The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-12-19
sTITCH. STITCH. sTTTCH.
The Poor Sewing-Women of New York City
Who Sing the Song of the Shirt.

VINO sing INC song OF liz ShlTIs
New York Herald.
When Thomas Hoods poetic soul, angered at
the inhuman manner in which INDECENT English
seamstresses were treated by their employers,
inspired him to produce his immortal Song Of
the Shirt England responded to his cry for
justice and vowed that the evils which he de-
plored should be at least mitigated, if not abol-
ished. A similar appeal to humanity seems to
be desirable in this city just at present, at least
if one is to judge from the heart-rending story
which a prominent merchant told a Herald re-
porter yesterday afternoon.
six dollars and ffty-three cents is nice pay
ment for making POI shirts, is it motif was the
indignant question. as he pulled a pay-book
from his pocket and showed the figures i'll black
and white. NO, | am wrong; the m
employers paid $7.75, but you must deduct from
that $l.22 for car fares. and then you have $Go3
for making 29I shirts. Who was fool enough to
accept the job2 III tell you. A man came here
from Silesia about fifteen months ago, with his
wife and two children. He IS a bright, intelli-
gent fellow, about forty years old, and has
worked for some years on a railroad in Germany.
He brought with him two sewing ma
chimes, aud he and his wife man
aged to support themselves for some
months by making shields and caps. When
the demand for these articles ceased he sought
other employment, but was unable to find any.
At last a friend told him that a firm in East
Fifty third street would be willing TO employ
him at making shirts. He jumped at the idea,
went to the firm, got the material for the shirts
and set to work at once, after he had provided
himself with cotton thread and other necessaries.
That was On Nov. 26. From that day until
Dec. 9. he and his wife an / another woman, who
provided a third sewing machine, worked from
9 in the morning to II at night, and at the end
of the time they had finished 29l shirts and had
received 81. IS.
He lived in Brooklyn. at a considerable dis
lance from the ferry, and had to pay a consider
able sum in car fares. The agreement was that
he should receive thirty cents for every dozen
shirts. and on Nov. 26 he took three shirts to his
employers, expecting to be paid at the rate of
two cents and a half a shirt. But how could he
be paid the odd half cent? Would his employers
be magnanimous enough to give him eight cents
instead of seven and a halfl Quite the contrary.
They paid him seven cents Instead of seven and
a half cents, his lawful due. On Dec. 8 he took
eight dozen shirts to his employers, and received
81. 40; on the 9TH be took another eight dozen,
and received So. Ga, the increased wages being ac-
counted for by the fact that these shirts required
to be finished better than the others, and on the
9Th he took a third eight dozen, aud received the
same amount as for the preceding lot.
81 saw him after he had taken his last eight
dozen, and he told me his story. L got his pay
book from him and showed it to several infuen-
tial gentlemen of this city. Knowing the price
they have to pay for shirts, they could hardly
believe that any employer would be so mean as
to ask men and women to make them for D cents
each. l told them that the mans wife could not
support her children on such starvation wages.
'GN '61 C'AA@oo ~ So SN0Af NNh tiA- AANiA1N 4AOAl
some charitable ladies in Brooklyn. then went
to a prominent labor bureau and requested the
proprietor not to any man or
woman, however badly off he or she might be,
to take employment from this firm at such a
rate of payment, and finally [ promised the
man whose case attracted my attention to the
matter to do my best to get him some job better
than that one. He is an honest man. and he
says that it would break his heart to see his
children selling newspapers on the street. That
was the reason why he accepted such badly
paying work. If the Herald will only give due
prominence TO this story Hoods hopes may be
says
And in a voice of dolorous pitch,
Would that its tones could reach the rieh)
She sang the song of the shirt.
mot even the most stony-hearted employer
would dare to pay a man and two women for
thirteen days labor such a miserable sum as
this firm paid Regen and his fellow-workers, if
the matter were known to the public"