The Sun.
London, England, 1842-07-11 00:00:00

TRADESMEN.

Several shopkeepers have given up business on account of the
falling off in their trade, anti the difficulty of getting in debts.
Drapers scarcely sell half the goods they sold in 1838.
Tailors and shoemakers in general have not more than half
employment, and many of them have scarcely a day's work in
a week. The working people are obliged to wear clogs; few
of, them can now afford to buy shoes. The master shoemakers
are not using half the quantity of leather they used in 1838. .
The provision dealers take a third less money in a week than
they took in 1638. The demand for cheese and butter, tea,
coffee, and sugar, has fallen eff exceedingly. The principal
part of the money now expended in provision shops is for meal
and poiatoee.
Butchers who each killed one or two cows per week have
been obliged to join in the purchase of one cow, so that now
the same persons do not sell more than one quarter or half a cow
pvr w eek. The slaying of other cattle has fallen off in like pro.
pot two.
Surgeons, schoolmasters, &c., have great difficulty in ob-
taining payment their labours, and are subject to heavy
losses, and hundreds of children are growing up in ignorance,
because the parents are too poor to pay 2d, or 3d. per week.

PAUPERISM.

In 1939 there were 89 adult out-door paupers and 48
children. The adults were chiefly aged people and widows, and
the children the children of widows.' In 1842 there are 303
adult out-door paupers, most of them able to work, and 315
children.

In 1638 there were 26 in-door •paupers : in 1842 there
are 101.

In the quarter ending June, 1838, 130/. 15s. 141. were paid
for out-door relief; in the same quarter, 1842, 21S/. Ca. 7d.
The rate of relief is much lower now than in 1838, owing to
the number of paupers, and the decreased ability of the rate-
payers_to pay rates.
A rate of one shilling in the pound mow produces 2001. less
than in 1838, owing to the depreciation of property, &c.

He said it was of very great importance that the state of
every place in the country should be made known. If
the Delegation did nothing more than make the condi-
tion of the people known it had effected a great good to
the cause of the people and the cause of righteous le-
gislation. INThtiVallace was to move an amendment
to-night:in the House of Commons, on going into a Com-
mittee of Supply, to the effect that the Corn-laws should
be immediately repealed. He trusted that the debate
would be continued till Thursday, when Mr. Roebuck
was to br ng on his motion. lie thought that the dis-
tress and sufferings of the country could not be impressed
too often, either in the Rouse or out of it, on the minds
of the people.
Mr. Alderman JOHNSON said that Sir Robert Peel had
often argued that the distress in the country could not
be very great when the deposits in the Savings' Banks
were increasing. Noe, though lie (Mr. Alderman John-
son) did not place much reliance on the Savings' Banks
barometer of the people's condition, yet as the argu-
ment had been used by one so high in station, and of such
influence as the Prime Xlinister of England, he would
show the deposits in the Savings' Bank of Derby did not
exhibit a prosperous condition of the people et that dis-
trict. The amount received of depositors from the
20th of November, 1841, to the 20th of May,
1442, was 11,632/. 4s. 2d., whereas the amount paid
to depositors during the same period in sums above
five pounds, was 12,972 L 7s. 2d., thus showing
au account of upwards of 1,000/. more paid out of the
bank than was received. He had some conversation
lately with a farther on the subject of wages, by whom
he was told that the wages he generally gave his
labourers at present were 10Id. per day. He asked it
any tbod were given in addition, and the reply was that
it was 10d. a day and nothing else. There was such a
great supply of labour in consequence of the manufac-
turers not being able to absorb the surplus population,
that work could be obtained at almost any price. That
tsar 10 miles from Derby. There was another village four
miles south of Derby where, unless the trade of the
bla.:kstnith mid the shoemaker came under that head,
there had never been any kind of manufacture, and
where until lately it was very rare for any one to be out of
*nplo,Yinellt. Two or three months ago he was told by
one of the farmers of the village that there were then ten
or a dozen incubi the village, who were employed by the
surveyor of the highway in getting gravel and in break-
ing stones.---(ilear, hear.) In the whole agricultural
district around Derby the people were beginning to feel
deeply the pressure, of the times, and pauperism was
fearfully increasing.
Mr. SIDNEY SMITH said he 110 been informed lately
i
by a Russian gentleman, that n Hassle, the population
7,f which was 45 millions, there Was not a single
pair of
-stockings worn by the common people.—(Hear, hear)
He might also adu that no one in the army under the
rank of a commissioned officer wore stockings, and even
commissioned officers themselves were not invariably ex-
ceptions to the rule. Thus there were 45 millions of
people who were
.onV
_waiting fur the opening of our
ports to becolYfe'dtue-Ctistemers for stockings. Ti„.y
knew very well that when ;once a pepple acquired a taste-
for what to them Was a luxury, i 4 aWll.e-a~~
aaky.—alear.) . _ •

The Rev. ROBERT Z HOMPSON, of Saddleworth, said
the district which he represented was situated on the
borders of Lancashire and Cheshire, in the West Riding
of Yorkshire. The inhabitants were chiefly employed
in the woollen and cotton manufacture. The associa-
tion by which he was delegated to the meeting was esta-
blished as a Reform Association, but it had also taken
up the question of free trade. In that district there were
a great number of persons who occupied small dairy
farms, besides being engaged in manufactures. Those
farms were a great assistance to them. Last Christ-
mas there were 55 farms unoccupied. The wages had
fallen one-third since 1828 and 1832. The number of
insolvencies in the same period was 116. The amount
of liabilities upon 45 of their insolvencies was 653,1001.,
and the average dividend paid upon all of them was
2s. lOid. in the pound.—(llear, hear.) The following
document might be relied upon, as it had been prepared
with great care :
Result of an inquiry into the state of employment of the
labouring population of Saddleworth, in the West Riding of
Yorkshire, carefully made by competent persons on the 20th,
21st, and 29d days of June, 1842, distinguishing those who.
are fully employed from those entirely unemployed, and from
those partially employed.
The entire population of the parish, as per last census, is
16,829, including the inmates of the poor-house, whose
number is now 164, and who, though miserable indeed, are
much better clothed and better fed than the greater part of
the unemployed and partially employed.
Of 8,169 labourers, the total number in the parish, 2.912
were fully employed, 1,828 half employed, 310 one-third em-
ployed, 526 one quarter employed, and 2,583 totally unemployed.
The remaining number of 8,496, not included in this return,
consists almost entirely of merchants, manufacturers, shop-
keepers, innkeepers, artisans, children under nine years of
age, and a few owners of landed property, and professional
men ; and are almost without exception, closely connected with
the interests of trade. In their several degrees, they are all
participating in the sufferings occasioned by the long-con-
tinued depression of, raanufacturing industry. Numbers of
them are gadually and switty sinking into a state of pauperism,
and, owing to' the great depression of property, and' the-utter
impossibility of collecting rents, the landed proprietors are suf-
fering in a degree not exceeded by any other class.
All the manufacturers in that part of the country with
whom he had conversed were of opinion that if they had
a tree trade in corn the workpeople would have imn v-
diate and full employment.—(Hear, hear.) As a minis-
ter of the Gospel, he had observed in his visits amongst
the people of his. district that they were gradually and
fearfully declining in health and strength. In one in-
stance he had met with a poor woman who had become
a lunatic in consequence of the distress in which her
husband and family were involved. The same state of
things existed in the surrounding districts. When he
met his brother ministers the time which was formerly
spent in talking over other matters was occupied in
talking of the distresses .of their respective neighbour-
hoods.

---
The CHAIRMAN said he was glad that gentlemen had
that morning directed a great part of their observations
to the immediate effect of a repeal of the Corn-laws---
(Hear, hear.) Sir James Graham had.last week talked
of an improvement which was to take place in six or
seven years. Here were positive
,statements by men
scattered all over the country—men of business and capi-
tal—men who knew the state of trade; and the demand •
for particular articles—positive statements as to what,
in their opinion, would give employment to the starving
people. Was it not probable that such men were right,
and that Sir James Graham was wrong ?—(Hear, hear.)
It was declared, on all hands, that if the Corn-laws
were repealed, immediate relief would be afforded.
Mr. IBBOTSON said if the Corn laws were repealed he
would take on 500 hands, and guarantee that in 14
days there should not be an unemployed workman in
Sheffield.—(Hear, hear.) This was the proper reply to
Ministers. If they did not know how to remove the
distress they were now told, and they were bound either
to find out some other remedy, or to adopt that which
was suggested.—(Hear, hear.).
Mr. CHAPMAN, of Loughborough, said ,he was per-
suaded, not only from the statements made in the Con-
ference, but equally from what he had seen and heard in
his own district, that the country was in very great peril.
It appeared to him that the safety of this country con-
sisted in the proper exercise and maintenance of the
rights of property ; but the labouring man had rights as
well as the pi ssessors of estates, and if the rights of hun-
ger pressed upon those of the possessors of property, it
was impossible that peace could be maintained. he
following letter, which he had ri ceived from Loughbo-
rough, w ould show the state of feeling in that town :
It is the decided opinion of the manufacturers and of the more
reflecting portion of the working-class here, that a repeal of the
Corn-law would produce immediate relief. I have shcwn your
letter to Alesssrs. Pagets and White, and to your query
on this point they say, " It is our decided belief that
a repeal of the Corn-law would bring speedy relief,
inasmuch as the Americans, who are our best and al-
most only foreign customers, and who could consume im-
mensely mere of our goods than they can pay-for now, would
then immediately send us their corn, and take what goods they
required, which would cause an increased demand for the goods
which they wculd take, and also an increased demand for
goods for our own market, required in consequence of the
American orders and the increased ability of our people to buy
goods for themselties, through the greater cheapness of their
food, which must necessarily fallow the free introduction of it
from foreign countries." In addition to the foregoing opinion
of the above parties, I beg to say that numerous Araerican mer-
chants, with whom we (Paget and White) have dealing, are
uniform in their opinion as to their power to infinitely in-
crease their consumption of British manufacturers, were
they allowed to pay for the same in produce. An
extensive Poston merchant, who is now in this country
shipping his purchases for the winter-trade, told us
a few weeks ago, that were our Corn-laws repealed he
could buy fifty times the amount of British goods he now does;
he said he should at once cease purchasing German and French
goods of such makes as he could get here, and this in conse-
quence of the pow er of the English to consume a vastly greater
amount of American produce in consequence of the limited ex-
tent of our land and our expensive diet, than the cheap provi-
sioned countries of the continent.

Mr. li.tv.moND said he resided for seven years in
America, and from long intercoure with the Americans
he was convinced that. if the Corn-laws were repealed it
would be the means of opening a vast commercial inter-
course between England and America. No people were so
desirous of keeping up a respectable appearance as the
Americans. None were so ready to encourage English
manufactures as they were, and from the reputation
which English goods had acquired in the American mar-
kets he felt convinced that the Engiish manufactures
might have almost the exclusive supply of that country.
Mr. H. ItAwsos then proceeded to make a statement
relative to the distressed condition of the inhabitants of
Colne. Before, however, proceeding to read h:s state-
ment, he would observe that the people of Colne would
have sent a delegate up to this Conference, but that such
was the excited state of the district; that the persons
residing there did not feel it safe to leave their property,
and that was the reasmi why none of them had, attended
the Conference. Mr: 11. Rawson then read the follow
ing statement

" Colne, July 1, 1841.
" The population of this town and township is 8,400 persons.
The progressive increase of distress and destitution, during the
last fifteen months, may in some measure be estimated by the
alarming increase of pauperism. The total number receiving
relief for the quarter ending 25th of March, 1841, as taken
from the Town's-book, was 754. For the quarter ending 25th
of June, 1,133; the quarter in Sept., 1,283; Dec., 1,478.
In March 25, 1842, 1,691 ; June 25, 2,073. Our present
relieving officer has been in office a year and a-halt and he now
states that when he first came, he paid the paupers of Coln*
with IS/. per week, and that he is now paying about 651. per
week, anu it must be observed that in addition to this a very
considerable amount of relief is distributed from the Manufac-
turer's Relief Fund. At the commencement of last winter the
overseers had about bOll/. in hand, but this suns was not only
paid away in addition to the usual sum raised by the current
rates, but the overseers were at the beginning of March last
nearly as much behind, in consequence of which the rate for
the ensui',g quarter was double the amount of any previous!)
levied far several years, the overseers are still very much
behind, and a rate at least equal to the last must be
speedily imposed. The overseers state that the paupers are ir.
the most abject state of misery and destitution, bordering on
actual starvation, having disposed of nearly every article of
furniture, clothing, and bedding, and are now suffering, what
they cannot, and will not long endure. And as to the great
body of rate-payers, including the farmers, they are fast ap-
proaching to a similar situation.
" The depression in trade has now continued so long, and
with such accumulated intensity, that every branch of business is
paralysed in the general calamity. As to the farmers some idea
may be formed of their condition from the fact which is too noto-
rious to escape observation, that they are compelled to sell more or
less of their cattle at every one of our monthly fairs, to enable
them to pay their proportion of the Poor-rates.
" The officers of the town feel confident that if the present
distress continue for only a few months longer the rates cannct
possibly be collected. Aa to cottage houses it is morally hr.-
possible for a large proportion of the tenants to pay any rent
whatever. In this extremity many of the owners who in ordi-
nary times paid the rates fur their tenants, have as might be
reasonably expected ceased to do so, and the tenants being
unable to pay the rates, necessarily increases the weight el
the
_burden on all those who still continue to pay -rates.
" In order to appreciate more fully the state of suffering to
which that large proportion of our population, now dependent
on the poor-rates, are reduced, it is necessary to state that the
amount now given as relief is much less in proportion to their
necessities than was formerly administered; indeed, the over-
seers and relieving officers say the scale of relief now given
cannot be lowered, except at the hazard of reducing the re-
cipients to absolute starvation. In this extremity of suffering,
in which all classes are more or less involved, the very idea of
the near approach of another winter without any improvement,
is truly appalling. Should this idea-be realised, how the means
of subsistence for the suffering masses are to be obtained, and
how the public peace is to be preserved, are problems which
our legislators ought to solve ere the time arrives." •
Mr. Wet. DixoN, delegate from the townships of
Accrington, Church, and Oswaldtwistle, proceeded to
make a statement relative to the distress existing in
the parish of Oswaldtwistle. In that parish old Sir
Robert Peel had originally commenced his career, and
district. the present Right Bon. Barunet possessed considerrble
property
that
he r, w i
upwardst.
o
in
thatd str It
tofd onbeeenthocuasiacnuci
pounds a year from his property in Oswaldtwistle.
The greatest distress prevailed in the parish 'frOm-Varit
of work. There were a great many block-printers in
that parish, who when they were in full employment
earned 20s. a week, but for the last eleven months, in
consequence of want of employment, these persons had
not earned more than 2s, a week. IA visiting
committee had been appointed, and 200 families
had been visited—of these only 100 averaged
Is. per head per week. rn- -one case a family
consisting of eight persons hact only one bed to
lie upon, and that was scarcely worthy of the
name of a bed. In another instance, a family'
con—
sisting of ten persons, bad- but one bed, and
that was some straw on the floor, with the clothes
which they had worn during the day thrown over
them. 'the rates were with difficul ycollected,
the inhabitants of the poor cottages were unable to
to pay any rent, and consequently the landlords-could
not pay any rates for them. A- gentleman of Oswalt's-
twistle had informed him (Mr. Dixon) that t
• he rate-col-
lector had been unable to collect the rate froth twenty-
live farmers, in consequence of the distress they were in,
and of the difficulty they had in collecting the money
clue to them. for milk, butter, The people in tins
neighbourhood were a. sterttly, industrious body, and had
seen better days, but hope was tiliigAt gone, and unless

all restrictions on the importation of grairi were taken
off, and that speedily, they dreaded the approach of an-
Other winter. Something must be done for them.
The Rev. Mr. STANYON, of Melbourne, stated that the
distress existing in Melbourne and its neighbourhood
was most appalling. Melbourne had a population of
3,000 persons; it was a manufacturing village situated
in a rural district. The manufactures consisted of shad
stockings, silk blond, and silk. Wages had depreciated
within the last six years from fifty to sixty per cent.
The value of capital invested in machinery had
depreciated 40 per cent. The result was poverty and
destitution. He knew a case of a family, consisting of
four or five persons, whose united earnings did mot
.amount to more than four shillings a week. In one
family, the members of which attended upon his minis-
try, the mother and the son, who were both reli-
gious characters, told him that now they did not
like to converse on religion, for they found it difficult to
believe, in consequence of the distress and destitution
they were suffering. In the neighbouring village of
Castle Donnington there were likewise hundreds out of
employment. These persons all fully understood the
cause of the misery, which they attributed entirely to
the Corn-laws ; and they were earnestly desirous of co-
operating with this Conference for their removal.
Mr. SUTTON said he . had merely to state, with refer-
ence to the district round the pariah of West Ham, that
the poor-ratea had . recently been very considerably in-
creased, , Up to March. last the rates were 9d. in the
pound.. In the month of March they were called upon
for an increased rate of Is. in the pound, and lately they
had been.called upon for a ls. 6d. rate. They had re-
fused the is. 6d. rate, but agreed to a Is. 3d. rate. Now
the district round was not manufacturing but agricul-
tural. He, therefore; thought it right to make
that statement to the meeting, in order that they should
know that it was not in the manufacturing alone that
the distress prevailed. There was one factory carded
on by John Tucker, and shere the wages of the working
people had been -reducedein on 25- per eent.....Daring the
winter time, in the pariah of West Ham, there was a
subscription raised for supplying the poor with coals,
potatoes, and other things, the necessaries of life, or they
would be in a much more deplorable state. It was very
touch feared, that after the partial employment now offered
them in field labour, they would be in a most deplorable si-
tuation as the winter approached: He would observe, with
regard to the builders in the neighbourhood. They have
now employed fewer hands than ever. With regard to
the shopkeepers, the poor people were obliged to pur-
chase the smallest amount of necessaries they could ask
for. • The builders, as he said before, had hardly any
men employed. With regard to the small houses, a
very great number of them were . untenanted,
and those that were let the landlords had
great difficulty in getting the rent for. He had
thought proper to make this statement, having heard
that it was desirable that the public should be informed
of the increase in the amount of the poor-rates in the
various districts of the country.
A DELEGATE inquired if the population in West Ham
was not partly agricultural and partly manufacturing ?
The CHAIRMAN said that the population was so dense,
that they could not call the small portion connected with
the manufactures a manufacturing district.
Mr. PALMER, of Essex, said, that the agricultural
labourers were in a most deplorable condition. They
obtained partial employment during the summer,-
and during the winter, they remained entirely
unemployed. This population resided near Lon-
don, and the farmers, as they were called, are
market-gardeners ; so that if the agricultural labourers
were prosperous at all it would be in the neighbourhood
of London.—(Hear, hear.) The labourers' wages in
West Ham averaged about 2s. a day. They were not
employed the whole week. If they ,nent to work in the
morning, and it was a wet day, the farmer said he did not
want them that day, they must go home. This happened
two or three times a week, and on Saturday night, instead
of the- man receiving 125., he got perhaps Bs. or 10s. He
(Mr. Palmer) was a shopkeeper in the neighbourhood,
and was perfectly conversant with the state of the labour-
ing people. During the last winter the poor came in for
pennyworths of tea and sugar, when they used to come
for two ounces of tea and a pound of sugar. He often
had his feelings harrowed up in witnessing the scenes
of distress; and he, often in commiseration accommodated
them with things until he could go no farther, as, if they
went behind in the least, they were never able to make
it up again. This proved that the argument that the
Corn-laws were a benefit to the agricultural labourers was
fallacy.—(Cheers.)- They worked badly for the opera-
tive and the agricultural labourer, and of course they
were bad for the whole labouring population. When the
poor were driven to such distress, and when they did get
a little money, was it to be wondered at that they should
fly to beer as a resoure of comfort, for whatever
temperance people might say about there being no
nourishment in beer, yet it was a stimulent. And was
it to be wondered at that they should not heed the ex-
hortation of ministers of the Gospel? Such was the state
of the agricultural population, and he was afraid
unless something were done that it would remain so.
The Rev. Mr. FERGUSON, of Leicester, said that so
great wan the alarm created by the present distressed
state of the country, that the humbler members of his
congregation were constantly asking him whether " they
had risen as yet in Yorkshire, and whether there had
seen any disturbances in the manufacturing districts."
Mr. MoottE wished to say, in confirmation of what
had fallen from Mr. Palmer as to the inefficiency of the
Coin laws to protect agriculturists, that no class was
more distressed than the agricultural population of, Ire-
land. There were no manufactures, it might be said,
in Ireland, and the Corn-laws were established
there as in this country. But under the influence of
those laws the produce of the Irish soil left the country,
and the farmers lived upon potatoes and buttermilk, and
the labourers upon potatoes and salt. Ile believed it was
fully proved that notwithstanding the richnes of the soil of
Ireland, the moisture of the climate rendered it unfit
for the growth of wheat. The most profitable crops
for the Irish farmer would be green crops and flax. • The
result of the present Corn-laws was to encourage the
farmer, under the influence of a fallacious protection, to'
cultivate wheat, which failed in many seasons, and which,
under any circumstances, was exported from the country
tor the payment of rents. Under the present system,
too, the landlords frequently ejected the poor cotters that
they might place their lands in the hands of farmers,
who employed large capital in the growth of wheat. Let
the Corn-laws be repealed, and green crops and flax
would be grown in Ireland, the linen trade would flourish
to an extent never known before, manufactures would
spring up, and other resources, besides the cultivation of
land, would be opened to the people. In what did the
Corns:lawa protect the Irish farmer ? They protected
him in bare feet, ragged clothes, and a wet floor to lie
upon.. They protected him in starvation ; and they pro-
tected the landlord in the right to wring from him every
thing but his starvation. The sooner the people of Ire-
land got rid of such protection the better.—(Cheers.)
The CHAIRMAN intimated to the meeting that- the
time for adjourning had come ; and he wished, previous
to their breaking up; to inform the Delegates that seats
would be provided for them in the House of Lords to
hear Lord Brougham. They would therefore proceed to
the House in a body.
The meeting then adjourned till 11 o'clock to-morrow,

IMPERIAL- PARLIAMENT

(THIS bAY.)

HOUSE OF COMMONS.
The SPEAKER took the. Chair a few minutes before
Four u'Cloek.

KEIGHTLEY UNION.

After a short conversation, leave was given to the
Keightley Union Committee, to continue their sitting
this evening, notwithstanding the sitting of the House.

PRIVATI: BILLS.

The Bishop of Derry's Estate Bill was read a second
time.

The Davidson Estate Bill, the Cleveland Estate Bill
the Fitzwilliam Estate Bill, and several others, were re
ported. _

The Mostyn's, BridFewater, Southampton, Lorton, and
Tweeddale Estates Bills were read a second time, as was
also Verconsin's Naturalisation Bill.
LIVERPOOL IMPROVEMENTS BILL.

The Lords' Amendments to this Bill were agreed to,
and the Bill was pas'sed.
THAMES NAVIGATION BILL.

This Bill was brought down from the Lords withou
an.) amendment.
NEW POOR-LAW BILL.

Mr. ORD presented a petition from a religious So-
ciety against ck rtaiu clauses of the new Poor-law Bill.
Sir HOWARD DOUGLAS presented a petition
from Newfoundland complaining of parts of the constitu-
tion established in that colony in 1832.
NATIONAL EDUCATION (IRELAND).-
Mr. Sergeant JACKSON presented several petitions,
against the present system of National Education in
Ireland.