Britain changed a lot in the 1700s. By
1745 Britain was one of the richest and most powerful countries in the world!
In 1707 England and Scotland had joined together to make Great Britain! As if
this wasn't enough Britain had a series of new royal families – twice!
Britain had a huge empire and controlled
large parts of America and Canada
Trading cloth, spices, tobaccos, and food
had made Britain rich
Britain had the biggest navy and the best
battleships in the world
Britain had a Prime Minister and
political parties like we have today
The Parliament changed the rules about
who could rule Britain. Roman Catholics were not allowed to rule... this meant
James VII and his son James Francis could not be kings. Instead their closest
Protestant relatives were allowed
First the Protestant nephew of James VII,
William of Orange became King, and later a relative of Queen Anne, the German
George of Hanover, took the throne.
As had happened among the Dutch, shifting
religious beliefs and rising commerce was accompanied by a decline in demand
for religious uniformity
The orderly
cosmos described by Isaac Newton in the late 1600s was seen as a model for
government organization. With Copernicus, Galileo and Newton a new optimism about
the benefits of learning had arisen among intellectual
elite, in conflict with the old and common belief that the world was a mystery
never to be fathomed by humanity. Many continued to believe in God's
interventions, including people who believed in science, but the belief that
the world functioned solely by God's magic was starting to decline, as was the
belief that all humanity needed to get by was spontaneity and proper religious
attitude.
Britain was
becoming more literate. Personal correspondence and other forms of writing were
on the rise. Literate folks gathered in groups interested in science or
literature. A variety of learned journals were published. Book production
increased, and so too did newspaper distribution. More people believed in the
efficacy of literacy. In Scotland in 1700 around 45 percent the population
could read, and by the end of the 1700s it would rise to 85 percent. England's
literacy rate in this period would rise from 45 to 63 percent.
But for ordinary people life was still very hard. If you couldn't work you did not get paid and went hungry. If you were ill and couldn't pay a doctor you would die.
Improving Commerce
Until the 1720s,
England's population growth had been held in check by periodic harvest failures
and by diseases such as influenza, smallpox, dysentery and typhus. At around
5.25 million in 1720, England's population would be around nine million at the
end of the century. London's population in this period rose from around 700,000
to over one million. This was a larger population than that of Paris.
France had more than
three times England's population, but Britain was taking a lead in commerce –
ahead also of the Dutch, which was economically progressive but had a fraction
of Britain's population: a little less than 2 million in 1720. With the rise in
Britain's commerce, London had become a busier place and had been gathering
more people from England's rural areas and from Scotland, Wales and Ireland.
And London also had migrants from Germany, Holland and France. London had
become a great center for the arts and fashion.
In the 1700s England had
an agricultural output that was "at least twice that of any other European
country, and was to continued so until the 1850s" (Appleby,The
Relentless Revolution, p. 83). And this benefited development in
general.
Early in the century,
Thomas Newcomen created a steam driven piston in a cylinder, used for pumping
water from mines. However, Britain remained largely unadvanced in technology.
Watches, for example, were still inaccurate curiosities. People kept time by
the ringing of church bells. And more importantly, Britain was still dependent
on waterpower. But in the 1700s, productivity and real wages were inching
upwards. People's lives were improving materially. They were able to get more
in return for their labor. Britain was exporting more grain than it was
importing. Britain was a big producer of woolen cloth, and it led the world in
maritime trade.
Trade with India made
available new fabrics. English men and women had begun wearing lighter and
brighter clothing instead of heavy wool and linen. A new interest in variety
and consumerism had developed. The idea that it was okay to find delight in
buying things was taking hold. With the rise of a cultural of trade, investing
in trade, and the rise of consumerism, Christian asceticism was in decline. The
Puritanism of Cromwell's time had faded. So was adherence to the biblical
admonitions regarding the accumulation or lending of money.
Thinking was loosening
up. Joyce Appleby writes that like other European societies in England "a
censorship system was in place, but unlike them, it was rarely enforced."
More people were writing, and there were more readers becoming accustomed to
discussion. Silence while accepting authoritarian admonitions was not the
virtue that it had been when there was less change and availability of variety
and novelty. "Elsewhere in Europe," writes Appleby, vigorous
censorship stifled the emergence of a reading and talking public. Everywhere
there was fear of disorder."
In England a spirit of
enterprise was growing. Writes Appleby: "Self assertive individuals did
the innovating in England whether they were improving farmers and landlords,
joint-stock trading company managers, interloping merchants, cheese mongers, or
professional lenders."
According to Appleby, by
the end of the 1600s, "Those who promoted the market economy were greatly
aided by a public discourse about how nations grow wealthy. Efficiency,
ingenuity, disciplined work, educated experimentation all became a part of a new
ethic."
It was in this
environment that the Scottish philosopher Adam Smith (1723-90) wrote his
book the Wealth of Nations, published in 1776.
With the new hussle and
bussle of English life, people were accepting a higher taxation than was common
elsewhere, from which came appreciated services that were a part of that
hussle-bussle. Taxes in Britain were orderly rather than the haggling that existed
elsewhere – while economic success in England, according to Appleby, was
demonstsrating the benefits that accrued from "allowing men and women to
make their own self-interested choices."
Class and
Power
Class privilege
remained, with most men unqualified to vote because of a land qualification
law. A few owned much of the country's agricultural land. Some others owned
small farms. Some people rented land from the big landowners, giving the
landowner a share of the wealth they produced. And many others labored for
wages on the landowner's property and were able to graze a pig or a cow on the
village common.
Religious Organization
and Politics
Religious organization
remained an issue as Great Britain moved into the 1700s. The dominant religious
body remained the Church of England (the Anglicans), which conservatives
considered the orthodox faith. The Church of England was favored by England's
landowning elite, and parliament's House of Lords was an Anglican preserve.
Referring to the Church of England, the conservative political party, the
Tories, was also called the 'Church' party.
Presbyterians,
Congregationalists, Baptists and Quakers were called Dissenters. In England in
1689, religious pluralism had been legalized, but the Blasphemy Act of 1698 had
made denial of the Trinity punishable by imprisonment. Denying that
Christianity was the truth or denying the authority of the Scriptures was also
made illegal. But these laws were rarely invoked. In England, the last
execution for heresy had been in the early 1600s, and the last to have been
executed in Scotland for heresy was a nineteen year-old student at Edinburgh in
1698.
From 1710 to 1714,
conservatives tried to revive the union between the state and the Church of
England. They feared that if people were left free to choose their religion
there would be a dramatic spread of Dissenters. Also they thought that
religious disunity was an affront to God, that it threatened the salvation of
individuals and national security. Some Anglican conservatives also blamed
crime and vice on religious disunity. But the conservatives failed to pass
their legislation. In the 1720s they also failed in their effort to strengthen
the laws against blasphemy.
To the surprise of the
conservatives, the number of Dissenters remained stagnant. The Church of
England remained dominant in rural England, in the universities and in grammar
schools, while the Dissenters remained strongest in the cities and with the
middle class. And from the Anglicans a small new denomination emerged. Two
Anglicans at Oxford University, John Wesley and George Whitefield, started a
movement dedicated to nurturing spirituality through prayers, devotional
readings, self-examination, fasting, frequent communion and good works, which won
them the nickname of Methodist.
Catholics remained a
persecuted minority, largely clustered in remote parts of the country, as
Protestants remained fearful of plots to bring Catholicism back via England's
enemies abroad – Spain or France.
Protestant "dissenters"
continued to be able to run for a seat in parliament, but their representation
there was small, and Dissenters did not enjoy legal equality with the
Anglicans. A law passed in 1753 held that only marriages performed by an
Anglican clergyman were legal. Dissenters might be denied the right of burial
in a churchyard. They might receive discriminatory consideration in a court of
law. And Dissenters had to pay a special tax.
Values, Crime and
Punishment
People in Britain drank,
gambled and fought duels. Moralists worried about the rise in sexual
promiscuity and a decline in family values. They preached on the need of women
to resist men inflamed by libertine principles and pornographic literature and
the need of women to remain virgins until marriage. Prostitution was rampant. A
German visitor to London complained of passing a "lewd female" every
ten yards on a December evening along Fleet Street, including girl prostitutes
as young as twelve.
Crime was increasing with
the advancing economy. In London were habitual offenders and gangs of
delinquent youths. Responding to crime, politicians made more offenses
punishable by death. Capital crimes numbered in the dozens, including horse and
sheep stealing and shoplifting to the value of five shillings. But rather than
being hanged, many deemed guilty of a capital crime were sent to the Americas.
English Law
English law had been
created across centuries. It was a gathering of complexities and contradictions
– void of elegant simplicity. The influence of Roman law on English law
remained a rumor – Roman law used only occasionally as a mere ornament to the
considerations of jurists. Law in England was drawn from English experience,
and it was criticized for its anomalies, complexity, uncertainties, its
slowness, its tedious forms, its confounding of simple matters into confusing
language that helped enrich lawyers at the expense of honest people.
In the mid-1700s, a
lawyer named William Blackstone made a name for himself writing and lecturing
in praise of English law. And in writing about the law he improved it. He tried
to bring the law into conformity with science and the age of reason. Blackstone
mapped the law's tortuous complexities and depicted the nation's constitution
and laws as a reflection of the natural order of the cosmos and the nation's
development across history. British law and liberty he wrote was the
"noblest inheritance of mankind."
Blackstone approved of
law which held that husband and wife were one person and that the husband was
that person. In other words, Blackstone approved of law that held that a wife
had no right to own property in her own name and that the wages she earned
belonged to her husband.
Blackstone was not
without his contradictions. He claimed that the power of parliament was
absolute and elsewhere in his work that the legislature could not destroy human
rights. But he advanced the use of such phrases as crimes and misdemeanors, ex
post facto law, due process and judicial power. Blackstone denounced slavery as
inimical to "natural rights" and to British law. He advanced the idea
that the instant any slave landed in England he or she was free. And acting on
general principles of "God-given right," English law, he claimed, protected
"a Jew, a Turk or a heathen as well as to those who press the true
religion of Christ." He described freedom of the press as "essential
to the nature of a free state." And trial by jury he called the
"glory of the English law."
In England the idea was
widespread that common people had rights. It was an idea too among people in
England's American colonies.
Jacobitism
Refers to the political movement
in Great Britain and Ireland to restore the Roman
Catholic Stuart King James II of England and his heirs to
the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland. The movement took its name from
Jacobus, the Latinised form of James, and refers to a long series
of Jacobite risings between 1688 and 1746.
Jacobite ideology comprised four main tenets: The divine right of
kings, the "accountability of Kings to God alone", inalienable
hereditary right, and the "unequivocal scriptural injunction of
non-resistance and passive obedience",though these positions were not unique
to the Jacobites. What distinguished Jacobites from Whigs was their adherence
to 'right' as the basis for the law, whereas the Whigs held to the idea
of 'possession' as the basis of the law. However, such distinctions
became less clear over time, with an increase in the use of contract
theory by some Jacobite writers during the reign of George I.
Jacobites contended that James II had not been legally deprived of his
throne, that the Convention Parliament and its successors were not legal.
Scottish Jacobites resisted the Act of Union 1707, while not recognising
Parliamentary Great Britain Jacobites recognised their monarchs as Kings of
Great Britain.
The Glorious Revolution
The 1745 Jacobite rising
really began in 1688 when King James II (also called James VII in Scotland)
lost his crown and was replaced by his own daughter and his Dutch nephew! This
was called the Glorious Revolution. How did this happen?
James was not very
popular. He believed in something called Divine Right. This means that he
thought God had made him king and that he didn't have to listen to anyone!
James followed a
different religion to most of his people. He became a Roman Catholic while his
people stayed Protestant. The people feared he'd make them all Roman Catholic
too! This was a big deal at this time. People were scared of Roman Catholics
taking over!
James' daughter Mary was
still a Protestant. She had married her Dutch cousin William, who was also
James' nephew! William was also a Protestant
Important people in
government asked Mary and William to come to England with William's army and
get rid of James! The people were happier with a Protestant royal family
In 1688 William and Mary
became rulers of England and Scotland
King James did have his
friends though. They didn't like the idea of a foreign king and wanted James to
come back.
The Act of Union
Another
reason for the Jacobite rising of 1745 was a law called the Act of Union. The
Act was signed in 1707 and joined England and Scotland together to make Great
Britain. Before then Scotland and England had always been different countries. What
did this mean?
For many
years Scotland and England had shared the same rulers but remained as separate
countries
The Act of
Union was planned to make the two countries a lot closer
Many Scottish
people were unhappy with this idea. They thought England was bullying Scotland!
When the
Scottish Parliament eventually signed the Act there were riots in the streets
of Scotland.
Many Scots
became Jacobites because they thought the Stuarts would get rid of the Union
and make Scotland a separate country again
Some people
did like the Act though. Scotland became a richer country and many people made
huge amounts of money.
The 1715 Jacobite Rising
There had already been a Jacobite rising before Bonnie Prince Charlie started one. In 1715 Bonnie Prince Charlie's father, James Francis Stuart, came to Scotland and tried to get the thrones of England and Scotland back.
The 1715 Jacobite Rising
There had already been a Jacobite rising before Bonnie Prince Charlie started one. In 1715 Bonnie Prince Charlie's father, James Francis Stuart, came to Scotland and tried to get the thrones of England and Scotland back.
In 1714 the Queen of
Britain, Queen Anne, died without any children to take over. She actually had
18 children but they all died before she did!
The Jacobite friends of
James Francis wanted him to be the next King because he was Anne's closest
relative
But James Francis was a
Roman Catholic and British Protestants did not want him!
The crown was given to
the closest Protestant relative of Anne's in stead. Anne's German relative
George of Hanover was offered the throne after Anne died.This made the
Jacobites very angry!
The new King, George I,
could not speak English and was very unpopular
In 1715 James Francis
arrived in Scotland and raised a Jacobite army
The Jacobite Rising was
very badly planned though. James Francis also became ill and eventually the
rising failed
Many Jacobites felt that
had the Rising been better planned they could have won and put the James
Francis back on the thrones of England and Scotland. When Bonnie Prince Charlie
tried again in 1745, many Jacobites thought they could win this time.
THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
Intellectual climate
Newcomen and other inventors benefitted from the intellectual climate. "Britain was characterised by the free expression of new ideas," says Professor of History Jeremy Black from Exeter University.
Over the previous 100 years, a cascade of scientific breakthroughs had swept across the country. Sir Isaac Newton was able to explain the force of gravity for the first time. Robert Boyleshowed that air and gas had physical properties.
There was a prolific exchange of scientific and technological ideas. And Britain, unlike many European countries, did not suffer censorship by Church or state.
It was the Age of Reason. The established Christian view, of a world created by God, was being challenged by one which conformed to scientifically proven principles of nature.
Alongside the new discoveries was a growing movement of people, trying to find practical applications for these new discoveries.
Men of action and men of ideas, industrialists and scientists - often from very different backgrounds - met to share their ideas and observations, in what was to be called the Industrial Enlightenment. They unleashed a wave of free thinking and creativity.
Matthew Boulton owned an engineering works in Birmingham. Together he and James Watt - a self-taught Scottish scientist - began to manufacture more efficient steam engines.
Boulton & Watt became the most important engineering firm in the country, meeting considerable demand. Initially this came from Cornish mine owners, but extended to paper, flour, cotton and iron mills, as well as distilleries, canals and waterworks.
Eric Svedenstierna, a prominent official of the Swedish Iron Bureau, reported in 1803 his impression that steam engines "are as common in England, and are found in far greater numbers, as are water and wind mills with us".
This sense of progress even attracted painters to capture potent industrial scenes, such as the ironworks depicted in Coalbrookdale By Night.
Fundamental Shifts in Social Structure
This was the Industrial Revolution. Hundreds of thousands of miles of roads, railways and canals were built. Great cities appeared and scores of factories and mills sprang up.
The industrialization of Europe, like the
French Revolution, left a permanent mark on society. Life as it was described
in the 18th century changed drastically; classes shifted, wealth increased, and
nations began assuming national identities. Describing this industrialization
as a revolution is apt - despite the longer timeframe involved, the social
consequences and economic changes that the world has faced because of
industrialization easily equate the political effects that any of the European
revolutions had. The changes can not be underestimated in importance to society
today.
Until the
early 18th Century, most people lived off the land as they had done for
countless generations - an agricultural existence, defined by the harvests and
the seasons, and ruled by a small political and social elite.
But in the
150 years that followed, there was an unprecedented explosion of new ideas and
new technological inventions which created an increasingly industrial and
urbanised country.
With the advent of industrialization, however, everything changed. The new enclosure laws—which required that all grazing grounds be fenced in at the owner's expense—had left many poor farmers bankrupt and unemployed, and machines capable of huge outputs made small hand weavers redundant. As a result, there were many people who were forced to work at the new factories. This required them to move to towns and cities so that they could be close to their new jobs. It also meant that they made less money for working longer hours. Add to this the higher living expenses due to urbanization, and one can easily see that many families' resources would be extremely stretched.
With the advent of industrialization, however, everything changed. The new enclosure laws—which required that all grazing grounds be fenced in at the owner's expense—had left many poor farmers bankrupt and unemployed, and machines capable of huge outputs made small hand weavers redundant. As a result, there were many people who were forced to work at the new factories. This required them to move to towns and cities so that they could be close to their new jobs. It also meant that they made less money for working longer hours. Add to this the higher living expenses due to urbanization, and one can easily see that many families' resources would be extremely stretched.
As a result, women and children were sent
out to work, making up 75% of early workers (Stearns). Families were forced to do this, since
they desperately needed money, while factory owners were happy to employ women
and children for a number of reasons. First of all, they could be paid very
little, and children could be controlled more easily than adults, generally
through violent beatings. Children also had smaller hands, which
were often needed to reach in among the parts of a machine. Furthermore,
employers found that children were more malleable, and adapted to the new
methods much better than adults did. Children were also sent to work in mines,
being small enough to get more coal and ore from the deep and very often unsafe
pits (Stearns). They could also be forced to work as
long as eighteen hours each day. For these reasons, children as young as
eight years old were sent to factories—usually those which manufactured
textiles—where they became part of a growing and profitable business.
This unprecedented growth and profit was
another social change that occurred during the Industrial Revolution. The laissez-faire approach taken by the government—and advocated
by philosopher-economist Adam Smith—allowed capitalism to flourish. There were little or no
government regulations imposed upon factory policies, and this allowed the
wealthy, middle-class owners to pursue whichever path was most profitable,
regardless of the safety and well being of their workers. This relentless
pursuit of money caused another important social change: the ultimate breakdown
of the family unit.
Since workers, especially women and
children, were labouring for up to eighteen hours each day, there was very
little family contact, and the only time that one was at home was spent
sleeping. People also had to share housing with other families, which further
contributed to the breakdown of the family unit. As a result, children received
very little education, had stunted growth, and were sickly. They also grew up
quite maladjusted, having never been taught how to behave properly (Sadler). The living conditions were indeed
horrible; working families often lived in slums with little sanitation, and
infant mortality skyrocketed. During the early Industrial Revolution, 50% of
infants died before the age of two (Stearns).
However, the social changes that took
place were not all negative. Most classes eventually benefited in some way from
the huge profits that were being made, and by 1820 most workers were making
somewhat better wages. The "widespread poverty and constant threat of mass
starvation…lessened, [and] overall health and material conditions of the
populace clearly improved" (Porter). The government, however, did have to
eventually intervene in order to put an end to child labour and other
unacceptable practices.
Reforms Implemented due to Social Conditions
Until
the publication of the Sadler Report in 1833, the poor social
conditions in Britain went largely ignored by the ruling classes. It was
commissioned in 1832, and the Sadler committee undertook a great investigation
into the various aspects of life for the working classes, hearing testimony
from members of the working class. The Sadler Report eventually found evidence
of human rights abuse and terrible working conditions, suggesting that reform
had to be implemented to avoid general social unrest (Habermab).
Before
the Report, governments were averse to the implementation of reforms based on
their strict policy of laissez-faire, a large part of
the liberalism that the government found sacred. After its
publication, however, the British government was forced to act. Following is a
list of the various reforms implemented due to the social and working
conditions in Britain.
Year
|
Act or Investigation
|
Terms
|
1802
|
Health and
Morals of Apprentices Act
|
|
1833
|
Factory Act
|
|
1844
|
Factory Act
|
|
1847
|
Factory Act
|
|
1850
|
Factory Act
|
|
1853
|
Factory Act
|
|
1860
|
Bleach and
Dye Works Act
|
|
1864
|
Factory Acts Extension Act
|
|
1878
|
Factory Act
|
|
Dissent
in England
The
Luddites
It
was in 1811 that the most outspoken and violent movement to protest the
Industrial Revolution began. In the first few months of that year,
manufacturers in the city of Nottingham began to receive threatening letters
from the mysterious "General Ned Ludd and the Army of Redressers."
Workers of the area, angry at employers who were reducing wages and even
replacing experienced employees with unskilled (and therefore less expensive)
laborers, began to revolt, breaking into factories and destroying hundreds of
stocking frames in the space of a few weeks. The concept became known as Luddism, and over the next year the
movement spread throughout the industrial centres of England. Damages inflicted were generally
restricted to the destruction of factories and mills, but did occasionally
extend to violence against people, including the killing of William Horsfall,
the owner of a large mill in the area of Yorkshire (Luddites - the machine
breakers).The government's reaction to Luddism was quick and crushing. A reward of
£50 was offered to anyone who could provide information about the Luddites, and
in February of 1812 a law was passed making the destruction of machines a
capital offence. Twelve-thousand troops were sent to protect factories in
Nottingham and other regions where Luddites were active; at least 23 people
were executed for attacks on mills in the summer of 1812, and many others were
deported to Australia. Although some violence continued, the Luddite movement
in England had disintegrated by 1817.
Peterloo
Although English officials had managed to repress the violence of the Luddites, they could not stop the discontent that was growing across the country. Workers became interested in politics for the first time, demanding better working conditions, less corruption in the government, and universal sufferage. In 1819, a "reform meeting" was arranged to take place in Manchester on August 16th where two radicals, Henry Orator Hunt and Richard Carlile, were to speak (The Peterloo Massacre). The public assembly at St. Peter's Field drew a crowd estimated at 50 000 people, which worried the city magistrates and induced them to call in the military to quell a potential riot. The Manchester Yeomanry responded and, led by Captain Hugh Birley, charged into the docile crowd, killing eleven people and wounding 400. It was later said that many of the soldiers had been drunk at the time but the British parliament supported the troops, and several of the event's organizers were charged with unlawful assembly and sentenced to time in jail. The event became known as the Peterloo Massacre, in a reference to Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo.
Although English officials had managed to repress the violence of the Luddites, they could not stop the discontent that was growing across the country. Workers became interested in politics for the first time, demanding better working conditions, less corruption in the government, and universal sufferage. In 1819, a "reform meeting" was arranged to take place in Manchester on August 16th where two radicals, Henry Orator Hunt and Richard Carlile, were to speak (The Peterloo Massacre). The public assembly at St. Peter's Field drew a crowd estimated at 50 000 people, which worried the city magistrates and induced them to call in the military to quell a potential riot. The Manchester Yeomanry responded and, led by Captain Hugh Birley, charged into the docile crowd, killing eleven people and wounding 400. It was later said that many of the soldiers had been drunk at the time but the British parliament supported the troops, and several of the event's organizers were charged with unlawful assembly and sentenced to time in jail. The event became known as the Peterloo Massacre, in a reference to Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo.
Effects on the Rest of
the World
The quick
industrialization across Europe during the 19th century led to a great increase
in goods produced as well as a demand for raw materials.
This demand, coupled
with increased nationalist pride, led nations to seek colonies abroad in which
to produce and trade goods.
The main expansion for
the European colonial powers occurred in Africa. By 1914, the entire continent
with the exception of Liberia and Abyssinia were controlled by European nations.
England also took
control of India and Hong Kong during this period of expansion. By the
beginning of WWI, England had an empire which stretched across every continent
in the world. Vast amounts of natural resources were extracted from these
colonies, which aided the British industrial effort but left many of the
nations bankrupt
In short,
industrialization in Europe had far reaching consequences for the rest of the
world. While it made Britain the ultimate power for over a century, it can be
argued that its rule over the world caused conflict and internal strife which
continues to this day.
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