Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

less than 1%, but Table 7.6 (baptisms) shows an increased percentage in Period D. 88
Bricks and tiles were now made at several locations, while Tardebigge stone-cutters and
stonemasons dug sandstone, some of which was used in the construction of the Worcester
and Birmingham Canal. 89
Road labourers are listed in the censuses along with a railway
contractor in Beoley. 90
In the building trade all the descriptors met with earlier are still
present and are now joined by the paper-hanger, Charles Edward Cox, who also
advertised as an accountant and appraiser. 91
Textiles, clothing and paper
Tailors and other textile and paper workers were always present in small numbers
in this zone. 92
By the 1841 census tailors comprised some 1.8% of the adult male
workforce and other textile and paper workers 0.4%. 93
As expected, the share for textile
workers fell during the eighteenth century.
Although few tailors left probate, other sources show that they were present in
considerable numbers throughout the two centuries. For the most part tailors were not
wealthy, and one Feckenham tailor received a pauper’s funeral. 94
Most of those in
probate were probably masters running their own businesses, but, unusually, we also find
88 Tables 7.2, 7.4 and 7.6. In Table 7.6 those in the extractive sector were all brickmakers. The 1841
census has a figure of 0.9% of adult males in the extractive sector. VCH Worcestershire vol. iv, p.15, and
Noake, Guide to Worcestershire, p. 27, mention a Stanton family, ‘working colliers or nailmakers’, who
disputed the lordship of the manor of Beoley. If coal-miners, they presumably worked elsewhere. WoRO,
Ipsley (Mount Pleasant) 1841 census lists a miner (presumably visiting) in a lodging-house.
89 White, The Worcester and Birmingham Canal, p. 72. WoRO, Feckenham (Hunt End) 1851 census lists a
stone-sawyer.
90 WoRO, Feckenham and Beoley 1841 census. (The 1851 census has many more road labourers in this
zone than 1841.)
91 Redditch section of Robson’s Birmingham & Sheffield Directory 1839.
92 See Tables 7.2, 7.4, 7.11, and 7.18.
93 See Table 7.8. Baptisms 1813-1840 (Table 7.6) gives a figure of 1.3% for tailors and 0.5% for other
textile workers.
94 WoRO, Feckenham burials, 1684, burial of Arthur Baggett, tailor, poor.
270