Ancestors At Work
Alex Ombler reveals the harsh realities of life for our forebears who laboured on the docks
Did your relative work as a docker?
As long as vessels have carried cargoes on the seas, there has been the need for labourers to carry goods between ship and shore. However, the huge growth of seaborne trade and the construction of commercial docks during the 19th century saw the emergence of dock workers or ‘dockers’ as a recognisable labour force.
Among the grey mass of the working classes, the dockers were viewed by many as something of a race apart. While some had originally been agricultural labourers who had drifted from the land into port towns and cities in search of work, the core of the dock labour force was formed by Irish navvies who stayed on to work the docks and quays they had helped to build. This was
certainly the case at Liverpool, Glasgow and London, and also in Hull, Manchester and Leith.
Protective of their waterfront work territories, dock workers were separated from other dockside labourers by their Catholic religion and clannish tendencies. Dock work passed from father to son, and it was not uncommon to find entire families of dockers labouring side by side. Indeed, it was a common joke that a docker’s daughter would find it easier to get work on the docks than a male outsider. Many workers inhabited exclusive neighbourhoods close to the dock gates, and socialised in dockers’ pubs. In the newspaper the Morning Chronicle in 1849, Henry Mayhew recorded his impressions of the area near the docks at Wapping: “The courts and alleys round about the London Docks swarm with low lodging-houses, and are inhabited either by the dock labourers, sack-makers, watermen, or that peculiar class of London poor who pick up a precarious living by the water side.”
The Casual System
At the core of most dockers’ daily work was the controversial casual system. While some workers were in the permanent employment of companies known as stevedores (although in London the term generally referred to highly skilled overseers), shipping companies or warehousemen, many were employed on a casual basis – that is, a docker or ‘gang’ of dockers would be hired at the dock gates during ‘the call’ to ‘turnaround’ (discharge and unload) a single vessel. Casuals would then be paid, usually according to the type and volume of the cargo that they handled, before returning to the call to seek their next job. This system developed in response to the fluctuation and seasonal nature of seaborne trade, and enabled employers to take on extra men when trade was good without having to pay them when work was scarce.
Unsurprisingly, the casual system and its operation was a source of great division on the docks. Naturally, it favoured the employers and placed the burden of unemployment on the labour force. Those dockers who found it more difficult to get work or were frequently hired on the lower-paid jobs believed the casual system to be corrupt and based on favouritism and bribery. However, many dockers were hugely in favour of casualism, believing that the best workers were guaranteed regular work on the higherpaying cargoes. These men also enjoyed the freedom of being able to pick and choose their jobs, even taking extra time off when they had earned enough money.
Dock work was generally poorly paid, and wages were irregular. It was also physically tough, and often dangerous. While some bulk cargoes could be loaded and discharged using mechanical equipment, most goods were handled manually using the break-bulk system, by
‘Many were hired at the dock gates to discharge and unload a single vessel’
which goods shipped in man-sized boxes, barrels and sacks would be carried between ship and shore by hand or by sling. Other goods, such as grain and metal ores, were shovelled or bagged.
Specialist Roles
With such a wide variety of goods handled in different ports, some dock workers specialised in particular trades. For example, deal carriers and porters carried imported timber ‘deals’ (softwood planks) from ship to shore; coal trimmers loaded exports of coal; grain bushellers filled sacks with
grain; hatchmen stood by their ship’s hatch and signalled to the cranemen when to raise or lower goods in or out of the hold; and tallymen kept a tally of the volume and type of cargoes being loaded or discharged. Keep an eye out for these roles when you’re searching census records.
Employers had little if any responsibility to their casual employees. Safety equipment and procedures were almost completely absent, with dockers simply clad in cloth caps, scarves and long coats. Accidents and injuries were commonplace, with men maimed or killed by goods falling from slings hoisted high above their heads.
Furthermore employers were not obliged to provide their casuals with basic amenities such as toilets, canteens and lockers. As a result, dockers often congregated in dockside cafés, which were frequently unhygienic and squalid places where gambling took place and stolen goods were fenced. The general hardship of life on the docks maintained a spirit of comradeship and community amongst the dockers, while also fostering a collective resentment towards the employers.
The Great London Dock Strike of 1889 resulted in a victory for the dockers and the creation of the nationally important Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Labourers’ Union. In the decades that followed the strike the dockers’ unions tried to improve the conditions of employment for their members. For example, before and after the First World War registration schemes were introduced in many ports to reserve dock work for genuine dockers rather than general labourers scouring the waterfront looking for work. Most schemes included a basic fall-back wage for those registered dockers who were not hired at the call, together with guarantees that entry into dock work would be reserved for the sons of dockers. A similar scheme organised on a national basis was introduced after the Second World War.
The End Of An Industry
Although these schemes provided some basic employment securities, they failed to remove the casual system. Consequently, conditions on the docks during the early 1960s resembled those of the late Victorian era. However, the onset of the container revolution led to widespread government reforms that swept away the dockers’ working culture, consigning a way of life to history virtually overnight.
ALEX OMBLER
is a heritage project officer at East Riding of Yorkshire Council