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| Mrs Jenny Burt - 22nd April 1985 |
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J Burt - Thesis - Chapter 3
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This study was undertaken at Bedford College of Higher Education
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| The Relationship between the growth of the Boot and Shoe Industry and Non-conformity in Rushden, 1881-1901. |
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Temperance The temperance movement in Rushden broke through denominational barriers and was a subject which drew together all the churches of the village including the Church of England. In the words of B. Harrison 'once all denominations had established their temperance departments, the attack upon drunkenness became something which could unite Christians against the foe’1. Gilbert too said that 'the temperance question cut across party and denominational lines’2 and this certainly applied to the village. For example, the Rev. Bradfield (Old Baptist) was noted for his very advanced Liberal views and as an advocate of disestablishment of the Church of England and had frequent political battles with Canon Barker, yet when the subject of temperance arose, there was much co-operation between the two leaders, both sharing the same platform and Canon Barker taking the chair at temperance meetings when Rev. Bradfield was indisposed. The movement arrived relatively early in Rushden, the Rushden Temperance Society being formed in 1841 at the Old Baptist Church when fifteen members led by the Rev. J. Whittemore signed the Pledge 'We voluntarily agree to abstain from all intoxicating liquors except for medicinal purposes and in a Religious Ordinance’. Thereupon an 'energetic crusade’3 ensued and the First Band of Hope, the Junior branch of the movement, was set up in the village in 1855, again at the Old Baptist Church, only seven years after the movement began in Leeds4. However, not all chapel members agreed with the principles, some leading members of the church commenting that 'the old teetotalers are bad enough, but the idea of getting the children is intolerable5. Attitudes changed, however, and by the end of the century every church, including the Anglican, had its own Band of Hope and in 1898 there were nine Bands of Hope in the village with 1,300 members. Since Rushden could be described as a mecca for immigrant workers, one would assume that the strangers coming in would be quite rootless and with a number of single young men there would be a greater prevalence of drunkenness. Whether or not this is an accurate picture I cannot determine as time precluded searching out drunkenness figures, but more importantly to this essay, the chapels themselves and the Temperance Society believed that there was a problem and that they had a responsibility to wage 'war against the Demon Intemperance and the scourge of our Country’, and to wean people from the early belief that 'drink was a good creature of God,' and essential to 'their very existence'6. The 1881 Annual Report of the Society points out that the New Temperance Hall building 'shows the public that there is a strong Temperance element in the place and that the promoters are anxious to show that they are doing something to stem the torrent of drunkenness in Rushden.' The Society endeavoured to provide an alternative social life to the public house for the immigrant workers and Saturday night entertainments were frequently held in the Hall, built in 1871 by the Temperance Jail Co. Ltd., sometimes organised by the chapels or by the Society itself. The Society's Annual Report of 1893 said that the winter Saturday evening meetings average attendance was 350, and the Hall was used by many of the village's organisations for public teas, choral Society concerts, the Liberal Association, Joseph Arch addressed a 'crowded meeting’ on the 'Land Question and the County Franchise’, Sports Clubs, Dancing displays and Bazaars, and was frequently used as a temporary board school or church for new groupings until permanent premises were erected. Besides offering an alternative social life, more direct methods were employed to reform drinkers. For example, the Temperance Society would arrange meetings to which 'some drinkers were invited', they would be given a free tea then a social meeting with addresses was held. On one occasion this was described as 'well attended, thirteen to fourteen signed the Pledge but not one kept it till now though some tried for a considerable time. There is a great attraction of the public house and nothing else to induce them to keep away'7. It was clear that the Society understood the role of drink as an important part of the worker's social life and recognised the need to provide an alternative. They discussed the provision of 'a place where those who sign the Pledge and the young men can meet as a counter attraction to the public house1, and consequently the coffee tavern, the Waverley Temperance Hotel (Rushden) Ltd., was established in 1882 financed by an authorised share capital of £3,000 taken up by local businessmen. The chapels had their own reforming crusades ranging from Temperance Sundays and missions for their own congregations to more positive action. The Salvation Army's methods are well known but oral evidence has it that the Mission Church was equally as innovative. Midnight temperance meetings were held for people coming out of the pubs and clubs who would be met and invited to take tea and a bun before the meeting commenced. Other forces for temperance in the village were a branch of the Independent Order of Good Templars and the British Women's Temperance Association, promoted in Rushden in 1892, fourteen years after arriving in England from the United States, who used the old Temperance Hall as their own building. Many women sported the distinctive white ribbon broach denoting their opinions. One other branch of the movement needs to be mentioned, that is, the Temperance Brass Band, popular at many chapel and village functions which achieved national fame and, ironically, in recent years has become the Windmill Club band. B. Harrison has interestingly taken a number of national teetotal leaders and analysed their other reforming activities and interests. If one looks at the leaders of the Temperance movement in Rushden one can see that not only were they prominent in church life but also in the political, i.e. the School Board, the Board of Guardians and later the Urban Council, and the business life of the village, (See Appendix E) Thus temperance principles probably first encountered in the churches and Bands of Hope were carried over into business. The 1891 Jubilee Report of the Temperance Society reported that 'of 31 shoe manufacturers in Rushden, 26 were abstainers together with all the Guardians and Ministers of the place’8. At the coming-of-age of an employee of Mr. G. Denton at which tea and entertainment were provided, the presiding Chairman, another employee who had worked for thirty of his forty years for Mr. Denton, 'rejoiced that a pleasant and social gathering of this sort could be held without the use of intoxicating drinks'9. Similarly at a Leather Trades Dinner held at the Wheatsheaf Public House to which the principal manufacturers were invited, the proposer of the toast to the manufacturers drew attention to the fact that 'of the nine manufacturers present all were total abstainers and that such an example must have a beneficial effect on their employees'10. Perhaps the proposer was being rather optimistic since oral evidence maintains that after 'Saint Monday' the queues outside the pawn shop stretched 100 yards or more down the High Street. Family tradition has it that my own Great Grandmother used to say that after the weekend's drinking she had very little money with which to feed the family for the week. Needless to say, she was a staunch chapel supporter and teetotaller with her white ribbon broach although Great Grandfather was not, and her own children were divided between the two cultures of the chapel and the club. Whilst the Temperance movement was closely linked with the churches sharing much of their idea as part of the family of God and therefore a recognisably respectable entity, the movement was also very active in its political sphere. A committee was appointed on the question of Sunday closing to ascertain feeling in the village and reported 435 were in favour of closing the pubs all day on Sundays, 10 against, 44 no opinion. Every application for a license to sell beer in the village was opposed. A memorial got up by the Society in a very short time was signed by 'most of the influential ratepayers of the place representing about half the rateable value therein’11, and the application was refused. The chapels also fought license applications, the Independent Wesleyans sent two members (both leading shoe manufacturers) to Wellingborough in 1896 to oppose an application for an outdoor licence, and sent resolutions in favour of the Local Veto Bi11 to Lord Roseberry in 1896. B. Harrison believed that there was a change of emphasis from the early evangelistic ideas of the movement with its stress upon personal aim to the later concept of society itself being responsible for the reform of the individual either by education or by prosecution to reform, and many historians put forward the view that the movement became predominantly secular. But I believe that in Rushden the secular aspect was secondary and that running throughout all the social provision were religious overtones. For example, every meeting seemed to open with a prayer and singing and frequent reference is made to the idea of self respect and serving God as an example to others. The shoe worker could not fail to be open to influence by the temperance movement since its proponents frequently adopted the semblance of an evangelistic crusade. Whit Monday was traditionally the day of the temperance demonstration in the village when the members of the movement and the Bands of Hope belonging to the churches were led by the village's Brass Bands and would parade through the streets with tea, addresses and games being held in a local field followed by a public meeting in the evening chaired equally by the Anglican and non-conformist clergy. Likewise a public temperance lecture would be given on the Green on Feast Sunday (the Sunday of the local wake or fair) usually by the Baptist minister. Rushden seems to have followed the national trend in its political and secular aspects of the temperance movement but it also retained a considerable part of the early evangelistic appeal. The records leave one in no doubt of the energy and zeal of the movement within the churches and the life of the village and of its concern for the sobriety of the shoeworkers. Finally, although temperance played a prominent part in village life and as I said on page 24 was perhaps the greatest divider in the shoeworker's social life, one must recognise the distinction between temperance and total abstinence. The temperance movement and the churches were occupied with total abstinence, but the question of temperance, i.e. moderation, concerned the Working Mens1 Clubs. The matter had received great deliberation nationally before the introduction of alcoholic beverages to the movement, but it had been recognised that beer played an integral part in the leisure hours of the working classes and that to continue to deprive them of their most popular beverage would alienate them from the aims of the movement, i.e. conversation, business and mental improvement. The integrity of the working man would not be impaired by the introduction of alcohol as a matter of course since the working classes were responsible for their own conduct and recognised the need for temperance. The Rushden Clubs were anxious to promote temperance, i.e. moderation, for example complaints were received of a member fetching more than one pint of beer to take out of the Club on Sunday mornings. 'That member was banned from taking beer out and a limit was imposed on the members. I found that attitudes towards the Clubs softened as the Clubs established their respectability, though not from the strict non-conformist line, and by 1910 the President of one of the Clubs was also a sidesman at St. Mary's Church. References
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