Education under the Factory Act: reports of inspectors of
factories. 1839
(Parliamentary Papers, 1839, XLII, p. 357; in G. M. Young and W. D. Hancock, eds.,
English Historical Documents, XII(1), 1833-1874 (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1956), p. 357. In addition to the education provided by the National and
British and Foreign Societies, some education was developed under the Factory Act
of 1833. The act stated that children were entitled to two hours of education per day.
Unfortunately, the House of Lords deleted the requirement that the factory had to
provide support for this schooling. As a result the requirement depended upon local
initiative and support. Some factory owners, however, took their educational
responsibilities seriously.)
... But there is one factory school so superior to the rest, and so deserving of being
held up as an example, to be imitated as closely as circumstances win allow, that I
cannot refrain from mentioning it especially; and if the rest of the owners named in
the list were to visit this school, they would, I am sure, at once admit that they have
each something to do to bring their own to an equal degree of excellence. The school
to which I allude is that established in the factory of Messrs. M'Connel & Co., of
Manchester. They have provided a large, well-warmed and well-ventilated room,
suitably and substantially furnished; they have engaged a competent and zealous
master and mistress; reading, writing and arithmetic are taught to the children of
both sexes; the girls are instructed in different kinds of needlework, and excellent
maps are provided, and preparations are now making for teaching geography.
Religious and moral training and habits of order, good breeding, and cleanliness
and attention to neatness in dress have been objects of constant attention from the
commencement, and the owners have it now under consideration to introduce a
more special religious instruction, but which shall, at the same time, in no degree
interfere with the conscientious scruples of the parents of the children, who, it will
readily be supposed, in such a place as Manchester, must belong to various sects.
The children are employed in the mill six hours a day, and attend school three
hours. The school is opened in the evening for the benefit of those above thirteen
years of age, who wish to avail themselves of its advantages when the day's work is
over; and it is at present attended by forty-six voluntary scholars of this description
from the mill. Six of the adult operatives have been selected as a visiting committee,
an arrangement which is attended with many and great advantages. It secures a
superintendence in aid of that of the proprietors, and the schoolmaster has the
satisfaction of knowing that his exertions will be appreciated by those whose good
opinion must be of great service to him. It is, besides, a link of good feeling and
sympathy between the master and his work-people, the want of which is, I am
persuaded, the main source of most of the evils that have been sometimes found to
arise out of the unions and other combinations of the work-people. All my
experience and all my inquiries have led me to the conviction, that the disposition of
the working classes is to look up with respect and regard to their superiors, when
they are kindly and considerately dealt with by them. But when there is an entire
estrangement, when the proprietor of the factory never utters a word of friendly
inquiry about them and their families, when he does not even know the faces of his
work-people, but leaves all intercourse with them to subordinate agents, as is often
the case in great towns, is it to be wondered at that they should believe the interest
of the employer and the employed to be opposed, and that they should seek for
advice any where rather than from their master? Mr. Heathcote, the superintendent
of the Manchester division, in a late weekly report, states, " On Christmas-day I
attended an examination of the children at Messrs. M' Connel's mills, by invitation.
The examination did infinite credit to the children and their teachers, and reflects
the highest honour upon the worthy proprietors."