A Brief History of Britain 1851-2010

by Jeremy Black

  Moreover, winding roads have been superseded by motorways. If they are now less commonly driven straight through the countryside with scant allowance for its topography than was the case a generation ago, and are more sensitive to the landscape, motorways and bypasses still are certainly not Orwell’s winding roads. Instead, they represent the triumph of town over country which is a theme in this book. Furthermore, as another aspect of change, traditional crops and green fields have been replaced by oilseed rape or maize, or, more seriously, housing. The role of the post has been lessened by the internet and many post offices have been closed.

  Thus, Orwell’s piece serves as a pointed reminder of the porosity and changeability of manifestations of national civilization. Its points will be reflected upon in the final chapter of the book where we examine the changing and different ways we look at our past. These changing ways are central aspects of our history.

  PART ONE:

  1851–1931

  1

  CHANGING COUNTRY

  … the Station has swallowed up the playing-field. It was gone. The two beautiful hawthorn-trees, the hedge, the turf, and all those buttercups and daisies had given place to the stoniest of jolting roads … The coach that had carried me away, was melodiously called Timpson’s Blue-Eyed Maid, and belonged to Timpson at the coach-office up-street; the locomotive engine that had brought me back, was called severely No. 97 and belonged to SER [South Eastern Railway], and was spitting ashes and hot-water over the blighted ground.

  Charles Dickens (1812–70), a writer who frequently dwelled on the presence and pressure of change, captured, in his short story ‘Dullborough Town’ (1860), the train as a cause of lost innocence as well as a source of new experiences. He also recorded the extent to which the sights, smells and much else of life were transformed and created anew as Britain modernized.

  This modernization reflected the extent to which Britain in 1851 was closer, literally and metaphorically, to the world of William III and Sir Isaac Newton in the 1690s than to today. Indeed, it is necessary to underline the strangeness of the mid-nineteenth century because it is all too easy to treat the Victorians of 1851, with their railways and photographs, as like us. Indeed, as a result, one way to look at the period 1851–2010 is as if it was one period, our period, an age in which differences exist, but in which such differences can be traced against a background of essential similarity.

  That approach is mistaken. In fact, Britain in 1851 was profoundly dissimilar in many respects to today. The powerful grip of Christian worship, with religious observance by most of the population, and attitudes in the nineteenth century regarding social values and legal codes are core differences.

  Another major contrast arose from the country itself. Balloon flights across Britain were not a method of transport practised in 1851 as balloons did not yet have the benefit of the engines that were to make long-distance journeys possible in the 1920s. Such a flight in 1851 would, however, have revealed a country in which the urban imprint was far smaller than today, with less of the country covered by buildings. The census of that year was certainly the first in which the majority of the population lived in towns, but these towns were far more compact than their modern successors, both smaller and more densely populated. In particular, despite entrepreneurs taking advantage of rail services reaching settlements near London like Deptford (1836) and Surbiton (1838), there was as yet little suburban sprawl, in part because most people still walked to work.

  Moreover, the human imprint on the landscape was different in emphasis to now because in the 1850s it mostly related to working the land, largely by agriculture, but with forestry and quarrying also playing important roles. As a result, there was little of Britain that did not bear evidence of the direct impact of human activity, but, equally, that activity was closely linked to the practicalities created by terrain, soils, climate and other physical factors. Thus, long-lasting patterns of land use remained important, as knowledge of which fields or slopes were best for wheat or other crops, or sheep or cattle, were rocky or easy to cultivate, or were well or poorly drained, was handed down.

  By 1931, the situation was very different. The country could be readily, rapidly, reliably and predictably crossed by aircraft, and the view was of a landscape more directly affected by the human imprint, and of activities less conditioned by the practicalities of the landscape, than in 1851. The history of this transition is fundamental to that of Britain because it created not only a transformed environment but also a different mental picture of national life. The urban experience became more significant at all levels of society, and while ruralism was an important cultural theme, it was largely so as a conscious and hostile response to the sway of this experience, and, indeed, as an attempt to deny its sway.

  Population Growth

  A key driver of change was population growth and urbanization. Thanks to a high birth rate and a falling death rate, the population grew rapidly in this period, sustaining earlier increases in a way that appeared to defy the idea that the country could support only so many people. Despite large-scale emigration, especially outside the empire to the US, but also within the empire, notably to Canada and Australasia, England and Wales had a population of 17,928,000 in 1851 and 32,528,000 in 1901; the figures for Scotland were 2,889,000 and 4,472,000. Most of this growth occurred in the cities, while the rural population declined in absolute and relative terms: from just under 50 per cent of the total population in 1851 to just under 30 per cent in 1911, although the latter percentage was still far greater than that today.

  This growth posed a grave challenge to assumptions about society, leading as it did to concern that the new urban masses would prove a source and means of crisis, whether crisis was understood in terms of revolutionary politics, social violence, large-scale irreligion, demographic degeneration or epidemic infection, or several or all of these. The city as danger as well as source of pride and progress was a central theme in Victorian thought, and this remained pertinent for much of the twentieth century, although the 1960s were to bring forward a set of social and cultural values that was more clearly focused on the urban experience, and this remains the case today.

  Urbanization entailed unprecedented growth for London (the population of the Greater London area rose to 7.2 million in 1911) as well as for the growing cities of the north, especially Manchester, a key centre of industrialization; Liverpool, the empire’s second port (behind London, which had the largest and busiest port in the world); and Glasgow, a major empire port, Scotland’s principal population centre, and the leading centre of engineering and shipbuilding. Most of the urban population, however, lived in more modest-sized cities and towns, for example Newcastle, which had a population of 215,328 by 1901; Sunderland, the world’s leading shipbuilding town in the 1850s; and the Lancashire and Yorkshire mill towns, such as Bolton, Bradford, Bury, Halifax and Preston. In Ireland, Belfast developed as a great port with manufacturing industry based on linen, shipyards and tobacco, although its expansion saw the development of patterns of urban segregation based on religion.

  Population growth was also seen in key centres of industry and mining, as both activities required large amounts of labour. The population in County Durham, a major centre of coal mining and related industry, rose from 390,997 in 1851 to 1,016,562 in 1891, with growth of 34.7 per cent in 1861–71 alone. Glamorgan and Monmouthshire, the centres of Welsh coal and iron production, contained about 20 per cent of the Welsh population in 1801, but 57.5 per cent in 1901. Within this area, the population of the coal mining Rhondda Valley rose from under 1,000 in 1851 to 153,000 in 1911. Much of this expansion was fed from rural Wales, but there was also significant migration from Ireland and England: 11 per cent of Swansea’s population in 1861 had been born in south-west England, which lacked comparable industrial growth. As is often the case, immigrants were blamed for crime in Wales.

  Industrialization

  The growth of the rapidly expanding centres and areas was based on a
key element in the changing country: industrialization. Industry had been an important element in Britain’s economic development in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, but the widespread application of steam power and factory methods of production across most of the range of industrial activity did not occur until the mid-nineteenth century. Employment opportunities drew labour to expanding industrial cities and, in turn, their populations provided multiple opportunities for industries, services and agriculture.

  Economic transformation was seen across the economy – in industry, trade, finance, transportation and agriculture, with the impact of what was later called the Industrial Revolution proving particularly impressive. The British economy had not only changed greatly from the early eighteenth century, but had also developed powerful advantages over foreign states, notably France, in manufacturing and trade. A culture of improvement lay at the heart of much British economic, intellectual and other innovation, and this belief in the prospect and attraction of change moulded and reflected a sense of progress. These and other advantages greatly impressed informed overseas visitors, helping to lead them to a cult for ‘Britishness’ as a testimony to progress; though these visitors were prone to ignore the extent and impact of periodic economic depressions.

  Alongside production, the consumption of goods and services also developed. In particular, a national market was created for producers. This market owed much to the way investment in improved communications increasingly affected local production, with trends in national and local consumption being encouraged by new media, such as newspapers. In turn, developments in consumption helped drive both trade and industrial activity. This serves as a reminder of the need to avoid viewing industrialization as a process solely dependent on industrial technology. Alongside manufacturing, commerce became a defining characteristic of British society, and one that was particularly important in townscapes, where weekly markets were supplemented, and then largely replaced, by permanent shops. Some of the shopping names of the period are still found on British high streets. John Sainsbury (1844–1928) opened his first dairy in London in 1869, Thomas Lipton (1850–1931) his first grocery in Glasgow in 1871, and in 1894 Marks and Spencer was founded. By 1900, Sainsbury had 47 provisions stores and by 1914 Lipton had 500.

  The nature of industrial activity also changed, with more specialization, as well as a greater division of labour and the growth of capital. A stronger emphasis on the need for constant, regular and predictable labour led to different forms of labour control, including factory clocks, which, like the train system, increased the emphasis on time, and thus pressure for reliable systems for measuring time, the latter on the national scale. For rapid industrial growth, the essentials were capital, transport, markets and coal; and their availability enabled Britain to avoid the limitations of the organic economy – that based on the growth of plants, notably wood for fuel. Instead, it was possible to exploit the plentiful supplies of fossil fuels in the shape of coal that gave Britain a powerful edge in industrial activity.

  The use of coal, a readily transportable and controllable fuel (unlike water and windmills), and an efficient power source, was exploited in a host of industries such as metallurgy, soap production, glassworks and linen bleaching. Partly as a result of the development of large-scale coal mining, cheap energy made possible a rise in per capita living standards in the nineteenth century, despite the major increase in population. Coal-based steam power ensured that coalfields were key centres of economic growth, notably those of north-east England, south Lancashire, the West Riding of Yorkshire, South Wales, and central Scotland, but also smaller coalfields elsewhere, for example in the Midlands, Somerset and Kent. Moreover, the significance of coal was seen in the importance of its movement, notably from north-east England to London, for long by sea but increasingly by rail.

  The statistics still impress. The average annual production of coal and lignite for Britain in 1855–9 was 67 million tons (69 million tonnes), compared to 31.5 million tons (32 million tonnes) for France, Germany, Belgium and Russia combined. The scale of activity was also measured by the number of pits. The year 1910 was the peak one for the number of collieries in South Wales: 688 in all. That coalfield produced 10.25 million tons (10.4 million tonnes) in 1860, but 57 million tons (58 million tonnes) by 1913, by when improvements in drainage and ventilation had made possible the working of deeper seams. Coal also meant large-scale employment, indeed of a third of the Welsh male labour force.

  Heavy industries such as iron and steel, engineering and shipbuilding, were also attracted to coal and iron-ore fields, leading to a local geography of activity with the location of mines, manufacture, and transport in the same areas. Thus, Workington on the Cumbrian coast developed as a major centre of iron and steel production from 1857. Reflecting the way in which increased production was a response to, and in turn encouraged, the flexibility of the factors of production, railways built in the 1840s and 1850s created ready access for Workington to nearby iron-ore fields and to the coke supplies of County Durham on the other side of the Pennines, a journey that was not feasible by sea; while many of the migrant workers for the town came from Ireland. Similarly, metallurgy and the chemical industry were found on and near the Welsh coalfields.

  Once iron replaced wood in shipbuilding, the industry took off as Britain had major competitive advantages with ships built of iron and powered by coal. The annual average of tonnage launched at Sunderland rose from over 60,000 (c. 61,000 tonnes) in the 1860s to 190,000 (193,048 tonnes) by the 1890s. In 1881, 341,000 tons (346,471 tonnes) were launched on the Clyde (Glasgow) and 308,000 (312,942 tonnes) on the Tyne (Newcastle) and Wear (Sunderland) combined; and in 1914 the figures were 757,000 (769,148 tonnes) and 666,000 (676,687 tonnes). Belfast, Barrow-in-Furness, the Humber and the Mersey were also important centres of shipbuilding. Shipyards employed large numbers of people, as did ancillary concerns such as engine manufacturers. Whereas there were 4,000 employed in Scottish shipbuilding in 1841, the number had risen to 51,000 by 1911.

  Conversely, previously important manufacturing areas, such as East Anglia and south-west England, suffered de-industrialization, in part because they lacked coal, and, as a result, lost people both to industrializing areas and abroad. Thus, Norfolk’s large textile industry collapsed in the face of competition from factory-produced textiles from northern England. Many small Norfolk market towns, such as Diss and Swaffham, saw little growth and were not to change greatly until they expanded again from the 1960s, leading to the joke, ‘When it’s 12 o’clock in London, it’s 19.53 in Norfolk.’ The previously large textile industry in the south west also collapsed, and this greatly affected the prosperity of local cities and towns, such as Exeter and Trowbridge; although factory production developed at Tiverton.

  Machines were increasingly the key to economic activity, mechanization bringing profit and larger factories. The concentration of machine power became important to production. In 1850, there were 17,642 automatic looms in Bradford, mass-producing women’s dress fabrics in what was the world centre of worsted wool production and exchange. Manchester was also a city of power looms, although small workshops were more common in mid-century in Birmingham, London, or even Sheffield, which, by then, was producing half of Europe’s steel.

  Mechanization was crucial to uniformity, the production of low-cost standardized products. As a result, brands of mass-produced goods, such as chocolate and soap, could be consumed and advertised nationally, which encouraged a transformation in retailing. New distribution and retail methods, particularly the foundation of department and chain stores, helped to create national products. Local products, in contrast, fell away.

  Mechanization had a major impact on many industries. For example, newspaper production was transformed by the use of steam-powered presses, which increased the rapidity of printing. As in other industries, competition spread the new technology, which had been introduced in London in 1814 for The Times. The first issue of the Wiltshire County
Mirror (10 February 1852) announced that it was due to ‘the first introduction into Salisbury of Printing by Steam’. In response, the Salisbury Journal immediately adopted steam-printing. In 1854, the printer-proprietor of the Staffordshire Sentinel declared, in his first issue, that he had purchased a similar ‘printing machine’ so as ‘to execute his work both expeditiously and at the cheapest possible rate’. The manufacture of paper also became a large-scale industry, with paper based on wood pulp replacing that based on rags.

  These and other changes were followed in a country newly aware, through mass literacy and frequent publication of statistics, of developments across the nation. The statistics of industrialization were part of the utilitarian, measurement-based, outcome-oriented mentality that economic change led to. This mentality was depicted by Charles Dickens in his novel Hard Times (1854), where he contrasted the variety of human experience with the obsession on mathematical facts of the new world: ‘So many hundred hands in this Mill; so many hundred horse steam power. It is known, to the force of a single pound weight, what the engine will do.’

  The Train

  The railway, in which Britain led the world in inventing and disseminating the new technology, greatly increased the effectiveness of the country in both manufacturing and marketing, and thus helped make industrialization national in its impact, even if it was regional in its character. By 1851, a national rail system had been created, although there were still gaps that were to be filled later. Both the local landscape and geography were transformed as tunnels were blasted through hills, while rivers were bridged: the Tamar in 1859 and the Forth in 1890, both bridges that remain dramatic to this day. Another key link, the Severn Tunnel on the route from Bristol to Cardiff, was opened in 1886.