#ID: 1860-11-12_article_1
#DATE: 1860-11-12
#TYPE: article
#HEADER: The Needle women of London.
#TEXT: ;;; The Needle women of London.;;; A correspondent of the London Times, describing one of the great mantas-making establishments in that city, communicates the following facts:;;; "Work is commenced every morning at 7 o'clock, and continued until 11 at night — a period of 16 hours--the only intervals allowed being about 10 minutes for each meal-- the total amount of time allowed for — eating their food, I was going to say, but surely 'bolting' it is the more appropriate phrase — being 40 minutes per day; thus leaving 15 hours and 20 minutes as the period devoted to work.;;; And this, be it remembered, is not merely during the busy season, as at the west-end, but for all the year round, from January to December; for you must understand that at the establishment to which I refer the greater part of the sewing is given out to stop-workers in the busy season — and all that is done in-doors is the original cutting out and ultimate fitting together of the separate parts; but when the slack season comes, there is always as much sewing reserved as will keep the girls of the establishment employed up to the full pitch — so that there is, in fact, no 'slack season' at all for them.;;; And yet for this continued and unrelenting pressure of sixteen hours work per day, from year's end to year's end, this firm assume to themselves the greatest possible credit.;;; They thank God that they are not as other firms are at the west-end-- oppressors and destroyers of young women.;;; They never (not even for a few weeks in the busy season) make their people sit up till 3 or 4 in the morning. Oh, no!;;; their gas is always turned off in the work-room by 11 o'clock. Why, sir, the west-end system, with its few weeks of severity, followed as it is by months of comparative leisure, is mercy itself when viewed alongside of this unmitigated 'never-ending, still beginning' slavery, to which I am referring.;;; "The only day of leisure which the girls of this establishment have is Sunday.;;; From Monday morning to Saturday night they are as complete prisoners as any in Newgate.;;; They know not whether the sun shines or the rain falls at that time.;;; They are not allowed to cross the threshold even to purchase a pair of shoes or a new gown for themselves, and must employ their friends outside to do this for them.;;; "Nor is the accommodation in-doors such as in any way to reconcile them to this close confinement.;;; The work-room, in which ten or twelve of them are employed, is only about twelve feet square, and is entirely devoid of arrangements for ventilation, which is the more to be deplored, as during the evening they have to encounter the heat and foul air of three flaming gas-burners right over their heads, every door and window being shut by which a breath of pure air could possibly enter.;;; The bed-rooms are equally uncomfortable, no fewer than six persons being huddled into one, and four into another.";;;