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Material Lives of the English Poor: a Regional Perspective, C.1670-1834

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Material Lives of the English Poor: a Regional Perspective, C.1670-1834 Material lives of the English poor: a regional perspective, c.1670-1834 Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Leicester Joseph Harley School of History 2016 1 Abstract The literature on consumption has grown rapidly over the past thirty years and we now have a detailed understanding of how the material lives of the middling sort and elite were transformed over the long eighteenth century. With the exception of the occasional case study and the research on clothing, the poor have largely been neglected in this literature. Consequently we have very little understanding of whether the poor were also able to consume at a greater level over the period or of how their consumption patterns varied between men and women and across contrasting counties and urban-rural locations. This PhD addresses these gaps through the detailed analysis of over 350 pauper inventories from Dorset, Kent and Norfolk from c.1670 to 1834. This is the largest collection of pauper inventories ever assembled for historical analysis. These sources have been contextualised by analysis of other types of inventories of paupers, artefacts, pictorial sources, pawnbroking records, autobiographies, diaries and pauper letters. The sources suggest that the poor increasingly acquired a greater quantity and variety of household goods over the long eighteenth century and that the material lives of the poor were improving. This increased consumption, however, appears not to have been equal and uniform, as it was not until the late eighteenth century that significant numbers of paupers owned these goods in greater frequencies. Moreover, these items appear to have been consumed by greater numbers of the poor who lived in the Home Counties and urban areas, whilst fewer paupers generally owned these goods in more rural, remote and less commercial areas. Nevertheless, the changes in the poor’s material lives appear to have been considerable and signified a number of important changes in people’s domestic behaviours and everyday lives. 2 Acknowledgments I have accumulated many debts throughout the writing of this thesis and it is a pleasure to acknowledge them now. I would like to thank the Arts & Humanities Research Council for funding my PhD (grant number ah/k503101/1) and a number archive trips. I also received help from the Economic History Society who funded some of the costs of researching Kent. Without the help of supportive funding bodies such as these, this research would not have been possible. Equally, I would like to thank the staff at the many archives I visited, and in particular those at the Dorset History Centre, Kent History Library Centre, Lancashire Record Office and Wigan Archives Service. In nearly every archive I visited I got out every single imaginable (and unimaginable) document one could think of in the pursuit of inventories. I must have made everybody’s lives much more difficult and laborious with my continuous requests, however staff were always friendly and went out of their ways to help me. I have presented this research at a number of different talks. I would like to thank the people who offered advice and suggestions after hearing my findings. I would like to thank the editors of Continuity and Change and the anonymous reviewers of my article that was published there. Each of their comments has helped me to become a more conscious historian. Above all, I would like to thank Pete King who supervised me throughout the entire PhD and Roey Sweet who joint-supervised me towards the end. Pete was always very enthusiastic about my research and this frequently rubbed off on me. Moreover, his comments, advice and criticisms have helped to greatly improve my writing and think about the source material more critically. Roey has been invaluable since she started co- supervising me. In a day and age when academics are forever busy and constantly bombarded with emails, Roey went above and beyond and was always very supportive and able to offer advice at every step of the way. Finally, I would like to thank my parents and Claire Bishop. My parents have continuously supported me and believed that I would get to this point even when the odds seemed stacked against me. Dad, I owe you a beer at the football and Mum some flowers. Claire has equally been infinitely supportive. She listened to me talk endlessly about pauper inventories, brought me coffee when I was laid off in my study with a broken metatarsal bone, and ultimately stopped me from working myself into the ground. 3 Table of Contents List of tables...............................................................................................................................6 List of figures............................................................................................................................10 Abbreviations...........................................................................................................................12 Chapter 1: Introduction...........................................................................................................14 Historiographical review...................................................................................................15 Thesis aims and scope ......................................................................................................27 Thesis structure ................................................................................................................29 Chapter 2: Sources and Methodology....................................................................................32 Parish records and inventories.........................................................................................33 Pauper inventories............................................................................................................36 Other inventories..............................................................................................................68 Terminology: pauper and poor.........................................................................................72 Backgrounds to counties ..................................................................................................74 Chapter 3: Beds, furnishings, hearths, cooking and lighting in the homes of the Dorset, Kent and Norfolk poor ............................................................................................................79 Valuations and quantities of items...................................................................................80 Beds and furnishings.........................................................................................................83 Furniture ...........................................................................................................................96 The hearth ......................................................................................................................114 Lighting ...........................................................................................................................138 Chapter 4: Tableware, dining and luxury goods in the homes of the Dorset, Kent and Norfolk poor ..........................................................................................................................147 Tableware and dining .....................................................................................................147 Luxury goods...................................................................................................................180 4 Linguistic analysis and a new ratio-based analysis.........................................................210 Chapter 5: Gender and urban-rural differences...................................................................219 Gender ............................................................................................................................219 Urban and rural differences ...........................................................................................232 Chapter 6: Conclusion ...........................................................................................................241 Bibliography ...........................................................................................................................250 5 List of tables Table 2.1: Types of inventories found among parish and miscellaneous archival collections, c.1643-1841.............................................................................................................................34 Table 2.2: Percentage of pauper inventories which record various goods in Dorset, Kent and Norfolk, c.1679-1834..............................................................................................................68 Table 2.3: Percentage of various Kent inventories which record select items, c.1668- 1834........................................................................................................................................71 Table 3.1: Total average value of goods recorded in pauper inventories, 1681-1825...........81 Table 3.2: Average and median total number of items in pauper inventories, c.1679- 1834........................................................................................................................................82 Table 3.3: Percentage of pauper inventories which record beds and mattresses, c.1679- 1834........................................................................................................................................84
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