Apprenticed out of parish

[Colin Moretti]

Does anyone know what sort of proportion of apprentices would have been placed out of their parish of origin at different times? For those placed out of parish were the distances involved minimal, eg to parishes within (say) 10 miles, or was it very common to go much further?

I guess that apprenticeships arranged by poor-law guardians are likely to be outside the parish to minimise the number claiming settlement, or was it arranged between parishes on an (unofficial) two-way basis?

Was there a difference between parish and "proper" apprenticeships?

Has there been any analysis of the Board of Stamps Apprenticeship records?

Any information gratefully received.

Thanks

Colin

[Sue Mackay]

Membership of the London Livery Companies/Guilds was by apprenticeship as well as inheritance. Quite a few of those apprentices travelled a fair way. One of my lot travelled from Worcestershire.

[Peter Goodey]

Apprenticeships arranged at parish expense were exempt from tax and therefore wouldn't appear in the Apprenticeship Books.

I'm not sure what point you're making about settlement. My understanding is that settlement could be acquired through an apprenticeship. But then whole aim of setting a boy up with a trade was so he wouldn't in future be a burden of the ratepayers!

[Colin Moretti]

Apprenticeships arranged at parish expense were exempt from tax and therefore wouldn't appear in the Apprenticeship Books....Of course not. I'm interested in the mobility of the population; I would guess that once the apprenticeship was completed the then journeyman would be more likely to remain in or near the parish of the apprenticeship rather than return home. After seven years, or whatever, friendships or more (potential marriage to a local girl for example) would have developed in the place of apprenticeship. Presumable, too, good apprentices might well have been offered employment with their master on completion.

...I'm not sure what point you're making about settlement. My understanding is that settlement could be acquired through an apprenticeship. But then whole aim of setting a boy up with a trade was so he wouldn't in future be a burden of the ratepayers!If the Overseers were thinking about more than the immediate future they might like to see as many people as possible earn settlement outside the parish so that they would not be a future burden; after all, there was no guarantee that at the end of the apprenticeship employment would result.

What I'm trying to understand, bit by bit, are the reasons for our ancestors moves around the country - as Sue remarks ...One of my lot travelled from Worcestershire [to London].. I've found indentures here in Hampshire RO where the apprentice was going some considerable distance, and they were Parish apprenticeships too, not your proper London livery company ones.

I don't want to reinvent the wheel but if no one has done any similar research I might just go through the HRO catalogue and try to make an analysis.

Colin

[Colin Moretti]

...
If the Overseers were thinking about more than the immediate future they might like to see as many people as possible earn settlement outside the parish so that they would not be a future burden; after all, there was no guarantee that at the end of the apprenticeship employment would result.
I came across this item recently which is one of the things that prompted my original query:... An analysis of the masters' abodes (when not stated in the accounts they have been obtained from the indentures) reveals the surprising figure that only 16 out of 72 children apprenticed between 1693 and 1731 are sent to men living in other parishes. Without stressing the point, this marked neglect of the opportunity to avoid possible future expense seems to be a further sign of an intelligent standard of administration at Eaton. While the writer has not attempted any sort of systematic investigation of the extent of out-parish apprenticeship, it would seem clear from notes taken from the poor law records of various Bedfordshire parishes that the practice was widely adopted. Only for Maulden (for which a large number of indentures are extant) has an analysis similar to the above been made, but with the reverse result. Out of 66 apprenticeships, ranging from 1658 to 1788, as many as 45 are to out-parish masters, living as usual within a few miles from Maulden. The migration from one village to another within the district thus has an important bearing on the general question of stability of the poorer families.
F G Emmison The Relief of the Poor at Eaton Socon, 1706-1834 Bedfordshire Historical Society Reports, 15 (1933)

I was hoping that someone might be able to point me in the direction of a more systematic and general analysis, given that lots of work must have been done since 1933.

Colin

[Geoffers]

Has there been any analysis of the Board of Stamps Apprenticeship records?

I have extracted the Norfolk entries from the records available on CD. The information that can be extracted is limited as it just relates to the contract between master and apprentice. As mentioned above, it does not include indentures exempt from the tax - it does not in itself indicate if someone remained in a parish/place where they were apprenticed.

[Colin Moretti]

That sounds like best part of the job done Geoffers, but I'll wait to follow it up in case anyone can point me in the direction of something already published.

Thanks

Colin

[Colin Moretti]

As no further publications have been identified I've now made some sort of analysis myself. The task was made immeasurably easier because geoffers has already transcribed and supplied the basic data, as he noted above. Also invaluable were parish map coordinate data from the free PARLOC program devised by Dave Bennett http://www.parloc.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/.

Anyway, combining those two sets of data I was able to produce this, based on more than 2400 apprenticeships:


http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m1/colinmoretti/Distancefromhome.jpg


Just over 43% of apprenticeships were in the parish of origin of the apprentice, or at least in a parish with the same grid reference. The most distant apprentice was from Sunderland 328 km away (as the crow flies). There were also two from the Netherlands.

I would welcome any comments, further references or other sources of data to extend the analysis.

Colin

[Colin Moretti]

PS

Just noticed the mistake, it's a pity that I can't spell - too much bother to change the text in the chart.

Colin