for him. Isn’t that a shame, when so many poor men have to go without dinner or breakfast? There’s five basket-men to my knowledge. They are making money all out of poor men that can’t help themselves. The poor suffers for all.”

In order to assure myself of the intensity of the labour of ballast-heaving, of which I heard statements on all sides, I visited a gang of men at work, ballasting a collier in the Pool. My engagements prevented my doing this until about six in the evening. There was a very dense fog on the river, and all along its banks; so thick was it, indeed, that the water, which washed the steps where I took a boat, could not be distinguished, even with the help of the adjacent lights. I soon, however, attained the ballast-lighter I sought. The ballast-heavers had established themselves alongside a collier, to be filled with 43 tons of ballast, just before I reached them, so that I observed all their operations. Their first step was to tie pieces of old sail, or anything of that kind, round their shoes, ankles, and half up their legs, to prevent the gravel falling into their shoes, and so rendering their tread painful. This was rapidly done; and the men set to work with the quiet earnestness of those who are working for the morrow’s meal, and who know that they must work hard. Two men stood in the gravel (the ballast) in the lighter; the other two stood on “a stage,” as it is called, which is but a boarding placed on the partition-beams of the lighter. The men on this stage, cold as the night was, threw off their jackets, and worked in their shirts, their labour being not merely hard, but rapid. As one man struck his shovel into the ballast thrown upon the stage, the other hove his shovelful through a small porthole in the vessel’s side, so that the work went on as continuously and as quickly as the circumstances could possibly admit. Rarely was a word spoken, and nothing was heard but an occasional gurgle of the water, and the plunging of the shovel into the gravel on the stage by one heaver, followed instantaneously by the rattling of the stones in the hold shot from the shovel of the other. In the hold the ballast is arranged by the ship’s company. The throwing of the ballast through the porthole was done with a nice precision. A tarpaulin was fixed to prevent any of the ballast that might not be flung through the porthole being wasted by falling into the river, and all that struck merely the bounds of the porthole fell back into the lighter; but this was the merest trifle. The men pitched the stuff through most dexterously. The porthole might be six feet above the stage from which they hove the ballast; the men in the lighter have an average heave of six feet on to the stage. The two men on the stage and the two on the lighter fill and discharge their shovels twelve times in a minute; that is, one shovelful is shot by each man in every alternate five seconds; so that every one of the four men engaged at the work flings the height of 36 feet every minute, or 2160 feet in an hour; and in that time, according to the concurrent computation of the heavers, the four men may easily fling in 10 tons, or 5600 lbs. a man. The men work with the help of large lanterns, being employed mostly by night.

I shall now state the sentiments of the men generally, and then individually, upon the subject of their grievances.

To be certain as to the earnings of the men, to see their condition, and to hear from a large number of them their own statements as to the hardships they suffered, and the sums they gained, I met two bodies of the ballast-heavers, assembled without pre-arrangement. At one station 50 were present, at the other 30. The men were chiefly clad in coarse, strong jackets; some of them merely waistcoats, with strong, blue flannel sleeves, and coarse trowsers, thick with accumulated grease from long wear. They had, notwithstanding their privations, generally a hardy look. There was nothing squalid in their appearance, as in that of men who have to support life on similar earnings with in-door employment. Their manners were quiet, and far from coarse. At the first meeting 50 were present. One man said, “Well, I think I am the oldest man at present, and I don’t get above 5s. a-week; but that’s because I’m an old man, and cannot work with the young ones.” Upon an average the common men earned 10s. a-week the year through, and took home 5s. I inquired, “Are you all compelled to spend a great part of all you earn in drink with the publican?” The answer was simultaneously, “All of us—all—all!” Of the remainder of their earnings, after the drink deductions, the men were all satisfied they spent so much, that many only took 2s. 6d. a-week home to their wives and families on an average. Last week two earned 20s., the publican taking 10s. from each. Three earned 15s.; one of these took 1s. 6d. home, the other 3s., both working for publicans; the third, who worked for a grocer, took home 13s.; the other 2s. being spent in tea and sugar, he being a single man. Three earned 10s.; one, working for a publican, carried home 6s., the difference going in compulsory drink; another 4s., and another 5s. Six did one load of ballast, receiving 7s. 6d. each for it; one took home 4s. 11d.; another 6s. 6d. (a private job); another, who did a load for 5s. 3d., took home 2s. 3d.; the other two took home 5s. each. One man earned 3s., and took it all home, having worked at a private job for a foreigner. Fifteen earned nothing in the course of the last week. For the last fortnight nine had earned nothing. There were nine present that had earned something in the last three weeks. “The fortnight before Christmas,” said one, “I didn’t earn 5s. all that fortnight.” “Nor I, nor I,” said several others. On being asked, “Are you compelled to spend half of your earnings in drink?” there was a general cry of, “More than that, sir; more than that.” I asked if men were forced to become drunkards under this system; there was a general cry of, “We are; and blackguards, too.” Seventeen were married men. Of them, 3 had no children; 3 had one child; 4 had 2 children; 2 had 3; 3 had 4; one had 5; one had 6. The men all said, that to get away from the publican would be “a new life to them—all to their benefit—no force to waste money in drink—and the only thing that would do them good.” Many threw away the drink they had from the publicans, it was so bad; they drank Thames water rather. They were all satisfied “they earned 10s. a-week the year through, spending of that sum what they must spend, and what they were induced to spend, from 5s. to 7s. 6d. a-week.” “Another thing,” they said, “if you get a job, the publican will advance 1s.—now and then he may. They hate to give money; there’s trust for as much grog as you like.” All hailed with delight the least possible chance of being freed from the publican. One man said he was compelled often enough to pawn something of his own or his wife’s to go and spend it at the public-house, or he would have no chance of a job. All declare “such a system never was known to have been carried on for years.” Many said, “We shall be discharged if they know we have told you the truth.” They stated that the ballast-heavers numbered between 300 and 400. There were 60 craft, each requiring 4 heavers; and many men were idle when all the others were at work. Thirty were present when I counted the other meeting. A man said there might be three times that number looking for work then, and as many at work belonging to that station alone. In 1841 the census returns showed that there were 170 ballast-heavers; the men assembled declared that their numbers had more nearly trebled than doubled since then. Within the last two or three years many new hands had got to work, on account of the distress in Ireland. The men agreed with the others I had seen that they earned, one week with another, 10s., taking home but 5s. at the outside, and often only 2s. 6d. In answer to my questions they said, the winter is the best season; the trade is very slack in summer. Earnings in winter are pretty well double what they are in summer. Many agricultural labourers work among the heavers in winter, when they cannot be employed on the land. Of this body all said they were sober men till they took to ballast-heaving, and would like to become sober men again. (A general assent.) Three of the men had taken the pledge before becoming ballast-heavers, and were obliged to break it to get work. They had to drink five pots of beer, they declared, where, if they were free men, they would only drink one. When asked if the present system made drunkards, they answered with one voice, “All; every ballast-heaver in it.” Twenty were married men. All their wives and children suffered (this was affirmed generally with a loud murmur), and often had nothing to eat or drink while their husbands had but the drink. It was computed (with general concurrence) that 150 ballast-heavers paid foremen for lodgings, not half of them ever seeing the bed they paid for. About twelve years ago they could earn twice or three times as much as they can now; but prices were higher (12s. per score, for what is now 8s.), and the men were far less numerous. The following is a precise statement of the sums to which each ballast-heaver present was entitled, followed by the amount he had carried home the week before, after payment of his compulsory drinkings, and of what he might be induced to drink at the house of his employer while waiting to be paid:—