The Cotton Factory Times. — 1901-09-06 (Manchester, Greater Manchester, England)

SUICIDE IN THE FACTORY DISTRICTS.  Is tb.o hems° Duo to Driving ? BY J. F. M.  Most people cling to life, especially the young. When young persons begin to make away with themselves the evil has beoome a public scandal and its continuanee a public danger. When the young begin to feel that death is preferable to life, " driving " is merely licensed homicide. Suicide as a means of escape from their sufferings is no new thing to the Lancashire workers. It has always been a feature of factory life. In the wellknown work of Frederick Enrols, describing the "Condition of the Working Class in 1844," a lurid picture of the then existing conditions is given. Writing of the evils allied with the industrial system, he refers to suicide in the following terms "For suicide, formerly the enviable privilege of the upper classes, has become fashionable among the English workers, and numbers of the poor kill themselves to avoid the misery from which they see no other means of escape." Such was the condition of things in 1844, and in spite of the Factory Acts, the growth of trade unionism, and the extension of the franchise, the case is pretty much the same to-day. The frightful alternatives of starvation or torture drive a number of workers oet of their minds, and the words of Engels, written 57 years ago, are true to the facts to-day, for workers still "kill themselves to avoid the misery from which they see no means of escape." A consideration of recent cases raises certain questions of vital concern to the Lancashire people, viz :—(1) Is suicide increasing in the factory districts, and, if so, to what extent? (2) Is " driving" one of the factors in this increase? Is suicide on the increase in Lancashire? To answer this question we will compare two periods— the decade of 1871-80 and the decade of 1891-1900, omitting the last year, the returns for which have ' not yet been issued. The registrar general's returns show that in the ten years 1871-80 the suicides in Lancashire were 2,167, and the nine yease 1891-99 there were 3,413. In the first period the average number of suicides per annum in Lancashire was 216; in the second period the number was 379, or an increase of 183 suicides per annum. In 1871-80 the rate was 68 per living; in 1891-99 the rate was 90 per million; an increase of 22 per million, or nearly one-third more than it was twenty years ago; and this means, taking into consideration the increase in population, a relative increase of nearly 100 suicides per year, or 1,003 per decade more than formerly. This is an apalling increase in a very short time, as everyone will admit. It shows an evil advancing with giant strides, and it shows that the health and sanity of Lancashire people are being rapidly undermined. For where there is one who commits suicide there are a thousand who bear their sufferings with fortitude, and the figures show that numbers who have hitherto borne the strain are beginning to succumb. The figures as given, however, do no tell the worst. To get to know the full evil we must compare them With the figures for the whole of England and Wales, and then we lied that not only is the rate of suicide in Lancashire increasing to a vast extent, but that it is increasing at a greater speed than the general rate throughout the country, as will be seen from the following facts. The general rate of suicide in England and Wales daring the years 1871-80 was 70 per million, in 1891-99 it was 89 per million, an increase of 19 per million during the last 20 years, while the increase in Lancashire has been 22 per million, or three more than the general average. That " driving " is one of the causes of suicide has been demonstrated on many occasions. In the last result the physical and mental conditiou of the individual depends on the mode of life and environment. The man is simply what his life or work makes him. All work which imposes too great a strain upon the nervous system first weakens and finally shatters it. This morbid condition is transmitted, and the final result is a neurotio generation characterised by the pathological conditions of insanity and suicide. The increasing strain of modern life, the increasing concentration in industrial centres, the decreasing rural and increasing urban population, the perpetual tension to which mind and body are subject, often in the midst of a vitiated atmosphere, all tend to create a morbid condition of the nerves. Add to this that medical science now keeps alive a number of weakly people who transmit an impaired body and an unhealthy mind to their offepring, and we have a faint ides of the main causes that lead to impaired vitality in general. In the industrial regions of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire these causes are operative to an intense degree. Nowhere does machinery run so swiftly, nowhere is industry carried on at a higher pressure, nowhere is more work done in a less time, nowhere is the wear and tear of nerve-fibre so great, nowhere is the strain of life more exhausting. The strain that factory work implies words can but faintly depict, "And all these hours—ten hours a day— a spinner and weaver are on their feet; no sitting down, no waiting, no resting, one must keep up to the machinery, though agonised with headache, or troubled by any other complaint. While the machine runs the workers must stand; the machinery cares nought for fatigue, weakness, ailment, sorrow, anxiety for sick husband, wife, or child at home; grief for a dear one's death maybe the night before; with the motion of the spindles and shettles no human min or woe must interfere; the workers most leave their heart and soul at home when they go to the factory. . . . Sometimes the torture is worse than the treadmill ; one must keep the pace—or—but there is no alternative." (" Effects of the Factory Sytem.") And then, as if this were not enongh, often come "driving," the last straw that breaks the camel's back, the last burden that breaks the worker's heart ; the limit of endurance is passed, the cord snaps, the mind breaks down, and the unhappy worker brings his sufferings to a premature end.  There is not the slightest doubt that, to a certain extent, the increase in the rate of suicide in Lancashire is due to "driving." The rate of suicide in the County Palatine is above the average, and for this excess " driving must to some extent bear a share of the odium. Flow far "driving" is responsible for the excess it is, of coarse, impossible to compote, but if only six people annually are driven to suicide directly or indirectly as a consequence of "driving," that in itself would amount to half the excess above the average rate throughout the country.