1841 Census: East Street

 

 

1841 was the year of the first extensive Census.  Victoria had been on the throne since 1837 and was expecting  her second child, the future Edward V11.  Thirty-five thousand enumerators were appointed to collect up the census forms which had been distributed earlier.  Where the householder was illiterate the enumerator filled in the form. Adults' ages were rounded down to the nearest five.  Occupations were given, but not relationships within households.  Even so, the 1841 census is a rich source of data, especially for those of us who live in Coggeshall today. 

East Street, like West Street, follows the line of the Roman road, Stane Street.  Until about thirty years ago, when the by-pass was built, all traffic heading East through to Harwich passed along East Street.  It is still a busy through road today.  Most of the houses in the street are owned by the occupiers, although there are one or two rental properties.  Many of the houses are timber framed, dating to the mid-or late mediaeval period, some very small cottages and some much larger structures.  Typical residents today are retired professional couples, although there are exceptions.  Young people sixteen and under are a rarity in East Street.

The 1841 Census

In 1841, there were sixty-six households in East Street, housing a total of two hundred and ninety-four people, one hundred and eleven of whom were sixteen or under. It is doubtful whether they would have been considered as children then, not least because some of them had already been at work for five or six years. Typical residents were married couples with growing families, the husband employed in a traditional occupation.  The largest family recorded lists ten children.

Women's work

Perhaps the most interesting data is that on occupations.  The most common female occupation was that of servant, living in with the family.  Out of the sixty-six households, seventeen had at least one servant, usually a girl in her teens or early twenties.  A couple of households had three servants, but none had male indoor staff.  Dressmaking and cap-making employed fifteen females, with one Milliners having both assistants and apprentices living in. 

Coggeshall was famous for its tambour lace, a kind of embroidered net. Thirteen females were described as tambourers, with ages ranging from nine to twenty-five.  Typically these were young teenage girls, perhaps because of the sharp eyesight required. Seven people, some as young as nine, were employed at the silk mill.  Apart from charwomen - there were four of these - that was the range of female occupations, outside the home. With no labour-saving devices, and with growing families, women would have worked hard.  The term "economically inactive" was yet to be invented.

The butcher, the baker's boy and the cabinet-maker...

For males, as breadwinners for their families, there was a much wider range of occupations. The eleven agricultural and bricklayers' labourers were the exception in East Street; all the rest were employed in skilled trades involving apprenticeships.The butcher, brewer, tailor, hairdresser and shoemaker were all represented, supplying the immediate needs of the local community. Wheelwright, saddler, farrier and blacksmith would be essential trades in a society dependent on horse transport. 

Only four trades stand out in this list: surgeon, veterinary surgeon, wool stapler and gas fitter.  The Coggeshall Gas Company began to generate coal gas in 1837, so there was gas street lighting.  This modern trade sits oddly alongside wool stapler which harks back to Coggeshall's long history as a wool town. By 1841 the town had gone over to silk-weaving.

Bankruptcy

A little further research proved rewarding: the wool-stapling firm of S, F and S Unwin went bankrupt in 1846, unable to cover its debts.  Newspaper reports provide astonishing details of the sale of their property held at the White Hart: between them Stephen Unwin and his two sons Fraser and Stephen owned not only large houses and all the industrial premises of wool-merchants, but they also owned blocks of cottages and land up and down Coggeshall.  All this went under the hammer, along with the life assurance policies on the Unwins and their wives.  The paper reports the names of sitting tenants, what the annual rental income was, who bought it and what they paid.  

For example, a cottage with good garden and a sitting tenant went for £45.  With an annual rent of £5.4s, that is a yield of just over 10%.  Cottages in Coggeshall now cost somewhere in the region of £250-300,000.  Imagine an annual rent of £25,000, which would be 10%!

It would, of course, be wonderful to be able to identify who lived in each house by number, not least the house I live in myself.  Alas, that is one thing the census does not provide.  My plan is to look at changes over time, in the street where I live.  Thank you for reading.