Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

This crude ranking approximates to perceptions of different occupations.
Unfortunately, inventory totals do not survive to inform us about wealth of those after
1780. People’s aspirations changed over time, so, for example, even the humble labourer’s
clothing and diet changed from 1660 to 1840. Men of certain occupations were more likely
to be literate, but this also changed during the study period. Social status was also
associated with occupations, and for the most part those higher ranked in the table above
were more likely to have served as jurors, churchwardens and overseers. Parish-clerks
were usually from lower down the social scale; many were shoemakers. 27
Throughout the study period individuals can be traced who moved up or down the
social scale for a variety of reasons. Amongst those who were given the opportunity to
move upwards were poor boys chosen to serve a parish apprenticeship. As noted in earlier
chapters, certain trades were also associated with geographic mobility. Educated, gentry
and professional families were likely to move further than poor labourers, but certain trades
such as millers and papermakers often had to move long distances in order to find their next
opportunity. Other groups such as soldiers and pedlars were of necessity more mobile.
Sometimes several members of a certain community moved to seek out better
opportunities, such as the needlemakers from Long Crendon who deserted
Buckinghamshire for the more robust economic opportunities of Redditch’s needle-trade in
the early nineteenth century. Some of these Long Crendon needlemaking families
demonstrate exceptional continuity within the trade, a theme explored below.
27 Perhaps shoemakers were also more able to leave off their shoemaking work to attend to parish business
than a blacksmith or quarryman.
363