LL-L "Nomads" 2002.08.24 (04) [E/S]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 24.AUG.2002 (04) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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From: "Wim" <wkv at home.nl>
Subject: LL-L "Nomads" 2002.08.23 (06) [E]

Hi,

Very interesting, as a kid there used to be folks called " skipperties"
living on barges near our town, people thought of them as " mobile home
folks on boats" , and locked their doors, or put clogs near the front
door. (The farmer is home, don't try anything), if they were around,
they were not Gypsy's though. They spoke the local low Saxon dialect. As
do the people here in the north east of Holland who live in mobile
homes.
That was 20 years ago though, I don't know how the situation is now a
days, There are still a lot of people living in mobile homes and barges.
But most of the people living in barges are not Skipperties. They are
ordinary people, who have a floating bungalow. The skipperties mooved
place ever so often, and lived in "real" boats.
I wander if anybody knows more about this.

Wim
[Wim Verdoold]

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From: "Friedrich-Wilhelm Neumann" <Friedrich-Wilhelm.Neumann at epost.de>
Subject: LL-L "Nomads" 2002.08.23 (06) [E]

Hi, Ron, Lowlanders,

Ron wrote:

> From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Nomads

> Also in Germany, including Northern Germany, there used to be itinerant
> craftsmen, usually young men who had no steady home.  In earlier times,
> a period of migration was expected of them, to acquire experience,
> skills and money to start their own workshops, but oftentimes this
> became a permanent arrangement due to lack of funds.  These artisans had
> their various guilds, and these tended to provide networking and
> protection.  Typically, the various artisan guilds would have their own
> jargons and attires.

> I believe the last group to give this up were the
> carpenters.  When I was a small child, I would see them trecking about,
> with their wide-brimmed hats, their extremely widely flared corduroy
> pants, their long earrings in one ear, and their bundles and tool boxes.

You still find them (carpenters) throughout Germany at these days- even
female "Wandergesellen".

Regards

Fiete.

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From: Sandy Fleming [sandy at scotstext.org]
Subject: "Nomads"

> From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Nomads
>
> In many areas of Germany (including areas that are now parts of Polands
> and Russia), there used to be dirt-poor, landless, migratory rural
> workers, or farmhands.  Even though they were not actually an ethnic
> group (although many of them were of at least partial Slavic origin,
> many of them Kashubian), they tended to have ties with each other and
> thus were some sort of community, a network through which they learned
> where their services might be needed.  They would work for land-owning
> farmers, sometimes for tenant farmers, who would house and feed them for
> the duration of, say, harvest time.  These would include children,
> sometimes *very* young children, in other words entire families.  (Our
> American friends will no doubt be reminded of Mexican farmworkers in the
> USA, and I believe this is a fair comparison.)  I think this German
> situation gradually came to an end after Bismark et al. introduced a
> social security/services system and improved living conditions of the
> lowest social strata.  My paternal grandmother, born at the border
> between what is now Poland and Kaliningrad (Russia), still lived through
> this as a child of "potato workers."  Each child in that family was born
> in a different place.

This sounds very much like some of my ancestors of three or
four generations back - the birth records show that they were
farm workers and the birthplaces seem to range all over Fife
and the Lothians.

Most working class people (really working class - miners and
farmers, not clerks and suchlike) in the Scottish Lowlands of
two or three centuries ago lived in "cots", which were tiny
one-roomed cottages with dirt floors, and they generally had
large families, and possibly more than one family to a cot.
Pencaitland, a village just to the south of us, was considered
progressive because the local lady insisted on larger cots
with two rooms.

Miners also lived in cots but unlike farmers weren't itenerant,
because they were literally (and I mean that literally!) slaves
to the pit owners and couldn't move anywhere else. This was
because in a human rights act raised by the Scottish parliament,
miners and salters were specifically excluded from having any
rights. After the act of union the British government in London
became concerned at the living conditions imposed on miners and
salters in Scotland, the 1775 Act of the British parliament
saying that, "Whereas by the law of Scotland, as explained by
the judges of the courts of law there, many colliers, and coal-
bearers, and salters are in a state of slavery and bondage,
bound to the collieries or saltworks where they work for life,
transferable with the coalworks and saltworks &c." and went on
to set out recommendations for better living, which were ineffectual.

So in 1779 the British Pairlaiment laid down the law: "...all
the colliers in that part of Great Britain called Scotland, who
were bound Colliers at the time of passing this Act, shall be,
and are herby declared to be free from their servitude."
Unfortunately the pit owners found loopholes and although the
law was a great improvement on living conditions, they were
still pretty harsh. The British parliament then sent observers
to Scotland to see what was really going on. Here's some reports
of mining conditions from one observer (he recorded their Scots
but in my file it's been improved upon a bit):

Janet Cumming, 11 years, Sheriff-hall Colliery, Midlothian,
on examination, said: "A gang wi the weemin at five at nicht;
wirk aa nicht on Fridays, an come hame at twelve in the day.
A cairy big bits o coal fae the waa-face tae the pit-bottom,
an the smaa pieces, caad chows, in a creel. The wecht is
uisually a hunderwecht. A dinna ken hou mony pund the ar in
a hunderwecht, but it's some wecht tae cairy. It taks three
journeys tae fill a tub o fower hunderwecht. The distance
varies, as the wark isna aye on the same "waa" – sometimes
150 fathoms, whiles 250 fathoms. The roof is vera low. A hae
tae bend ma back an legs, an the watter comes aften up tae
the caufs o ma legs. A hae nae likin for the wark, but
faither maks me like it. A never got hurt, but aften obliged
tae scramble oot o the pit whan the bad air wis in. A'm at
the nicht schuil, lairnin tae read in the tipenny beuk. Jesus
wis God, an Dauvit wrate the Bible."

Helen Reid, sixteen years, Edmonston Coliery, Midlothian:
"A'v been five year in the mines in this pairt; wirk frequently
fae five in the mornin till six at nicht. A can cairy near twa
hunderwecht on ma back. A dinna like the wark, but A think A'm
fit for nane ither. Mony accidents happen ablo grund; A'v met
wi twa saerious anes masel. Twa year back the pit closed on
therteen o us, an we wis twa days athoot maet or licht. Nearly
ae day we wis up tae oor chins in watter. At last we pykit oor
wey up tae a auld shaft, an wis heard bi folk watchin abuin. Aa
wis saved. Twa months back A wis fillin tubs at the pit bottom,
when the gig clickit ower aerly, an the heuk catched me bi ma pit
claes. The folk didna hear me skriechin. Ma hauns haed fast grippit
the chain, an the great hicht o the shaft gart me loss ma courage,
an A swarfed. The banksmen could scarce remove ma hauns; the deid-
grip saved ma life."

William Martin, ten years, Tranent Colliery, Haddingtonshire
(now East Lothian): "Hae been ablo aichteen months on ma faither's
wark at puttin; wirks on nicht an day shifts. A faa asleep sometimes
whan we canna git the coals awa, but the shaft o ma faither's pick
suin waukens me. The place A wirk in the noo is weet; the watter
covers ma shae-taps, an A'm obleeged tae sit in't tae wirk. Naebody
taks onything but cake or breid ablo, an we sinnle chainge oor claes,
as it's that lat afore we git hame."

John Hogg, ten years, Preston Colliery, Gledsmuir, Haddingtonshire:
"A push the tubs wi mither whan she wirks, an sometimes wi sister.
Faither is idle the noo wi black spittle an bad braith. It's a lang
time since A wis at the schuil; A could read in the 'big-spell'. A'v
heard the boys read the Testament at the Sabbath schuil but dinna ken
onything aboot it. Sometimes A wirk lang, an ither times short. Canna
say hou mony oors; dinna ken what's meant bi oors. It's dark whan A
gang doon an sae whan A come up, an sometimes licht."

Jane Peacock Watson, forty years, Harlawmuir Colliery, West Linton,
Peeblesshire: "A hae wrocht in the bowels o the yirth therty-three
year; hae been mairiet twinty-three year, an haed nine bairns, six
leevin, three deid. Hae haed twa deid-born; think they wis sae fae
oppressive wark. A vast o weemin hae deid-born bairns an fause births,
that's waur, as they'r never able tae wirk efter that. A hae aye been
obleeged tae wirk ablo till forced tae gae hame tae bear the bairn,
an sae haes aa ither weemin. We gae back as suin's we're able, never
langer than ten or twelve days – mony less, if they'r needed. It's
juist horsewark, an ruins the weemin; it crushes their hunkers, bends
their ankles, an maks them auld weemin at forty."

Margaret Leviston, six years, Harlawmuir Colliery, West Linton,
Peeblesshire: "Been doon at coal-cairyin six weeks; maks ten tae
fourteen rakes a day; cairies ful 56 lbs o coal in a widden backet.
The wark isna guid, it is vera sair. A wirk wi sister Jessy an mither.
A dinna ken the time we gang; it is gey dark. Git plenty o broth an
porridge, an rin hame an git bannock, as we juist live by the pit;
never been tae the schuil, it's that faur awa." "A most interesting
child, says the reporter, "and perfectly beautiful. I ascertained
her age to be six years, 24th May 1840. She was registered in Inveresk."

This observer adds commentary to some of this. Regarding 11-year-old
Elisson Jack at Loanhead Colliery, he says: "[...] one journey is
designated 'a rake', the height ascended and the distance along the
roads added together exceed the height of St Paul's Cathedral. And
it not unfrequently happens that the tugs break, and the load falls
upon those females who are following. However incredible it may appear,
yet I have taken evidence of fathers who have ruptured themselves from
straining to lift coal on their children's backs.

"It is almost incredible, to believe that human beings can submit to
such employment, crawling on hands and knees, harnessed like horses,
over soft slushy floors, more difficult than dragging the same weight
through our lowest common sewers, and more difficult in consequence
of the inclination, which is frequently 1 in 3, to 1 in 6 inches."

All this was stopped in 1843 when Queen Victoria issued an edict
prohibiting from then onwards all female labour in the mine within
the realm of Great Britian and Ireland, although this wasn't taken
as a good thing by all. At many a colliery the men had to stand
throwing stones at the women morning after morning to drive them
back from the pit. In Midlothian twenty women managed to keep
working for three months by dressing up as men, until they were
summoned to the Court at Edinburgh and released on the promise
that they never go below again. This was the last case in Scotland
of female labour in the mines.

(Much of the above information is from P. McNeill's "Tranent and
its Surroundings", 1895.)

Sandy
http://scotstext.org

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