# Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 2/The cost of cottages

THE COST OF COTTAGES.
Some observations that I made on cottage-building, under the title “Home or Hospital,” in the 21st number of Once a Week, have occasioned so many inquiries and remarks, that I feel it right and expedient to adopt a suggestion of one of my correspondents, and relate such facts as I can furnish on the subject of the cost of cottage-building. I cannot explain, nor understand, the statements of some of these applicants as to the cost of good dwellings for labourers; and the wide difference between their estimates and my own experience, and that of several persons who have built cottages in various parts of the country, seems to show that there may be great use, if no great beauty, in a matter-of-fact account of what has been done, and may be done any day.
I have built five Westmoreland cottages, the specifications of which, and the receipted bills for which, lie before me now.
The first was a dwelling for my farm-man and his wife—without children. It was built in conjunction with a wash-house for my own house, and a cow-stable for two cows, with all appurtenances. The cottage consists of two good rooms on the ground-floor, with two large closets—one used as a pantry, and the other containing a bed on occasion. The wash-house has the usual fittings—boiler, pump, and sink, and all conveniences. The cow-stable has stalls for two cows, and a smaller one for a calf: two windows in the walls, and one in the roof: a gutter and drain, joining the one from the cottage, and leading to a manure-tank, which is flagged and cemented so as to be perfectly water-tight, and closed with a moveable stone lid: all the buildings are two feet thick in the walls, which are of the grey stone of the district—mortared in the outer and inner courses, and the cavity filled in with rubble. The cottage kitchen has a range, with an oven; and the bedroom has a fireplace. The cost of this group of buildings was 130l.
The other cottages are, however, more in the way of my inquiring correspondents. The four ​are built in pairs, on a terrace, with a space of a few feet between the two pairs, and a flight of broad steps leading up from below. There is a good piece of garden ground to each cottage.
The walls are two feet thick, and may stand for centuries. The foundations are on excavated rock. The roofs are of Coniston slate, and the corner-stones are from the Rydal quarry. The woodwork being properly seasoned, and duly painted, there is no call for repairs beyond the occasional painting and whitewashing, and replacing of a slate now and then in stormy weather. A more durable kind of property can hardly be. When once warmed through, these dwellings, if well built at first, are warm in winter and cool in summer; and they are perfectly dry, which is not always the case with houses built of stone in blocks—some kinds of stone absorbing moisture.
The kitchens and passages are flagged. One pair has a boarded floor in the sitting-room; the other is flagged. Boards are usually preferred. Each cottage has two out-houses behind—a coal-shed and privy (with a patent water-closet apparatus)—the passage between the house and out-houses being roofed with a skylight. There is a cistern in each roof to afford a fall for the water-closet. Each dwelling has a pump and sink; each kitchen an oven and range; each house has two closets (for which the thickness of the walls affords convenience). There is a fire-place in every room; a fanlight over the kitchen door; a window (to open) on the stairs; a dresser in the kitchen, and shelves in the pantry. Each cottage has a porch, like most dwellings in this part of the country, where the protection of a porch to the house-door is needed in stormy weather.
Such is the character of my cottages. As for their contents—the ground-floor consists of a kitchen, a good-sized, light, cheerful sitting-room, and a pantry under the stairs. In one pair, the living-room is 12 feet 8 inches long by 11 feet 3 inches broad, and 7 feet high. In the other pair, the same room measures 15 feet in length by 12 in breadth. The respective kitchens are 10½ feet by 10, and 12 feet by 10. Up-stairs there are three bedrooms, one of which is convenient for a double-bedded room. The estimate in the contract was 110l. per cottage; but some of the conveniences above mentioned were an after-thought, and cost 7l. per house. Thus, the total cost of each dwelling was 117l. The tenants pay no rates, but a rent of 7l., including the garden ground. These dwellings are in great request, and therefore inhabited by a superior set of tenants, who have, for the most part, done justice to their healthy and cheerful abodes by keeping them clean. They pay their rent half-yearly; and this last Martinmas all had paid before the rent-day arrived.
The nearest cottage to these is one built by a friend of mine, containing a sitting-room with a kitchen-range, a back-kitchen and out-house; and two bedrooms above, each with a fire-place. Cost, 100l. Rent, 5l., exclusive of 5s. for garden-ground.
Ambleside is noted for its building arts, insomuch that its workmen (called “wallers” and “slaters”) are sent for from Manchester, Liverpool, and even, as I am told, London. The wages of the “wallers” or masons, are 4s. a-day; and of labourers, 15s. a-week. The builder of these cottages, Mr. Arthur Jackson, turns out thorough ​good work. It was from him, as well as from another good builder, since dead, that I learned that in this place a substantial cottage of four rooms can be built for 60l.—as I know it can elsewhere. I have now applied again to Mr. Jackson for estimates; and he says that he can undertake to build for 60l. a house of four comfortable rooms, with a pantry under the stairs, and a fire-place in each room. For 100l. he would build one with five rooms, three above and two below, with a scullery. He has never built in brick, because no bricks are seen here, except the few imported for the backs of fireplaces; but he is disposed to think he could build at the same cost in a brick country. Some evidence which I have just received confirms his opinion.
Here is an account of three superior brick cottages lately built in the neighbourhood of Manchester. Each contains the same amount of in-door accommodation as my cottages. The dimensions are:—
* Chief bedroom over the “house-room.”
The cost is, in detail, as follows:
| MATERIAL. | 327£10s.10d. |
| LABOUR. | 327£10s.10d. |
* 327162100100
Or 109l. each. The proportions being preserved, it appears that in Manchester, as here, a good cottage of four rooms, without accessories, can be built for 60l.
Mr. Bracebridge published a notice, some two years since, of some labourers’ cottages built for him twenty years before, which had stood well, and I appeared advantageous enough to recommend afresh. A row of six dwellings, admitting of a common wash-house and other offices, can be built for 500l.,—their quality being as follows:—
House-room, 13 feet by 12; a chief bed-room over it, of the same size. A second bed-room, smaller by the width of the stairs, is over the kitchen and pantry. By spending six guineas more, a room may be obtained in the roof 12 feet by 8, and 8 feet high, lighted from the gable, or by a dormer window. The detailed account may be seen in the “Labourer’s Friend” for November, 1857 (p. 180), and further particulars in a letter to the same publication, dated March 13th, 1858.
The fullest account that I know of, and on the largest scale, of the cost and rent of cottages, is contained in the Report of the Poor-law Commissioners on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Classes, in 1842. The date is rather old; but such change as has taken place in the last seventeen years is in favour of cottage-building, as a speculation, as well as in the quality of the dwellings. The economy, as well as the sanitary condition, is better understood.
At p. 400 of that Report there are tabulated returns from the officers of twenty-four Unions in the manufacturing counties, in which we see (among other particulars) the cost of erection and the rent of three orders of cottages. I can here cite only the extremities of the scales. The lowest order of dwellings, yielding a rent of 3l. 5s. per annum, cost originally from 28l. (at Stockport) to 60l. (at Glossop).
The next order, yielding a rent of 5l. 15s., cost from 40l. (at Uttoxeter) to 90l. (at Burslem and Burton-upon-Trent).
The best class, yielding a rent of 9l. 2s., cost from 75l. (at Salford) to 155l. (at Derby).
At pp. 401 and 402 of the Report, there is a long list of the same particulars, with the cost of repairs, in regard to rural cottages in England and Scotland. The cost of four-roomed cottages varies astonishingly, being as low as 20l. and 25l. in Bedfordshire and Cheshire, and as high as 180l. in Suffolk. The greater number are set down as between 40l. and 100l.
Any reader who refers to these tables will certainly amuse himself with the whole portion of the Report which relates to the cottage-improvement at that time achieved. Nothing will strike him more than the account (at p. 265) of the labourers’ cottages built by the Earl of Leicester at Holkham, in Norfolk, showing what a home the labouring man may have for the interest of 100l., with something additional for repairs; say a rent of 6l, though his kindly landlord asked less. In brief, the tenant has a—
* Three bedrooms above.
In the rear, a wash-house, dirt-bin, privy, and pig-cot: and 20 rods of garden ground. The drainage excellent, and water abundant. For the rest, I must refer my readers to the Report, from p. 261 to p. 275, with the engraved plans and illustrations.
More modern narratives and suggestions abound,—judging by booksellers’ catalogues and advertisements. One of the most interesting notices of the subject that I have lately seen is in the October number of the “Englishwoman’s Journal,” and in letters, called forth by that article, at pp. 283 and 284 of the December number of the same Journal. If these letters disclose a painful view of the ownership and condition of many cottages, ​they are also encouraging in regard to the eagerness of respectable labourers for respectable homes. To an account of tenements of four rooms each, with out-buildings and garden, costing from 75l. to 80l. each, the rent of which is 4l. 10s., the remark is added:—
“The rents are paid up very regularly, so that this Michaelmas, out of twenty-six occupiers, there was not one defaulter.”
This question of the cost of cottages is a very important one,—not only because it is bad for labourers to be charged anything but the genuine price for their abodes, but because there is no chance for the working-classes being well housed unless dwellings of a good quality can be made to pay. At present, unconscionable rents are, on the one hand, extorted for unwholesome and decayed dwellings; and, on the other, it is supposed that nobody but wealthy landowners can afford to build good cottages,—such cottages being regarded as an expensive charity. In my small way, I am satisfied with my investment: I know that other people are: and I believe that it is possible to lodge the working population of the kingdom well and comfortably, without depraving charity on the one hand, or pecuniary loss on the other.
In many—perhaps in most places—however, the first stage of the business is yet unaccomplished. Society is not convinced of the sin and shame of restricting the building of abodes for the working-classes, and of making them pay high rents for places unfit for human habitation. I fear there are many neighbourhoods in England too like, in this respect, to the one in which I live,—where many of the abodes of the humbler inhabitants are a disgrace to any civilised community. If ever there was a settlement favoured beyond others in regard to natural sanitary conditions, it is Ambleside: and if any one spot can be found superior even to Ambleside, it is Windermere (five miles off), where the railway ends, and whence the Lake tourist, on his arrival, overlooks from a height a glorious view of lake, wood, and mountain. In both places there is scarcely any level ground in the whole area. The facilities for drainage cannot be surpassed. There is rock for foundations; and the water-supply is unbounded—unbounded as to quantity, if it were regulated and distributed with any degree of care and good sense. Good soil, good air, great variety of level, and plenty of water,—what more could we ask in choosing a dwelling-place? Yet there is disease, vice and misery which would be accounted intolerable if they came in the shape of inevitable calamity. Instead of general declarations, I will offer a few facts,—omitting at present any notice of such abodes as are private property, in the hope that when reform begins with public property, the owners of cottages and small houses will be awakened to a sense of what they are doing in letting such tenements as many in Ambleside, either by the shame of contrast, or by losing their tenants. While mansions and villas are rising throughout the neighbourhood, one has to wait years to obtain a few yards of ground on which to build a cottage. All possible discountenance is shown to cottage-building: and I have myself been told, many times a year, for many years, that the people could not pay rent for good cottages, and would not take them if they were provided to-morrow. This must be altogether a mistake. There is, as I said, great anxiety to occupy my cottages; and rents of 4l. and 5l. are paid for dwellings of which the following is a true account. They were measured and reported upon a day or two ago.
These houses are endowment property, under the care of the trustees of the school. The trustees do not dispute the condition of the property, nor defend the exorbitant rents they are obliged to demand; but they declare that they find it impossible to obtain from the Charity Commissioners the necessary powers for its improvement. They have repeatedly made application; but the delays, the mislaying of papers, the fruitless trouble incurred, has discouraged them. Meantime, the state of three houses, as examined, is this.
Number One is inhabited by a family of six persons. There is no water-supply whatever. There is no out-door convenience which can be used by decent people. There is no opening in back or sides, and no ventilation at all in the sleeping-place but one small pane, which the mother broke the other day, to prevent the young people being stifled (a danger increased, by the way, by the boys smoking their pipes within doors, even in the mornings). The six sleep in two beds scarcely larger than sofas. The living-room is 10½ feet long by 10 broad, and 7 feet 2 inches high.
Number Two contains a family of eight persons. The conditions as to air, water, and convenience, are the same; the living-room is 10½ feet by 9. The rent is 4l.
Number Three contains a family of six. Conditions mainly the same. The living-room is 7 feet 2 inches in height; but only 8 feet 6 inches long by 7 feet 9 inches wide. The rent is 5l., the same that is paid by my friend’s tenant for an airy, cheerful, well-found dwelling of four rooms and outhouse, on the hill-side.—This is all I will at present say of labourers’ dwellings at Ambleside.
At Windermere a new town has sprung up since the establishment of the railway-station, and the temporary residence of a clergyman of architectural propensities; so that we naturally supposed the new settlement to be peculiarly healthy,—all fresh and new, and set upon a platform, absolutely tempting for drainage. Some weeks ago we were startled by news of a terrible fever—typhoid fever—at Windermere, the schoolmaster being dead, and several other persons who could ill be spared. The mortality between that time and this has been fearful. A good man who lived there desired, a few years since, to carry his large family to Australia. He was too old to go by the aid of the Emigration Commissioners, and his friends lent him the means to go and establish himself, with the intention of sending afterwards for his wife and seven children. He slowly made his way in Australia, has paid his friends, and is now, no doubt, looking forward to the arrival of his family in no ​long time; but, alas! this fever has carried off four out of the seven children. This is the news which is on the way to the affectionate father!
When one inquires the precise cause of the epidemic, one medical man says there is no sufficient house-drainage at Windermere; another says the mischief is owing to the quantity of decomposed vegetable matter—to the swamps, in short, on the platform; while another declares that the main evil is the accumulation of filth. Whether it be any one or all of these, the mortality is chargeable on ignorance or carelessness, or worse.
While such things are happening here, there, or everywhere, every year, it is a matter of no small consequence to ascertain the conditions on which our labouring population may be well housed,—as a matter of business, and not of mere charity; that is, under the steady natural laws of society, and not the fluctuating influence of human sensibilities, which have always more calls upon them than they can meet. When it is ascertained that it answers to labourers to pay from 3l. to 6l. rent, rather than have sickness in the house, and that they may have for that rent good dwellings of from four to six rooms, or equivalent attachments, there will be a manifest decrease in the sickness and mortality of the country.
Harriet Martineau.