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power” for the propertied classes. There we were chiefly concerned with the social functioning of 

the labourer. But for a full elucidation of the law of accumulation, his condition outside the 

workshop must also be looked at, his condition as to food and dwelling. The limits of this book 

compel us to concern ourselves chiefly with the worst paid part of the industrial proletariat, and 

with the agricultural labourers, who together form the majority of the working class.  

But first, one word on official pauperism, or on that part of the working class which has forfeited 

its condition of existence (the sale of labour power), and vegetates upon public alms. The official 

list of paupers numbered in England

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  851,369 persons; in 1856, 877,767; in 1865, 971,433. In 

consequence of the cotton famine, it grew in the years 1863 and 1864 to 1,079,382 and 1,014,978. 

The crisis of 1866, which fell most heavily on London, created in this centre of the world market, 

more populous than the kingdom of Scotland, an increase of pauperism for the year 1866 of 

19.5% compared with 1865, and of 24.4% compared with 1864, and a still greater increase for the 

first months of 1867 as compared with 1866. From the analysis of the statistics of pauperism, two 

points are to be taken. On the one hand, the fluctuation up and down of the number of paupers, 

reflects the periodic changes of the industrial cycle. On the other, the official statistics become 

more and more misleading as to the actual extent of pauperism in proportion as, with the 

accumulation of capital, the class-struggle, and, therefore, the class consciousness of the working 

men, develop. E.g., the barbarity in the treatment of the paupers, at which the English Press (The 

Times, Pall Mall Gazette, etc.) have cried out so loudly during the last two years, is of ancient 

date. F. Engels showed in 1844 exactly the same horrors, exactly the same transient canting 

outcries of “sensational literature.” But frightful increase of “deaths by starvation” in London 

during the last ten years proves beyond doubt the growing horror in which the working-people 

hold the slavery of the workhouse, that place of punishment for misery.

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B. The Badly Paid Strata of the British Industrial Class 

During the cotton famine of 1862, Dr. Smith was charged by the Privy Council with an inquiry 

into the conditions of nourishment of the distressed operatives in Lancashire  and Cheshire. His 

observations during many preceding years had led him to the conclusion that “to avert starvation 

diseases,” the daily food of an average woman ought to contain at least 3,900 grains of carbon 

with 180 grains of nitrogen; the daily food of an average man, at least 4,300 grains of carbon with 

200 grains of nitrogen; for women, about the same quantity of nutritive elements as are contained 

in 2 lbs. of good wheaten bread, for men 1/9 more; for the weekly average of adult men and 

women, at least 28,600 grains of carbon and 1,330 grains of nitrogen. His calculation was 

practically confirmed in a surprising manner by its agreement with the miserable quantity of 

nourishment to which want had forced down the consumption of the cotton operatives. This was, 

in December, 1862, 29,211 grains of carbon, and 1,295 grains of nitrogen weekly.  

In the year 1863, the Privy Council ordered an inquiry into the state of distress of the worst-

nourished part of the English working class. Dr. Simon, medical officer to the Privy Council, 

chose for this work the above-mentioned Dr. Smith. His inquiry ranges on the one hand over the 

agricultural labourers, on the other, over silk-weavers, needlewomen, kid-glovers, stocking-

weavers, glove-weavers, and shoemakers. The latter categories are, with the exception of the 

stocking-weavers, exclusively town-dwellers. It was made a rule in the inquiry to select in each 

category the most healthy families, and those comparatively in the best circumstances.  

As a general result it was found that 

“in only one of the examined classes of in-door operatives did the average 

nitrogen supply just exceed, while in another it nearly reached, the estimated 

standard of bare sufficiency [i.e., sufficient to avert starvation diseases], and that 

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in two classes there was defect – in one, a very large defect – of both nitrogen and 

carbon. Moreover, as regards the examined families of the agricultural population, 

it appeared that more than a fifth were with less than the estimated sufficiency of 

carbonaceous food, that more than one-third were with less than the estimated 

sufficiency of nitrogenous food, and that in three counties (Berkshire, 

Oxfordshire, and Somersetshire), insufficiency of nitrogenous food was the 

average local diet.”

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Among the agricultural labourers, those of England, the wealthiest part of the United Kingdom, 

were the worst fed.

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 The insufficiency of food among the agricultural labourers, fell, as a rule, 

chiefly on the women and children, for “the man must eat to do his work.” Still greater penury 

ravaged the town-workers examined. 

“They are so ill fed that assuredly among them there must be many cases of severe 

and injurious privation.”

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(“Privation” of the capitalist all this! i.e., “abstinence” from paying for the means of subsistence 

absolutely necessary for the mere vegetation of his “hands.”) 

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The following table shows the conditions of nourishment of the above-named categories of purely 

town-dwelling work-people, as compared with the minimum assumed by Dr. Smith, and with the 

food-allowance of the cotton operatives during the time of their greatest distress:   

Both Sexes 

Average weekly  

carbon 

Average weekly  

nitrogen 

Five in-door  

occupations 

28,876 grains 

1,192 grains 

Unemployed Lancashire 

 

Operatives 

28,211 grains 

1,295 grains 

Minimum quantity to be  

allowed to the Lancashire  

Operatives, equal number  

of males and females 

28,600 grains 

1,330 grains 

One half, or 60/125, of the industrial labour categories investigated, had absolutely no beer, 28% 

no milk. The weekly average of the liquid means of nourishment in the families varied from 

seven ounces in the needle-women to 24¾ ounces in the stocking-makers. The majority of those 

who did not obtain milk were needle-women in London. The quantity of bread-stuffs consumed 

weekly varied from 7¾ lbs. for the needle-women to 11½ lbs. for the shoemakers, and gave a 

total average of 9.9 lbs. per adult weekly. Sugar (treacle, etc.) varied from 4 ounces weekly for 

the kid-glovers to 11 ounces for the stocking-makers; and the total average per week for all 

categories was 8 ounces per adult weekly. Total weekly average of butter (fat, etc.) 5 ounces per 

adult. The weekly average of meat (bacon, etc.) varied from 7¼ ounces for the silk-weavers, to 

18¼ ounces for the kid-glovers; total average for the different categories 13.6 ounces. The weekly 

cost of food per adult, gave the following average figures; silk-weavers 2s. 2½d., needle-women 

2s. 7d., kid-glovers 2s. 9½d., shoemakers 2s 7¾d., stocking-weavers 2s. 6¼d. For the silk-

weavers of Macclesfield the average was only 1s. 8½d. The worst categories were the needle-

women, silk-weavers and kid-glovers.

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  Of these facts, Dr. Simon in his General Health Report 

says: 

“That cases are innumerable in which defective diet is the cause or the aggravator 

of disease, can be affirmed by any one who is conversant with poor law medical 

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