PAUPER APPRENTICESHIPS

The system began in the sixteenth century with the Statute of Apprentices of 1563. This Act gave Justices of the Peace the power to arrange apprentices for pauper children, vagrants and give relief to those "overburdened by children". In 1593 further legislation empowered overseers of the poor to raise a local rate in order to pay their premiums. These regulations were encompassed in the Poor Relief Act of 1601 which encouraged apprenticeships and allowed parish officers, churchwardens and overseers to bind out any child for whom they were responsible provided two Justices of the Peace agreed.

The objective of the legislation was to prevent children begging which many did in gangs. The parish could apprentice any child under fourteen years of age. In 1696 the age limit was increased to sixteen years. Apprenticed girls served until they married or attained the age of twenty-one but for boys the age was twenty-four years.

Finding a master for such apprentices was sometimes problematic because village ratepayers were not always amenable to taking on young girls or boys from poor families as their apprentices, so after 1696 parishioners were chosen either on rotation or by ballot to accommodate such apprenticeships. They could be fined £10 if they refused.

In many parishes no premium was paid for pauper apprenticeships although a few basics may have been covered. If premiums were paid, they varied from place to place and time to time. The premium was always paid from the poor rate but it was not unusual for overseers to sell a child’s possessions or impose a contribution from the father of an illegitimate child. The main idea, however,  was to rid the parish of any financial liability for that child and to force a legal change of settlement which serving an apprenticeship elsewhere would do.

By the end of the sixteenth century, an apprenticeship was generally accepted as a means of providing technical training to both boys and girls in a wide range of occupations. The Statute of Apprentices of 1563 made apprenticeship compulsory for anyone who wished to enter a trade and that remained the case until 1814 when the Act was repealed.

It is usually fairly easy to identify pauper apprenticeship indentures because they differ from those of other apprentices. A pauper apprenticeship may have been a simple agreement between parish officials and the master. An indenture was similar to regular apprenticeship indentures but with some identifiable differences.  They will invariably show the age of the child and they are unlikely to name the father, although it is often straightforward to determine the name of the father of illegitimate children from their indemnity payments which were noted in the margins of the document.

There is usually an undertaking from the master to the effect that the apprentice will not become chargeable to the parish during the apprenticeship term and that the master will provide apparel at the end of the term. This was also a regular feature of the factory apprentices so they could be reasonably attired when looking for work.  If the indenture itself has not survived, there is often an apprenticeship register maintained by the parish overseers as a result of an Act of Parliament which required the keeping of the regsiter dated 1766, from which basic information can be obtained. There may also be a type of bond from the master guaranteeing to carry out its terms. Occasionally their basic details may have been recorded within vestry minutes.

One copy of the indenture, signed by the master and the Justices of the Peace, was kept by the parish. The second copy was signed by the master, the churchwardens and overseers and usually given to the apprentice on completion of his term. In the unlikely event that you have no pauper apprentices in your ancestry, you may well find your ancestor’s signature on indentures as a master, Justice of the Peace, churchwarden or overseer. Factory apprenticeships, particularly associated with the cotton mills, specified only small children which meant that there was usually a clause included in the agreement that at the age of fourteen a child would be sent to a master to be trained in a worthwhile trade.

It was not unusual for parish apprentices to be assigned to masters in another parish because under settlement terms once forty days of an apprenticeship had been served, that child became legally settled in the new parish which was a convenient way of excluding pauper children from their rate liability. This is a possibility to be investigated when an ancestor just appears from nowhere in a parish and so this if this is the reason, it requires further research in order to ascertain the original parish.

With the advent of cotton mills from the late eighteenth century some out-of-area parishes shipped waggon=-loads of pauper children to the textile and cotton mills who were only too pleased to employ them as a source of cheap labour. However, this practice was restricted under Acts of Parliament of 1802 and 1816 after which children could only be sent within forty miles from home.

Ultimately, if a pauper parent objected to their child’s placement then their own relief money was reduced.

Orphans also typically served as apprentices because this meant that they had a home and were clothed and fed. Whether pauper or orphan, the boys were usually apprenticed in husbandry or agricultural servants or they could be sent for factory or mine work depending upon locality. Those who showed promise were often apprenticed to the artisan trades such as shoemaking or blacksmithing. Girls typically served in housewifery in a home or inn or perhaps in spinning. In reality they often acted as “cheap” servants to the farming community. Like boys, however, they could have been apprenticed in trades like millinery or dressmaking if they showed promise.

The masters taking an apprentice were the parish farmers, tradesmen, shopkeepers and factory owners who were expected to each take a pauper apprentice on a rotational basis, but some parishes allowed them to opt out on payment of a penalty fee if they did not take an apprentice. It was not unusual for illegitimate boys to be apprenticed to their biological fathers, either because they took an interest in them or more likely because the parish officials considered it his duty to do so. Similarly, orphans might have been apprenticed to relatives which ensured that the whole family had the same place of settlement.

After the introduction of the New Poor Law, attempts were made to abolish the pauper apprentice system but this was not particularly practical. However, legislation was passed in 1844 with the following effect:

• Maximum apprenticeship term was eight years
• No one under the age of nine years or who could not read and write his own name, was to be apprenticed
• Premiums were only paid if a child was handicapped
• Children over fourteen years had to consent to an apprenticeship also if under sixteen years needed the father’s consent.
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Further legislation in 1851 meant that:

• Masters who neglected or ill-treated apprentices could face prosecution
• Apprenticeship registers had to be maintained
• A nominated officer of the union had to visit each apprentice at least twice a year to ascertain their wellbeing and progress.

Pauper apprentices in industry increasingly became a resource of unskilled and cheap labour within a few select occupations. Some industries such as hat manufacturing or brickmaking had more than their fair share of pauper apprentices which frequently deterred the more respectable families from entering the trade. Similarly there were trades which offered few prospects on completion of an apprenticeship such as the in textiles, cotton, lace and framework knitting.

During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries large numbers of pauper, orphaned and abandoned children from the south of England were sent by overseers to serve as apprentices in the northern textile mills often from the age of eight until they were twenty-one.

Most factory owners notified parish overseers of their vacancies and then the parish overseers contacted the mill owners to negotiate terms. If there were a number of possible apprentices, the mill owner or his agent would visit the parish to sign the indentures and arrange the transport of the children. Conditions for some children were far from satisfactory with many being sent a long distance from their homes. However, in general, factory children were probably not sent further than any other apprentices. The terms served by factory apprentices were often longer than normal. Some overseers considered that very young children should serve until they were fourteen or sixteen and then be apprenticed for a second time in a trade which would be more beneficial to their working lives.

Such apprenticeships arose because of various charitable institutions and individual bequests assisting poorer parents who did not seek parish relief but who could not afford such training. Some charities were only interested in apprenticing orphans. In many cases benefactors bequeathed money to parishes specifically to apprentice children. In some towns there were borough charities.

Occasionally charities recognised that once free the apprentice could face difficulties if they wished to set up on their own account. Some indentures included a clause requiring the master to give assistance to the apprentice by providing tools or stock Some charities gave a lump sum to apprentices at the end of their term if their behaviour throughout the apprenticeship was good or they provided loans. Those who served a charity apprenticeship usually had better indenture conditions than pauper apprentices.