Chimney sweeping is a needed and honorable profession with a history that goes back to 16th century England, though fireplaces date back to early Roman times. The story of chimney sweeps includes the first recorded case of an industrial cancer and the birth of a familiar phrase, to “light a fire under someone.”
The earliest days of chimney sweeps involved a filthy and difficult job performed for the wealthy who lived in large estate homes and castles, such as Leeds Castle in Kent, England. Then the trend of installing chimneys caught on. While at first it was only the ruling class who enjoyed a fireplace and chimney, before too long the working class began requesting fireplaces in every room of their home.
Sweeps would usually work from house to house along tight-knit city streets, and sometimes they moved from roof to roof, cleaning sooty chimneys.
Changes were made in the 17th century when England began charging a hearth tax that was based partly on the number of chimneys the house had. In order to avoid the hefty tax, builders began connecting flues of new fireplaces with the existing chimney. This created complex mazes of narrow, pitch black tunnels inside homes.
Another change was that coal began to be used in fireplaces instead of wood. Burning coal left sticky soot deposits in large amounts which had to be regularly cleaned; otherwise, smoke would fill the houses with toxic fumes.
It was with the increase in coal usage that regular visits from chimney sweeps became necessary and the profession rapidly grew. Chimney sweeps began to be associated with restoring fresh air in homes and the sweeps themselves became a symbol of good hearth and good health.
Ironically, the health of those most responsible for clean chimneys was sacrificed to the task. Tragically, small children were the primary “tool” used to clean the filthy, often maze-like chimneys and were the ones essentially enslaved to the job.
Destitute parents would either sell their children to a chimney master or poor orphan boys were chosen for the trade. In exchange for food, a home, and water, the children were made to work in nightmarish conditions. They worked from dawn to dust and it’s said that their only day off all year around was Mayday, when they would dance in England’s streets.
The primary job for the small children was to climb into chimneys in order to scrape the coal deposits from the flue lining. If a child was afraid to continue a climb, the master would sometimes light a small fire to motivate him to get busy working; that is where the phrase “to light a fire under someone”originated.
There were many perils for the children chimney sweeps, who were usually between the ages of 5 and 11 years old. Their developing bones became deformed because of the odd positions their bodies were in constantly as they scooted up chimneys. They suffered from soot inhalation, which was partially responsible for the fact that most child chimney sweeps didn’t live past middle age. The first recorded industrial cancer was suffered by male adolescent chimney sweeps. It was a painful and deadly cancer. Some children became trapped and died of suffocation inside chimneys.
Efforts were made from time to time to put an end to the cruel treatment of the children chimney sweeps. An English poet named William Blake wrote a poem called “The Chimney Sweeper” which helped spotlight the cruel life the children lived. “The Water-Babies, A Fairy Tale for a Land Baby,” a classic written by Reverend Charles Kingsley, also helped the cause.
In 1864, the English Parliament finally passed the “Act for the Regulation of Chimney Sweepers” which made it illegal to send a child up a chimney.
**Courtesy: Chimney Solutions
Children and chimneys
From the late 18th century children formed a rising proportion of the population almost two out of five people by the mid-1820s. It was common for them to work to supplement family incomes. Orphans and abandoned children came under the care of the Poor Law, but were usually put into the care of employers who provided for them in return for their work.
Child labour
Parliamentary concern over the exploitation of child labour in the 19th century is usually associated with factories. In fact the beginnings of such concern was focused on the ‘climbing boys’ recruited by chimney sweeps or apprenticed by parish authorities to climb into and clean chimneys.
In the 1760s, Jonas Hanway, a wealthy London merchant and philanthropist, campaigned extensively to improve working conditions for sweeps’ apprentices. Eventually, an Act of 1788 specified a minimum age of eight years old for apprentices, but this and other regulations were never enforced.
Finding a solution
In the early 1830s, as Parliament became more preoccupied generally with the exploitation of child labour, the Chimney Sweeps Act was passed in 1834 outlawing the apprenticing of any child below the age of ten. Furthermore, no child was to be actually engaged in cleaning chimneys under the age of 14.
Chimney Sweeps Act
In 1840, a revised Chimney Sweeps Act raised the minimum age of apprenticeship to 16. As with earlier legislation, this was largely ignored due to the absence of any means of enforcement. Children younger than ten were still being made to climb chimneys.
In 1863 the publication of ‘The Water-Babies’, a novel by Charles Kingsley, did much to raise public awareness about the gross mistreatment of children in this kind of employment through its central character, Tom, a child chimney sweep. Parliament responded the following year with a new Chimney Sweepers Regulation Act. This was ineffective despite its humane purpose.
In 1875, a successful solution was implemented by the Chimney Sweepers’ Act which required sweeps to be licensed and made it the duty of the police to enforce all previous legislation.
**Courtesy: UK Parliament