THE CHIMNEY SWEEP

THE CHIMNEY SWEEPER

Chimneys started to appear in Britain around 1200, when they replaced the open fire burning in the middle of the one room house. At first there would be one heated room in the building and chimneys would be large. Over the next four hundred years rooms became specialised and smaller and many were heated. Sea coal started to replace wood, and it deposited a layer of flammable creosote in the inside surface of the flue, and caked it with soot. Whereas before, the chimney was a vent for the smoke now it was needed to draw the fire and this required narrower flues.

Even so, boys rarely climbed chimneys before the Great fire of London.  Regulations,were put in place and the design of chimneys was altered, The new chimneys were often angular and narrow, and the usual dimension of the flue in domestic properties was 9 inches (23 cm) by 14 inches (36 cm). The master sweep was unable to climb into such small spaces himself and employed climbing boys to go up the chimneys to dislodge the soot. The boys often 'buffed it', that is, climbed in the nude, propelling themselves by their knees and elbows which were scraped raw. They were often put up hot chimneys, and sometimes up chimneys that were alight in order to extinguish the fire. Chimneys with sharp angles posed a particular hazard. These boys were apprenticed to the sweep, and from 1778 until 1875 a series of laws attempted to regulate their working conditions, and many first hand accounts were documented and published in parliamentary reports. From about 1803, there was an alternative method of brushing chimneys, but sweeps and their clients resisted the change preferring climbing boys to the new Humane Sweeping Machines. Compulsory education was established in 1870but it was a further five years before legislation was put in place to license Chimney Sweeps and finally prevent boys being sent up chimneys.

The poor boys offen got stuck in the flue and burned alive. There are many pictures which depict the child trapped with his knees stuck against his chin, in the narrow burning chimney.

*  boys, and sometimes girls, were technically called chimney sweeps apprentices, and a master sweep, who being an adult, was too large to fit into a. chimney, He would be paid by the parish to teach orphans or paupers the craft. They were totally reliant on him - they or their guardians had signed papers of indenture in front of a magistrate which bound them to him until they were adults.. The master sweep had to teach the craft and its mysteries, to provide the apprentice with a second suit of clothes, to have him cleaned once a week, allow him to attend church, and not send him up chimneys that were on fire. An apprentice agreed to obey his master. ^] Once his seven year long apprenticeship was completed he would become a journeyman sweep, and would continue to work for a master sweep of his choice. Other apprentices were sold on to the sweep, or sold by their parents.

It was generally agreed that six was a good age to train a boy. Though, it has been logged a boy of four was trained. A master sweep would have many apprentices, they would start the morning by roaming the streets calling out "Soot -Oh, Sweep" or another cry to let the house-owners know they were around - this would remind the owners of the dangers of un-swept chimneys. When engaged, the master sweep would fix a cloth over the fireplace, , and the climbing boy would take off his boots and any excess clothes, then get behind it. The flue would be as tall as the house and twist several times, and its dimensions would be 14in by 9in. He would pull his cap down over his face and hold a large flat brush over his head, and wedge his body diagonally in the flue. Using his back, elbows and knees, he would shimmy up the flue in the manner of a caterpillar and use the brush to dislodge loose soot, which would fall over him and down to the bottom, and a scraper to chip away the solid bits, as a smooth chimney was a safe chimney. Having reached the top he would slide back down at speed back to the floor and the soot pile. It was now his job to bag up the soot and carry it back to the master sweep's cart or yard. soot  was valuable and could be sold for 9d in An apprentice would do four or five chimneys a day. When they first started they scraped their knees and elbows, so the master would harden up their skin by standing them close to a hot fire and rubbing in strong brine using a brush. This was done each evening until the skin hardened. The boys got no wages but lived with the master who fed them. They slept together on the floor or in the cellar under the sacks and the cloth used during the day to catch the soot. This was known as "sleeping black The boy would be washed by the mistress in a tub in the yard, this may happen as often as once a week, but rarely did. One sweep used to wash down his boys, in the lake in Hyde park, in London, called The serpentine. Another Nottingham sweep insisted they washed three times a year, for Christmas, Whitsun and the Goose Fair. Sometimes, a boy would need to be persuaded to climb faster or higher up the chimney, and the master sweep would either light a small fire of straw or a brimstone candle, to encourage him to try harder. Another method which also helped stop them from "going off" was to send another boy up behind him to prick pins into the soles of his feet or buttocks. These people must have been sick?

Sometimes, the chimney’s would actually be on fire! Careless climbing boys could get stuck with their knees jammed against their chins. The harder they struggled the tighter they became wedged. They could remain in this position for many hours until they were pushed out from below or pulled out with a rope. If their struggling caused a fall of soot they would suffocate. Dead or alive the boy had to be removed and this would be done by removing bricks from the side of the chimney. This caused concern and societies were set up to promote mechanical means for sweeping chimneys and it is through their pamphlets that we have a better idea of what the job could entail. Here a sweep describes the fate of one boy:

After passing through the chimney and descending to the second angle of the fireplace the Boy finds it completely filled with soot, which he has dislodged from the sides of the upright part. He endeavors to get through, and succeeds in doing so, after much struggling as far as his shoulders; but finding that the soot is compressed hard all around him, by his exertions, that he can recede no farther; he then endeavors to move forward, but his attempts in this respect are quite abortive; for the covering of the horizontal part of the Flue being stone, the sharp angle of which bears hard on his shoulders, and the back part of his head prevents him from moving in the least either one way or the other. His face, already covered with a climbing cap, and being pressed hard in the soot beneath him, stops his breath. In this dreadful condition he strives violently to extricate himself, but his strength fails him; he cries and groans, and in a few minutes he is suffocated. An alarm is then given, a brick-layer is sent for, an aperture is perforated in the Flue, and the boy is extracted, but found lifeless. In a short time an inquest is held, and a Coroner's Jury returns a verdict of 'Accidental Death.' "

These however were not the only occupational hazards that chimney sweeps suffered. In the 1817 report to Parliament witnesses reported that climbing boys suffered from general neglect, In addition they exhibited stunted growth and deformity of the spine, legs and arms, that, in the 1810s, was put down to being required to remain in abnormal positions for long periods of time before their bones had hardened.. The knees and ankle joints were the most affected. Sores and inflammation of the eyelids that could lead to loss of sight, were slow in healing because the boy kept rubbing them. Bruises and burns were obvious hazards of having to work in an overheated environment. Cancer of the scrotum, was only found in Chimneys sweeps so was referred to as Chimney Sweep Cancer in the teaching hospitals. Asthma and inflammation of the chest was attributed to the fact that the boys were out in all weathers, and was the first log of industrial cancer.

It is a disease which always makes it first attack on the inferior part of the scrotum where it produces a superficial, painful ragged ill-looking sore with hard rising edges.....in no great length of time it pervades the skin, and the membranes of the scrotum, and seizes the testicle , which it in larges(sic), hardens and renders truly and thoroughly distempered. Whence it makes its way up the spermatic  into the abdomen.

He also comments on the life of the boys:

The fate of these people seems peculiarly hard...they are treated with great brutality.. they are thrust up narrow and sometimes hot chimneys,(sic) where they are bruised burned and almost suffocated; and when they get to puberty they become ... liable to a most noisome, painful and fatal disease.

There are still chimney sweeps all over the world, in Poland and Croatia, they wear the traditional uniform all in black with brass buttons.

 In Germany, depictions of chimney sweeps, are considered good luck.

I think they were heartless scoundrels and feel so sad for the past boys, though in Scotland, only the men worked as sweeps and not children.

Is it me, or am I odd? I found this subject  not only disturbing,  but of great interest. The power of the research on the net? Next time you turn on your gas heating, think of those poor children?