THE

FLEET PAPERS.

NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS.

H. COLWELL's answer to H. CAYLEY's leller, next week.

A GENTLEMAN COMMONER, County Prison, Gloucester.—If possible, next week.

A CLERGYMAN, Bucks, Wishes to be satisfied that Mr. Oastler is correct in his argument upon the RIGHT to Rents depending upon the RIGHT of the poor to support. If the reverend gentleman will be at the pains to examine the argument as it stands in the Fleet Papers, he will find all doubts on the subject removed. If there be a failing link, let him show it.

A FRIEND TO THE NEW POOR LAW, Southwark, Denies that the New Poor Law is a step to no Poor Law at all. That such is the object of the projectors of the New Poor Law. is so selfevident, it would be waste of time and paper to say much more about it. No wonder that "A Friend to the New Poor Law" is anxious to get rid of that alarming fact. Let A Friend to the New Poor Law" settle the matter with Lord Brougham. When his Lordship says that Mr. Oastler is mistaken, it will be time enough for Mr. Oastler to reply. CHARLES JONES, Richmond.-Mr. Oastler is always gratified by the perusal of his letters. But why not call at the Queen's Prison? A written explanation on the subjects mentioned in Mr. Jones's letter of Sept. 21, would occupy a whole Fleet Paper. Mr. Öastler does not pretend to be a teacher" on ** the currency question"; he is willing to learn; and when he has mastered the subject, he would not object to become a teacher." Mr. Oasiler is obliged to Mr. Jones for Lord Western's letter, which he has perused. Mr. Oastler's opinion is. (but many gentlemen who have devoted years to the study of the question differ from him) that the standard is the evil. Lord Western "never imagined that the measure originated in any quarter, from any sinister motive." Now, Mr. Oastler believes that the standard was cunningly calculated and fixed to answer the purposes of the monied class. He believes that Sie Robert Peel well knew what the consequences of the measure would be, and that, knowing so, he gave his influence to that standard.

It was but the other day, a friend, who was intimate with the Premier's father, informed Mr. Oastler of the following conversation between the father and the son, communicated to him by the late Sir Robert Peel.

Sir R. Peel, Sen.-" You are little aware of the confusion you will cause in the country by your Cash Payment Bill. You will reduce the value of land one half."

Sir R. Peel, Jun.-"I do not care, father, I will carry it."

Oh, Yes, Sir Robert Peel was not the fool that Lord Western imagines.

are regularly published every SATURDAY, at 2d. each; also every four weeks, in Parts, containing four Numbers, at 9d. each.

A few copies, bound in cotton, of Vols. 1 and 2 of the Fleet Papers, at 10s. each volume, may be had of the Publishers, or of Mr. Oastler, at the Queen's Prison.

JOHN PAVEY, 47, HOLYWELL STREET, STRAND.

"MR. OASTLER.

"On Tuesday week we had the pleasure to spend a couple of hours, in his cell in the Queen's Prison, with this powerful and talented gentleman; and his admirers and friends in this county will be glad to learn that he is in the enjoyment of as good health as he ever was in his life. He assured us, that since it had pleased Providence to throw him into prison, he had never been more happy in his life; that during the whole time he had not had one unkind word or look from living mortal; and what made his imprisoned hours more sweet was, that his amiable and excellent wife had never uttered one murmur. When we left him at the gate, we fully intended giving him another call, and promised that we would do so; but, alas! we forgot that he was subjected to the cruel and arbitrary rules of mortal man. When we called the evening before leaving town, we were told there was no admittance, as the time for visits for that day was passed. Ah, Oastler, a few years ago, when your eloquence in the manufacturing districts, in defence of the oppressed, thrilled our heart, little did we think that such advocacy would bring you to be separated by bolts and bars from the world at large, and that your friends could only see you at such hours and times as a keeper' willed it.”—The Wakefield Journal, Sept. 8, 1843.

TO MR. RICHARD OASTLER, QUEEN'S PRISON.

13 Charlotte Street, Hope Town, Bethnal Green, Sept. 13. 1843. Sir,-Enclosed is the letter which I on Monday promised to send you. You will perceive by the postscript, that liberty has been given to communicate it to all persons who may be interested in the subject of its contents. As many of your readers are deeply interested in the subject to which the letter refers, its publicity will not only be gratifying to them, but perhaps be productive of some good. The Petition to which the letter has reference breathed the same spirit as does the Memorial, but with this exception-the Petition did not pray for inquiry, but prayed the Legisla1ure to enact such laws as would protect the petitioners against the influences of unrestricted machinery, against foreign competition, and, above all, against the destructive influence of home competition.

I remain, Sir,

Your very humble servant,

W. E. BURROUGHS,

Secretary of the Broad Silk Hand-loom Weavers of Spitalfields.

TO MR. W. E. BURROUGHS.

No. 20, Charles Street, Berkeley Square, August 16, 1843. Sir, I was prevented by indisposition from attending the House of Lords on Tuesday last, but I presented yesterday your Petition, and stated, that I had received a table which had been communicated to the Board of Trade, and had calculated the averages; that in consequence of the removal of the prohibition there had been a fall, since 1825 to the present year, of 54 per cent. on the prices paid for weaving 16 sorts of velvet, and of 45 per cent, on 11 sorts of other silk articles; that by the repeal of the Spitalfields Act, there was a difference of 34 per cent. in one case in the prices paid by masters for weaving the same article, and of 39 per cent, in another case, and that the average weekly earnings upon velvet were 9s. 9d. per week, and upon mantua less than Ss, 6d. 1 added, that if the Board of Trade did not institute an inquiry and did not grant redress, I might consider it my duty, in another Session, to bring the subject before the House of Lords. I mention these circumstances, as they are not noticed in a newspaper which I have seen, and as you might not otherwise be informed of them.

I am, Sir,

Your obedient, humble servant,

STANHOPE.

PS.-You are of course at full liberty to communicate this letter to all persons who may be interested in the subject.

TO THE RIGHT HON. THE LORDS OF THE PRIVY COUNCIL OF TRADE. The Memorial of the Operative Broad Silk Hand-loom Weavers of Spitalfields and its vicinity, Hambly showeth,-That your memorialists baving received from your right hou. committee a letter dated August 3, 1843, stating that the memorial of the Broad Silk Hand-loom Weavers of Spitalfields and its vicinity had been under its consideration, and that the Government would not Defuse its assent to the desire for an inquiry, if it be entertained by the operatives of the Spitalfields trade in general; are earnestly solicitous that such desire should be fully and satisfactorily established. In order that the Government may be fully convinced that it is really the desire of the general body of the Broad Silk Hand-loom Weavers of Spitalfields to have their case inquired into, your memorialists have not only appended their names to this their memorial, but will also anost respectfully lay before your right hon. committee a more replete statement of some of the causes which have led to the misery and degradation of a majority of your memorialists. That your memorialists may not Le misunderstood by your right hon. committee, as to the causes to which they have alluded, they deem it proper to state, that some of the more remote causes of their

depressed condition are, first, the vast increase of machinery, which, being unrestricted in its use, has superseded such a vast amount of manual labour that the consumption falls far short of the production; and, second, the repeal of the prohibition laws, which allows foreign manufactured articles, of various descriptions, to be imported, which, together with the machinery, causes such a diminution of employment, as to force an apparent superabundance of hands in the labour market. The want of more severe laws with respect to the punishment of smuggling, adds much to the evils already mentioned. But your memorialists conceive, that the chief and immediate cause of their depression (arising in a great measure from the operation of the two before-mentioned causes) is to be found in the downward and ruinous system which allows the unprincipled manufacturer, by paying so much below others of respectability for the same description of work, to rise into opufence upon the starvation and misery of your memorialists, the injury of the honourable manufacturer, and the destruction of trade.

more

There is one circumstance, above all others, which your memorialists are desirous of deeply impressing upon the minds of your right hon. committee, and that is, that in the face of a active demand," for a certain description of goods, which was the case only a few weeks since, a reduction in wages of your memorialists was effected by the principal houses in Spitalfields, so that your memorialists have no hope of amelioration from a “more active demand" for their labour. The incalculable benefits which your memorialists derived from the operation of the Spitalfields Acts, and the prohibition laws, by which all could live in comparative comfort, by their honest industry, are stik fresh in their recollections. They have marked, since the repeal of the said laws, the fearful approaches towards free trade, with all its demoralizing and brutalizing influences, such approaches having caused premature deaths innumerable, and deprived very many of those now in existence of their once comfortable homes. Your memorialists are therefore forced to the conviction, that while there is no law to prevent the unprincipled from taking every advantage of the defenceless, they might as well expect probity and all the other virtues to be exercised by notorious robbers, as expect, while there is so much temptation, anything like uprightness either from the unprincipled manufacturer, or the unprincipled workman. Unless there be laws to restrainunless there be laws that will protect the weak against the strong-the respectable and honest against the violence and cruelty of the unprincipled, the annihilation of your memorialists, and the annihilation of all order and security, must be the ultimate consequences. The solemn convic tions of your memorialists are not the result of theoretical argument, but are grounded on the practical operation and bitter experience of nearly twenty years.

Under all these melancholy circumstances, your memorialists are anxiously desirous of having an opportunity of proving, before any commission or committee that may be appointed, in the case of the Frame-work Knitters or otherwise, the truth of, more especially, their chief statement, relating to the destructive influence of Home competition.

And your Memorialists, as in duty bound, will ever pray, &c.

TO MR. RICHARD OASTLER, QUEEN'S PRISON.

7, Camden Villas, Kensington, August

My dear Sir, In page 263, line 8, of No. 33 of the Fleet Papers, you say, "I think I have produced sufficient to alarm those landlords who have dared to make prisoners (not vassals,) of their poor brethren claiming relief."

I will not delay a moment to write to you, to say, that I believe you understate the case here, and that many of the Queen's free subjects are made vassals, and are really under the position of slaves, under the New Poor Law, with this exception--that they may always go away and starve, or steal, or rob, if they prefer it.

This is a subject that has been long on my mind, before and since I became a guardian of the poor of this parish; but I do not know whether I can yet address myself to it properly. The theory of maintaining able-bodied destitute poor by providing work for them, is at present all moonshine.

The wages of a labourer in these parts are estimated by members of our board, who are supporters of the Poor Law, at 12s. per week on the average; and the wife of such labourer is supposed to be able to earn, if not ill or encumbered by an infant, 6s.; therefore in all a family may have for its support 18s.; and it is supposed, where there are three or more children, they can scarcely get on with less.

Now, if a man and his family are compelled to enter the workhouse, each individual is calculated to cost the union about 4s. per week. If, then, a man and his wife and two children enter the workhouse, the cost of their maintenance is 16s, and the man may be supposed to be pretty fairly dealt with, in respect of the return given to him for his labour, which becomes the property of the parish. But if a single labourer enters the house, he only receives or costs the union 4s. a week, whilst the union derives all the advantage of his labour, and pockets all his earnings above that sum. Is not this something like reducing a man to the situation of a vassal? Is this honest or proper? A vassal, a serf, or a slave, belong to their master or to the soil, to the lord of the soil: they have no property in their labour-they receive food, raiment, and shelter as their master thinks necessary for them, and to his advantage—they have nothing for ornament and comfort, nothing for the education of their children, nothing for charity, nothing for medicine, nothing for religious worship, but what their master permits them. They are better off that many an English labourer under the New Poor Law, because their master has an interest in keeping them strong and healthy. The relief given to labourers under the New Poor Law, is not sufficient to keep them in healthit is not sufficient to provide them with fuel, and shoes, and other clothing necessary for preserving health; it is just sufficient to enable them to protract a miserable existence in dirt and penury, exposed to every temptation to crime, and to many attacks of disease in its most acute and terrible, or subtle and destructive forms.

An out-door labourer, for instance, earns Sd. a day, and a loaf of bread per week for every

head in the family; for breaking stones or chopping wood at the workhouse, a single man earns, therefore, weekly 4s. and a loaf; a married man, 4s. and two loaves; a married man with a child, 4s. and three loaves; a married man and three children, 4s. and five loaves; or, supposing the loaf worth 6d., 6s. 6d. per week: he cannot get lodgings under 2s. or 2s. 6d. per week: evidently, therefore, he is not maintained by labour found for him by the parish; but the parish relies on his being assisted by the benevolence of his wealthy or poorer neighbours, or upon his earning an odd shilling or two on Sunday, or after the regular hours of work, or upon his pilfering. If he is seen begging, even at the age of eighty, he may be forced in to endure the discipline of the workhouse. The only set-off to this is, that if he or any of his family fall ill, he is supplied with medical relief. In certain cases, also, the wife may be expected to earn her 6s., in which case the family would earn 12s. 6d. per week, which is 5s. 6d. less than the sum acknowledged to be sufficient to maintain a family of five persons, or 5s. 6d. less than will maintain seven persons, allowing two more loaves for the additional two ehildren.

The answers I receive to these observations are such as follow: "We don't want these fellows to work for us-the parish gains nothing or very little for their labour. If the parish only pays one in-door pauper 4s. for his work, it must be recollected sometimes we have a family of seven, which cost us 28s."-The first argument is a cruel mockery, because if these "fellows" were not obliged to come, they would not work for the parish for so small a pittance. The other argument proves the improvident management of the destitute labourer and of destitute families under the New Poor Law, but not the justice of that management. The poor are obliged to suffer for the improvidence of their governors. This rule is wrong.

The Poor Law Commissioners, I am told, desire that no pauper should be employed in the workhouses, at any craft, but persons at regular wages. If the intention of these gentlemen is that the paupers who are now so employed should receive, or be allowed, on their leaving the house. a balance equivalent to such wages, they deserve credit for this desire. But I am afraid their real object is to prevent any excuse for a small allowance of beer, which is now given to the persons whose services we make use of at 4s. per week, as laundresses, carpenters, tailors, shoe-makers, &c.-to compel us to employ other persons who are not paupers; and so to reduce us to the folly of entirely wasting the relief of the paupers, by employing them on unprofitable works.

Sir. you must know, old as you are, you have yet a wrinkle to acquire in this age of simplicity, and of philosophy of the Edinburgh school, and that is, that paupers must not be employed in any way so as to interfere with the labour-market. How this is to be done, Heaven only knows. The New Poor Law, however, may go a step further, by making them destructives. This will improve the labour-market. The "efficient and energetic" board of guardians of this union had, before I came into office, hit upon the following notable plan:-They purchased 1007. or 2001. worth of granite at ready money, employed their paupers to break it, spent, in addition, about 301. per quarter or more for hammers, &c., and returned the broken granite for the same money, at three months' credit. Incredible and absurd as it may appear, I assure you this is a positive fact. Such is the madness of the spirit of brutal oppression. The granite is of no use to us, but we take it under the vulgar and coarse idea of preventing the destitute from applying for relief, for fear of the hard work provided for them.

To return to the subject of vassalage. A lord has sometimes power of life and death over his vassal, or he can punish him for refusal to work, or if he runs away. Under the New Poor Law, a man is not punished for running away, but for taking the workhouse clothes with him, or for deserting his wife and family. If he refuses to work, he is taken before the magistrate and punished. He cannot be hanged or beheaded; but if he will not submit to our rule, he must perish of want or disease, or commit some offence, to be punished by imprisonment, exile, or death.

Can it be fairly questioned, then, that under the New Poor Law not all, but many of the freeborn subjects of the Queen, are reduced to a state very nearly resembling vassalage, if not to vassalage itself, nay, worse than vassalage?

You must remember that we have the Poor Law Commissioners' authority for it, that this is an "efficiently" conducted union; and I believe I may add, that we are generous compared with other parishes and unions,

The usual amount of relief we give to a single pauper out of the house is a 1s.. one pound of meat, and one loaf of bread, per week-in value, at present, of about 1s. 10d. To respectable persons above sixty or seventy, we sometimes allow 2s. 6d,; and to persons above eighty years of age, very often 3s. We have, however, many persons from sixty to ninety-three years of age in the workhouses.

With regard to imprisonment, the guardians have no power, except as a board, to order any one to be kept in or go out of the workhouse-the master alone can determine, except in cases where the board give positive orders. We can only individually recommend the master to "confine" or let out a pauper. It depends, therefore, on the spirit of the board, or of the master, what degree of liberty is given to the paupers; the Poor Law Commissioners having ruled (Article 24) that paupers may be allowed to quit the workhouse for some urgent or special reason. The spirit of the system is undoubtedly a spirit of confinement. I hope the guardians of unions are not generally throughout the country tyrannical enough to carry it out. I found, however, the other day, a young female in our workhouse who had an illegitimate child, and she had not had liberty to leave the workhouse inore than three times for eighteen months or two years! Oh! the gallantry of the British Sovereign and British Parliament!-oh! the courage of the British Lion!-oh! the vile era of the rule of the Poor Law Commissioners. I remain, dear Sir,

Yours truly,

JOHN PERCEVAL.

CONCORDIUM PRESS, HAM COMMON, SURREY.

THE

FLEET PAPERS.

THESE Papers are principally intended for the perusal of the friends of Christianity and the Constitution; particularly the Clergy and the Aristocracy, and of all persons who are possessed of Properiy. The object of the writer will be to explain the reason for the present alarming state of English society, and the consequent insecurity of life and property; also to offer some remarks upon the folly and wickedness of attempting to uphold our Institutions, particularly that of Private Property, by the unconstitutional means of Centralization, Commissioning, Espionage, and Force; finally, to state his own views on the best mode of restoring Peace, Contentment, Security, and Prosperity, to every rank of the people of England.

The author is perfectly aware of the fact, that every Parliamentary leader is Now only attempting to legislate for the present moment-putting off the evil day -making laws "from hand to mouth," in the hope that some unforeseen, fortunate event may enable succeeding Statesmen to legislate for permanency. He is also convinced that there is a mode of successfully re-establishing our Institutions upon their original foundation-Christianity;-and that that is the only way to preserve them from the encroachments of political partisans, who are now paving the way to universal Ruin, Anarchy, and Despotism.

NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS.

J. J. B. As soon as possible.

THE

FLEET

PAPERS

are regularly published every SATURDAY, at 2d. each; also every four weeks, in Parts, containing four Numbers, at 9d. each.

A few copies, bound in cotton, of Vols. 1 and 2 of the Fleet Papers, at 10s. each volume, may be had of the Publishers, or of Mr. Oastler, at the Queen's Prison.

I cannot too strongly recommend the following to the notice of invalids. WILLIAM and his wife are treasures in a sick house.-R.O.

VILLIAM and SARAH DODD take this opportunity of returning thanks to their friends in general, and beg to acquaint them, that in consequence of the death of the gentleman with whom they have lived for the last six months, they are now in want of a situation.

They would be most happy to engage with any elderly or invalid lady or gentleman who might require their united services as nurse, cook, and housekeeper, and general assistant. They would have no objection to town or country, or to take charge of a set of chambers. W. and S. D. have no encumbrance; and the most satisfactory testimony as to character and ability will be given by the friends of the deceased gentleman with whom they have lived.

Address (post paid), William Dodd, 2, Elizabeth Street, King's Row, Walworth.

LONDON:

W. J. CLEAVER, 80, BAKER STREET,

PORTMAN SQUARE;

AND

JOHN PAVEY, 47, HOLYWELL STREET, STRAND.