London Labour and the London Poor: Selection (Classics)

by Henry Mayhew

  ‘I’ve been in the “fried” trade ever since, except about three months that I tried the sandwiches. I didn’t do so well in them, but it was a far easier trade; no carrying heavy weights all the way from Billingsgate: but I went back to the fried. Why now, sir, a good week with me – and I’ve only myself in the trade now’ [he was a widower] ‘is to earn 12s., a poor week is 9s.; and there’s as many of one as of the other. I’m known to sell the best of fish, and to cook it in the best style. I think half of us, take it round and round for a year, may earn as much as I do, and the other half about half as much. I think so. I might have saved money, but for a family. I’ve only one at home with me now, and he really is a good lad. My customers are public-house people that want a relish or a sort of supper with their beer, not so much to drinkers. I sell to tradesmen, too; 4d. worth for tea or supper. Some of them send to my place, for I’m known. The Great Exhibition can’t be any difference to me. I’ve a regular round. I used to sell a good deal to women of the town, but I don’t now. They haven’t the money, I believe. Where I took 10s. of them, eight or ten years ago, I now take only 6d. They may go for other sorts of relishes now; I can’t say. The worst of my trade is, that people must have as big penn’orths when fish is dear as when it’s cheap. I never sold a piece offish to an Italian boy in my life, though they’re Catholics. Indeed, I never saw an Italian boy spend a halfpenny in the streets on anything.’

  A working-man told me that he often bought fried fish, and accounted it a good to men like himself. He was fond of fried fish to his supper; he couldn’t buy half so cheap as the street-sellers, perhaps not a quarter; and, if he could, it would cost him 1d. for dripping to fry the fish in, and he got it ready, and well fried, and generally good, for 1d.

  Subsequent inquiries satisfied me that my informant was correct as to his calculations of his fellows’ earnings, judging from his own. The price of plaice at Billingsgate is from ½d. to 2d. each, according to size (the fried fish purveyors never calculate by the weight), ¾d. being a fair average. A plaice costing 1d. will now be fried into four pieces, each 1d.; but the addition of bread, cost of oil, &c., reduces the ‘fried’ peoples’ profits to rather less than cent, per cent. Soles and the other fish are, moreover, 30 per cent, dearer than plaice. As 150 sellers make as much weekly as my informant, and the other 150 half that amount, we have an average yearly earning of 27l. 6s. in one case, and of 13l. 13s. in the other. Taking only 20l. a year as a medium earning, and adding 90 per cent for profit, the outlay on the fried fish supplied by London street-sellers is 11,400l.

  Of the Street Trade in Baked Potatoes

  [pp. 181–3] The baked potato trade, in the way it is at present carried on, has not been known more than fifteen years in the streets. Before that, potatoes were sometimes roasted as chestnuts are now, but only on a small scale. The trade is more profitable than that in fruit, but continues for but six months of the year.

  The potatoes, for street-consumption, are bought of the greengrocers, at the rate of 5s. 6d. the cwt. They are usually a large-sized ‘fruit’, running about two or three to the pound. The kind generally bought is what are called the ‘French Regent’s’. French potatoes are greatly used now, as they are cheaper than the English. The potatoes are picked, and those of a large size, and with a rough skin, selected from the others because they are the mealiest. A waxy potato shrivels in the baking. There are usually from 280 to 300 potatoes in the cwt.; these are cleaned by the huckster, and, when dried, taken in baskets, about a quarter cwt. at a time, to the baker’s, to be cooked. They are baked in large tins, and require an hour and a half to do them well. The charge for baking is 9d. the cwt., the baker usually finding the tins. They are taken home from the bakehouse in a basket, with a yard and a half of green baize in which they are covered up, and so protected from the cold. The huckster then places them in his can, which consists of a tin with a half-lid; it stands on four legs, and has a large handle to it, while an iron fire-pot is suspended immediately beneath the vessel which is used for holding the potatoes. Directly over the fire-pot is a boiler for hot water. This is concealed within the vessel, and serves to keep the potatoes always hot. Outside the vessel where the potatoes are kept is, at one end, a small compartment for butter and salt, and at the other end another compartment for fresh charcoal. Above the boiler, and beside the lid, is a small pipe for carrying off the steam. These potato-cans are sometimes brightly polished, sometimes painted red, and occasionally brass-mounted. Some of the handsomest are all brass, and some are highly ornamented with brass-mountings. Great pride is taken in the cans. The baked-potato man usually devotes half an hour to polishing them up, and they are mostly kept as bright as silver. The handsomest potato-can is now in Shoreditch. It cost ten guineas, and is of brass mounted with German silver. There are three lamps attached to it, with coloured glass, and of a style to accord with that of the machine; each lamp cost 5s. The expense of an ordinary can, tin and brass-mounted, is about 50s. They are mostly made by a tinman in the Ratcliffe-highway. The usual places for these cans to stand are the principal thoroughfares and street-markets. It is considered by one who has been many years at the business, that there are, taking those who have regular stands and those who are travelling with their cans on their arm, at least two hundred individuals engaged in the trade in London. There are three at the bottom of Farringdon-street, two in Smithfield, and three in Tottenham-court-road (the two places last named are said to be the best ‘pitches’ in all London), two in Leather-lane, one on Holborn-hill, one at King’s-cross, three at the Brill, Somers-town, three in the New-cut, three in Covent-garden (this is considered to be on market-days the second-best pitch), two at the Elephant and Castle, one at Westminster-bridge, two at the top of Edgeware-road, one in St Martin’s-lane, one in Newport-market, two at the upper end of Oxford-street, one in Clare-market, two in Regent-street, one in Newgate-market, two at the Angel, Islington, three at Shoreditch church, four about Rosemary-lane, two at Whitechapel, two near Spitalfields-market, and more than double the above number wandering about London. Some of the cans have names – as the ‘Royal Union Jack’ (engraved in a brass plate), the ‘Royal George’, the ‘Prince of Wales’, the ‘Original Baked Potatoes’, and the ‘Old Original Baked Potatoes’.

  The business begins about the middle of August and continues to the latter end of April, or as soon as the potatoes get to any size, – until they are pronounced ‘bad’. The season, upon an average, lasts about half the year, and depends much upon the weather. If it is cold and frosty, the trade is brisker than in wet weather; indeed then little is doing. The best hours for business are from half-past ten in the morning till two in the afternoon, and from five in the evening till eleven or twelve at night. The night trade is considered the best. In cold weather the potatoes are frequently bought to warm the hands. Indeed, an eminent divine classed them, in a public speech, among the best of modern improvements, it being a cheap luxury to the poor wayfarer, who was benumbed in the night by cold, and an excellent medium for diffusing warmth into the system, by being held in the gloved hand. Some buy them in the morning for lunch and some for dinner. A newsvendor, who had to take a hasty meal in his shop, told me he was ‘always glad to hear the baked-potato cry, as it made a dinner of what was only a snack without it.’ The best time at night, is about nine, when the potatoes are purchased for supper.

  The customers consist of all classes. Many gentlefolks buy them in the street, and take them home for supper in their pockets; but the working classes are the greatest purchasers. Many boys and girls lay out a halfpenny in a baked potato. Irishmen are particularly fond of them, but they are the worst customers, I am told, as they want the largest potatoes in the can. Women buy a great number of those sold. Some take them home, and some eat them in the street. Three baked potatoes are as much as will satisfy the stoutest appetite. One potato dealer in Smithfield is said to sell about 2½ cwt. of potatoes on a market-day; or, in other words, from 900 to 1,000 potatoes, and to take upwards
of 2l. One informant told me that he himself had often sold 1½ cwt. of a day, and taken 1l. in halfpence. I am informed, that upon the average, taking the good stands with the bad ones throughout London, there are about 1 cwt. of potatoes sold by each baked-potato man – and there are 200 of these throughout the metropolis – making the total quantity of baked potatoes consumed every day 10 tons. The money spent upon these comes to within a few shillings of 125l. (calculating 300 potatoes to the cwt., and each of those potatoes to be sold at a halfpenny). Hence, there are 60 tons of baked potatoes eaten in London streets, and 750l. spent upon them every week during the season. Saturdays and Mondays are the best days for the sale of baked potatoes in those parts of London that are not near the markets; but in those in the vicinity of Clare, Newport, Covent-garden, Newgate, Smithfield, and other markets, the trade is briskest on the market-days. The baked-potato men are many of them broken-down tradesmen. Many are labourers who find a difficulty of obtaining employment in the winter time; some are costermongers; some have been artisans; indeed, there are some of all classes among them.

  After the baked potato season is over, the generality of the hucksters take to selling strawberries, raspberries, or anything in season. Some go to labouring work. One of my informants, who had been a bricklayer’s labourer, said that after the season he always looked out for work among the bricklayers, and this kept him employed until the baked potato season came round again.

  ‘When I first took to it,’ he said, ‘I was very badly off. My master had no employment for me, and my brother was ill, and so was my wife’s sister, and I had no way of keeping ’em, or myself either. The labouring men are mostly out of work in the winter time, so I spoke to a friend of mine, and he told me how he managed every winter, and advised me to do the same. I took to it, and have stuck to it ever since. The trade was much better then. I could buy a hundred-weight of potatoes for 1s. 9d. to 2s. 3d., and there were fewer to sell them. We generally use to a cwt. of potatoes three-quarters of a pound of butter – tenpenny salt butter is what we buy – a pennyworth of salt, a pennyworth of pepper, and five pennyworth of charcoal. This, with the baking, 9d., brings the expenses to just upon 7s. 6d. per cwt., and for this our receipts will be 12s. 6d., thus leaving about 5s. per cwt. profit.’ Hence the average profits of the trade are about 30s. a week – ‘and more to some,’ said my informant. A man in Smithfield-market, I am credibly informed, clears at the least 3l. a week. On the Friday he has a fresh basket of hot potatoes brought to him from the baker’s every quarter of an hour. Such is his custom that he has not even time to take money, and his wife stands by his side to do so.

  Another potato-vendor who shifted his can, he said, ‘from a public-house where the tap dined at twelve’, to another half-a-mile off, where it ‘dined at one, and so did the parlour’, and afterwards to any place he deemed best, gave me the following account of his customers:

  ‘Such a day as this, sir [Jan. 24], when the fog’s like a cloud come down, people looks very shy at my taties, very; they’ve been more suspicious ever since the taty rot. I thought I should never have rekivered it; never, not the rot. I sell most to mechanics – I was a grocer’s porter myself before I was a baked taty – for their dinners and they’re on for good shops where I serves the taps and parlours, and pays me without grumbling, like gentlemen. Gentlemen does grumble though, for I’ve sold to them at private houses when they’ve held the door half open as they’ve called me – aye, and ladies too – and they’ve said, “Is that all for 2d.?” If it’d been a peck they’d have said the same, I know. Some customers is very pleasant with me, and says I’m a blessing. One always says he’ll give me a ton of taties when his ship comes home, ‘cause he can always have a hot murphy to his cold saveloy, when tin’s short. He’s a harness-maker, and the railways has injured him. There’s Union-street and there’s Pearl-row, and there’s Market-street, now, – they’re all off the Borough-road – if I go there at ten at night or so, I can sell 3s. worth, perhaps, ‘cause they know me, and I have another baked taty to help there sometimes. They’re women that’s not reckoned the best in the world that buys there, but they pay me. I know why I got my name up. I had luck to have good fruit when the rot was about, and they got to know me. I only go twice or thrice a week, for it’s two miles from my regular places. I’ve trusted them sometimes. They’ve said to me, as modest as could be, “Do give me credit, and ’pon my word you shall be paid; there’s a dear!” I am paid mostly. Little shopkeepers is fair customers, but I do best for the taps and parlours. Perhaps I make 12s. or 15s. a week – I hardly know, for I’ve only myself and keep no ’count – for the season; money goes one can’t tell how, and ’specially if you drinks a drop, as I do sometimes. Foggy weather drives me to it, I’m so worritted; that is, now and then, you’ll mind, sir.’

  There are, at present 300 vendors of hot baked potatoes getting their living in the streets of London, each of whom sell, upon an average, ¾ cwt. of potatoes daily. The average takings of each vendor is 6s. a day; and the receipts of the whole number throughout the season (which lasts from the latter end of September till March inclusive), a period of 6 months, is 14,000l.

  A capital is required to start in this trade as, follows: can, 2l.; knife, 3d.; stock-money, 8s.; charge for baking 100 potatoes, 1s.; charcoal, 4d.; butter, 2d.; salt, 1d. and pepper, 1d.; altogether, 2l. 9s. 11d. The can and knife is the only property described as fixed, stock-money, &c., being daily occurring, amounts to 75l. during the season.

  Of the Street-sellers of Ham-sandwiches

  [p. 185] The ham-sandwich-seller carries his sandwiches on a tray or flat basket, covered with a clean white cloth; he also wears a white apron, and white sleeves. His usual stand is at the doors of the theatres.

  The trade was unknown until eleven years ago, when a man who had been unsuccessful in keeping a coffee-shop in Westminster, found it necessary to look out for some mode of living, and he hit upon the plan of vending sandwiches, precisely in the present style, at the theatre doors. The attempt was successful; the man soon took 10s. a night, half of which was profit. He ‘attended’ both the great theatres, and was ‘doing well’; but at five or six weeks’ end, competitors appeared in the field, and increased rapidly, and so his sale was affected, people being regardless of his urging that he ‘was the original ham-sandwich’. The capital required to start in the trade was small; a few pounds of ham, a proportion of loaves, and a little mustard was all that was required, and for this 10s. was ample. That sum, however, could not be commanded by many who were anxious to deal in sandwiches; and the man who commenced the trade supplied them at 6d. a dozen, the charge to the public being 1d. a-piece. Some of the men, however, murmured, because they thought that what they thus bought were not equal to those the wholesale sandwich-man offered for sale himself; and his wholesale trade fell off, until now, I am told, he has only two customers among street-sellers.

  Ham sandwiches are made from any part of the bacon which may be sufficiently lean, such as ‘the gammon’, which now costs 4d. and 5d. the pound. It is sometimes, but very rarely, picked up at 3½d. When the trade was first started, 7d. a pound was paid for the ham, but the sandwiches are now much larger. To make three dozen a pound of meat is required, and four quartern loaves. The ‘ham’ may cost 5d., the bread 1s. 8d. or 1s. 10d., and the mustard 1d. The proceeds for this would be 3s., but the trade is very precarious: little can be done in wet weather. If unsold, the sandwiches spoil, for the bread gets dry, and the ham loses its fresh colour; so that those who depend upon this trade are wretchedly poor. A first-rate week is to clear 10s.; a good week is put at 7s.; and a bad week at 3s. 6d. On some nights they do not sell a dozen sandwiches. There are halfpenny sandwiches, but these are only half the size of those at a penny.

  The persons carrying on this trade have been, for the most part, in some kind of service – errand-boys, pot-boys, foot-boys (or pages), or lads engaged about inns. Some few have been mechanics. Their average weekly earnings hardly exceed 5s., but som
e ‘get odd jobs’ at other things.

  ‘There are now, sir, at the theatres this (the Strand) side the water, and at Ashley’s, the Surrey, and the Vic., two dozen and nine sandwiches.’ So said one of the trade, who counted up his brethren for me. This man calculated also that at the Standard, the saloons, the concert-rooms, and at Limehouse, Mile-end, Bethnal-green-road, and elsewhere, there might be more than as many again as those ‘working’ the theatres – or 70 in all. They are nearly all men, and no boys or girls are now in the trade. The number of these people, when the large theatres were open with the others, was about double what it is now.