Innovation & Wealth › Industrial revolution › The factory system and industrial labor
Child labor in mills and mines
late 1700s – early 1900s· Event· Society: who gained, who lost
Well documentedSolid records, texts or physical evidence.
Children as young as five or six worked long hours in British mills and mines, valued for small size, low pay and obedience.
See it on the Innovation & Wealth map →What happened
Children had always worked on farms and in family workshops, but factories set a machine's pace for 12 hours or more a day. Mills took 'pauper apprentices' from workhouses, and in many early mills children were a third or more of the workforce. They pieced broken threads and crawled under moving machinery. In coal mines, five-year-olds opened ventilation doors in the dark and older children hauled coal carts. Injuries, beatings and stunted growth were common.
Impact on society and the economy
Outrage at child labor drove the first laws regulating work, making the state, not just owners and parents, responsible for working conditions.
How we know
Parliamentary inquiries (the Sadler Committee of 1832, the Children's Employment Commission of 1842), factory inspectors' reports, workers' memoirs studied by Jane Humphries, and Lewis Hine's US photographs.
Still debated
Did industrialization increase child labor overall, or mainly concentrate it where reformers could see it? Most working children were still on farms and in homes.
Connections (3)
▸The factory system and industrial labor relied heavily on Child labor in mills and minesWell documented
The connection
Machines reduced the need for strength and skill, so owners hired children, who were cheap, nimble and easier to discipline. Early rural mills took pauper apprentices from workhouses because adults avoided factory discipline. Children pieced broken threads and cleaned under running machines, often for 12 hours or more a day.
When and how
Britain's textile districts, about 1770–1850; similar patterns followed in New England, continental Europe and later Asia.
How we know
Mill payrolls, apprentice indentures and Parliamentary testimony record children's ages, hours and share of the workforce.
Debates
Children's share of factory workers fell after the 1830s; historians debate whether laws, new machines needing fewer helpers, or rising family incomes did more.
▸Child labor in mills and mines was restricted by British Factory ActsWell documented
The connection
Reports of exhausted, injured children prompted campaigns by Richard Oastler, who compared mill children to slaves in 1830, Michael Sadler and Lord Ashley. Sadler's 1832 committee testimony and a royal commission led to the 1833 Act banning under-nines from textile mills, limiting hours and adding inspectors. Later Acts tightened limits.
When and how
Westminster and the textile districts of Yorkshire and Lancashire, 1802–1847.
How we know
The Acts, Hansard debates and the Sadler and 1833 Factory Commission reports directly link the testimony to the laws.
Debates
Some historians say Sadler's committee used leading questions and chosen witnesses; others note mill owners shaped the 1833 law to keep adult hours long.
▸Child labor in mills and mines was largely outlawed in the US by Fair Labor Standards Act (minimum wage, child labor ban)Well documented
The connection
Around 1900 about 1.75 million American children aged 10 to 15 worked, many in mills and mines. Reformers, armed with Lewis Hine's photographs, won a 1916 federal ban, but the Supreme Court struck it down in 1918. The FLSA finally set 16 as the minimum age for most jobs and 18 for hazardous ones; the Court upheld it in 1941.
When and how
United States, 1904–1941: the National Child Labor Committee, photographer Lewis Hine, Labor Secretary Frances Perkins, and the Supreme Court in Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918) and United States v. Darby (1941).
How we know
Census counts of working children, Hine's photographs, the statute's child-labor sections and the Darby ruling document the link.
Debates
Child labor was already falling thanks to school laws, higher wages and new machines, so how much the FLSA itself ended it is debated. Farm work stayed largely exempt.