The Victorian era saw a rise in the lace-making industry. But this had a dark side, especially in rural schools in some parts of Northamptonshire.
Lace schools were essentially cottage workshops where children, mostly girls, were taught to produce bobbin lace – but in reality they functioned more like child labour camps than schools.
Reverend Thomas Mozley was the new curate for a Northants village called Moreton Pinkney in 1832. He was horrified by what he found! About 30 children were “packed in a small room” from six in the morning until six in the evening, all year round.
They sat in tight groups around candles and were forced to stay at their lace pillows continuously, making fine lace for commercial dealers.
One account of some of the scenes from these places were Dickensian – rows of little girls in a Moreton Pinkney lace room, all in clean print dresses with bare necks and arms so that the mistress’s cane would sting more.
The lace-mistress ruled with terror. In one account, a five-year-old orphan named Lydia arrived at the lace school weeping (her parents had just died of smallpox). The initially sympathetic mistress quickly hardened – as soon as the child’s tears fell on the lace thread, the mistress “forgot all pity, struck her six times over the head, and rubbed her face on the pins” of the lace pillow.
Beyond physical abuse, the labour expectations were punishing. Children in the lace school toiled roughly 10 hours a day. They had a quota of about 600 pins per hour to stick into their lace patterns, and if a child fell even five pins short by the end of the day, she would be forced to work an extra hour as penalty.
In order to keep up the pretence that these place deserved to be called “schools”, the lace-mistress might put in some token efforts to appear like she was trying to educate her subjects.
- Many lace schools began the day with a short prayer or reciting a psalm — this was often the only reading aloud done.
- Some schools had the letters of the alphabet pinned up or chalked onto a board. Children might occasionally be asked to repeat them — but not taught to read in any structured or useful way.
- When a clergyman or inspector visited, lace mistresses sometimes had children recite a verse or spell a word to give the impression of education — but this was staged.
Sources
Jack Preston 