MY ANCESTOR WAS A... SOAPMAKER
Sue Wilkes takes a closer look at the history of soap manufacture and the dirty work of the soap factories
Sue Wilkes takes a closer look at the history of soap manufacture and the dirty work of the soap factories
Soft soap has been made since ancient times. Fish oil and a lye (alkaline solution) made from wood or plant ashes were boiled together until they formed a jelly-like consistency. This cheap white or green soap was sold in tubs or barrels, and did not smell very nice.
Sometime during the 15th century, hard soap (in tablet form) was introduced to Britain. Bristol ‘grey soap’ cost a penny per pound, and ‘black soap’ was half that price. In 1524 soap manufacture began in London, but trouble brewed in the 1630s when Charles I gave the Company of Soapmakers in Westminster a monopoly. The company paid a levy to the crown for this patent. The move was very unpopular, and suppressed all soapmaking outside London. The nation’s washerwomen were enraged because the new ‘official’ soap hurt their skin and damaged linen. A clothes-washing contest was staged at the Guildhall to ‘prove’ which soap was the best.
According to a quote in Charles Knight’s The Popular History of England, the outcome was inconclusive: “They have had two general washing-days at Guildhall; most of them [the washerwomen] have given their verdict for the new soap to be the better, yet continual complaints rise up, that it burns linen, scalds the laundress’s fingers, wastes infinitely in keeping, being full of lime and tallow.”
Soap was a luxury that only the upper classes used for personal hygiene. Families made soft soap from wood ashes, or bought cheap soap ‘ lees’ from soapmakers. Nearly all of the soap manufactured was for the home market; hardly
Soap was a luxury that only the upper classes used for personal hygiene
any was exported. It had some industrial uses, such as removing grease or oil from woollen cloth, whitening silk, and fulling and dyeing cloth. Soap was also used in medicines and liniments.
Soap ingredients
Hard soap was made with soda ash; soft soap with potash. Hard soap’s quality was determined by the type of fat or oil used. White or ‘curd’ soap, the finest, was made from molten tallow; yellow soap from pine resin and palm oil; and ‘mottled’ soap had mineral colourings added. Before it could be used for soapmaking, the alkali (whether potash or soda) was treated with another chemical such as quicklime to remove any carbonic acid. It was then mixed with water until this ‘ ley’ reached the correct concentration.
For hard soap, oil (or tallow) was boiled with the ley in a large copper over an open fire. When a soapy compound or paste began to form, a stronger ley was added while the worker stirred the vat and kept it boiling. (Boiling took many hours, with several additions of ley.) The soapmaker kept tasting the mixture to check when it was no longer alkaline. To remove any water bound up in the soapy mass, common salt was added (‘cutting the pan’). The mixture separated into a top layer of soapy lumps (‘boiled to a curd’), with a clear waste ley below. After a finishing process, the waste ley was drawn off, and the soap was cast into wooden frames to set. When it was firm, the frame was removed and the soap cut into bars by ‘soapcutters’. For fancy soaps, perfumers re-melted the soap and added scent, and ‘stampers’ used a press to imprint the maker’s name on each bar.
In the mid-1780s there were more than 970 soapmakers in Great Britain. Excise officers supervised the manufacture of each batch. Soap ingredients, and the finished item, were taxed from 1712 to 1853, making it very expensive. It was only when the tax was repealed that soap acquired more general use for personal hygiene, laundry and household cleaning. Several technological and scientific discoveries in the early 19th century helped industrialise soapmaking. The number of soapmakers reduced, but each factory’s output soared.
Soda for soapmaking was formerly extracted from barilla (the ashes of a Spanish plant) or burnt kelp (from northern Scotland, including Orkney). The invention of the Leblanc process for extracting soda from common salt in 1791 meant that cheaper alkalis became available. Some soapmakers set up their own alkali works. Then Michel Eugène Chevreul’s research into the chemical composition of fats and soap inspired soap manufacturers to try vegetable oils such as palm oil from West Africa. ‘Marine’ soap, which was soluble in salt water, was made from coconut oil.
During the mid-1820s more efficient and cost-effective steam heating replaced open fires for boiling soap. Steam was passed through a perforated coil around the copper (now an iron vessel surrounded by brick).
Soapmaker statistics
The 1861 census found that about 1,600 men worked as soap-boilers; about 250 were under the age of 20. In contrast, just 11 women worked as soapboilers; only one was under 20. Their average wage was 5s per day. As well as male and female soapmakers, a large factory employed carpenters, printers, box-folders, boilermen, enginemen, labourers and carters together with workers in its chemicals department.
In the mid-1780s there were more than 970 soapmakers in Great Britain
Investigators for the Children’s Employment Commission in 1842 found that children and teenagers worked in soap factories. At Chris Thomas & Brothers’ Soap and Candle Works in Bristol, about 30 teenagers were employed, plus two boys under 13 years old – the pair made packing boxes, and piled up the soap after it was cut into bars. Factory hours were 6am to 6pm, with an hour and a half for meals, but the boys sometimes worked nights.
Soap-boiling factories were hot, steamy workplaces. Staff were in danger of being scalded, or worse. In 1904 the Manchester
Courier reported the death of William Aldridge, who fell in a vat of boiling soap at the works of Robert Brown in Newton Heath.
Over the years some brands, such as Lever Brothers’ Sunlight Soap, became household names. Family firm A& F Pears’ ‘transparent soap’, based on glycerine, was gentler on the skin than some of its competitors’ products. Pears used works by well-known artists, like John Everett Millais’s Bubbles (1886), on its advertisements.
By the late 1890s the main seats of soap manufacture were north-west and north-east England, London, Brentford, Bristol, Plymouth, Glasgow and Leith. Belfast, Londonderry, Limerick and Cork had important soap factories, too. Around this time Lever Brothers introduced the first soap ‘flakes’, which dissolved more easily than bar soap for washing clothes. The
first synthetic detergents appeared in the mid-20th century, and consumers can now buy many different household cleaning products. But a fine, wonderfully perfumed toilet soap is still a bath-time treat.
You can look for soapmakers’ records in the catalogues of local archives along with The National Archives’ Discovery catalogue (discovery. national archives.
gov.uk). For Scotland, use the Scottish Archive Network catalogue ( bit.ly/scottish
archives). The National Archives also has HM Customs and Excise records, and those held locally may include soap manufacturers’ addresses. Although the records of the London (formerly Westminster) Company of Soapmakers do not appear to have survived, Bristol Archives holds the company book of the Bristol Company of Soapmakers 1562–1642 (04370).
Fat was the basic ingredient of both soap and candles, so they were often made in the same factory. Glasgow City Archives holds the records of the Glasgow Candle and Soap Makers’ Society (a trade association) 1795–1845 (TD818), while the National Library of Ireland holds the minute book (MS 80) of the Dublin Corporation of Tallow- Chandlers, Soap-Boilers and Wax-light Makers.
Helpful resources
Soapmakers’ business records include account books, staff records, insurance policies, minute books, company journals, accounts, apprenticeships, share certificates, rentals (for tied accommodation) and pensions. Some historical trade directories listing soap and candle-making works are available online at the University of Leicester ( bit.ly/ leicester directories ). Census listings include soap agent, soapboiler, soapmaker, soap-cutter, soap-dealer and weigher. The Unilever company archive at Port Sunlight holds the records of several soap manufacturers, including William Gossage & Sons( Widnes ), A& F Pear sand Joseph Crosfield & Sons ( bit.ly/ unilever-archive). Sue Wilkes is a social historian. Her latest book is Tracing Your Manchester and Salford Ancestors (Pen & Sword)