Literacy in the nineteenth century

[greyingrey]

Don't know where to post this, so this seems the best place. I know it's tremendously hard to generalise, but maybe someone can give me a useful indication. I've got the remnants of a letter written to one of My Lot in the 1880s. Unfortunately, there's no indication of the occupation/social status of the person who wrote it, but My Lot would have been  working class fodder (they probably ate the rest of the letter). What kind of literacy skills could you have expected from "ordinary folk" at this time ?

Thanks

[Viktoria]

I`d say it varied, depending on when in the 1800 because there were various education acts.
Also Sunday Schools were that SUNDAY schools and although based on religion they also taught the three R`s.
 Some children were half timers and did half a day`s work and half a day`s schooling so they did have some learning--- basic things like times table, spelling and good handwriting.
Yet many people could not read or write but don`t be fooled by the many times people put a cross on papers such as marriage certs because the registrar ( who was the minister in the CofE)would ask them to put their mark( So as not to embarrass  those who could not write. It was assumed if they could write they would but this is obviously not always the case)and so they just put a cross when in fact  they could write their name.
My grandmother signed her marriage cert but put a cross on  birth certs of some children and signed on others.
I can`t remember the dates of various acts  but in the later part of the 19thC I`d guess most people had some basic education.
                                                Viktoria.

[stanmapstone]

There have been numerous threads on RootsChat about literacy. Surveys of adult literacy in the early part of Victoria's reign suggest that, for example, 79 per cent of the Northumberland and Durham miners could read, and about half of them could write. Eighty seven per cent of children in the Norfolk and Suffolk workhouse in 1838 could read and write. Thanks to the growth in freelance schooling, all privately financed, literacy levels had risen to about 92 per cent by 1870 and Forster's Education Act
"The Victorians" by A.N. Wilson ISBN 0-09-945186-7.

Letter from RH Gregg of Styal to Edwin Chadwick:Manchester, 17 September 1834
Gregg, a factory owner at Styal near Manchester; was having difficulty in finding enough workers for his mill at Quarry Bank. His solution is set out in this letter to Edwin Chadwick, secretary to the Poor Law Commission.
Whilst food is cheap and wages high, the want of education (I do not merely mean the ability to read and write, which few here are without), but education which may affect manners, morals, and the proper use of their advantages, is extremely felt and to be deeply deplored. I do hope Government will not allow another session to pass without making some struggle to effect this most desirable object.
Annual Report of the Poor Law Commission, Appendix C number 5 (1835)

Stan

[stanmapstone]

See Literacy, by Edward Higgs http://www.rootschat.com/links/03ix/

Stan

[stanmapstone]

The figures from the 1851 Education Census show that the total for England & Wales was 44,836 Day Schools with 2,180,592 Scholars (31/03/1851), and 2,837 Sunday Schools with 2,369,089 Scholars (30/03/1851).
There were also 1,545 Evening Schools for Adults with 39,783 Scholars (29/03/1851).

Stan

[Cell]

Do but My Lot would have been  working class fodder (they probably ate the rest of the letter). ?

Thanks

lol (perhaps they were just hungry)

I think you may be doing them a big injustice.
There is working class and working class - what is working class anyway? I think very few people were considered real "middle Class" in the olden days.


I can only go by family, coalminers, tinsmiths, farmers, school teachers , inn keepers, mariners, ag labs and so on.

There is a high literacy rate in my own so-called working class in the 19th century (I'm not going just off signatures on marriage certs,)

I'll take a few of my family.  I have found  that if the mother can read and write, it's more likely that the children are literate too. It is the mothers that usually have the most influence on the young children growing up in their early years.

My own grandfather ( who was born in the early 20th century) couldn't read or write until he joined the army( the army taught him) .My g grandmother ( His mother) was illiterate, but his father was literate so were both his parents... But it was his illiterate mum that brought him up (father off in the army most of the time) hence resulting in his  poor literacy ( even though he attended school)

My gg grandfather on my paternal side  ( who was just an ag lab -good old working class , born 1822)  was literate, but  I think this is because his  literate mother brought him up ( his father died at a young age) - His mum was a school teacher who was  illegitimate. Her mother was an unmarried teenage mother ( she was brought up by her grandparents, who were just working class plasterers).

My coalminers, my granddad on my other side, his parents were both literate ( born in the 1800's - they were just your common coalminers, my gg grandfather - literate. Before that the family were farmers-and literate as far as I can tell.

My grandmothers parents , her father  who was a farmer was illiterate ( born 1853),  her mother ( born 1876) , she was  very well educated-  she had absolutely beautiful handwriting - Her father was a farmer and he was illiterate ( born early 1800's), but her mother ( born 1840's )  - who also came from a farming family was literate.
I have a high illiteracy rate with my men folk on my grandmothers maternal line, but a very high literacy rate with their wives.

I  would think that it would be very hard to get an accurate literacy rate in Britain in the 1800's, some folk could sign their name  easily enough , but could not read or write. I would think that it would be false figures going off signatures on marriage certs.

 I thought I'd  point out that just because your family are "working class" it doesn't mean that they are illiterate - God forbid if that were the case  then all of mine would have been illiterate, which I know isn't the case.  By just Glancing over my tree and with a guestimate ( without going through them all), I 'd say in-between 65 to 80% of my working class lot were literate in the 1800's , depending on which decade in the 1800's

Kind Regards

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy

Ps The graph on the above article  is for France, but I would think that there would not be much of a major difference between the two countries.

[majm]

I would support Cell's post.    I am in NSW Australia,  with ancestors arriving here from the 1790s.   Some of my earliest ancestors to arrive here were literate.   They wrote letters, and some of those letters survive to this day.     On the other hand,  some of my ancestors who arrived in the 1850s were without any literacy skills whatsoever.   

Where I find a female ancestor with literacy, I always find her children were literate.    Where I find a male ancestor with literacy (including one glaring example : a school master in the 1830s in NSW), their female children were not given that gift.   

I make no comment about spelling, for even the NSW Governor, Lachlan Macquarie, varied the spelling of his own surname from day to day, and even within the one document.   He was the governor of the Penal Colony 1810 - 1821, credited with establishing the administrative system that is the basis of the NSW constitution, its institutions, and our democracy.    He was a Scottish chap.     

Yes, Sunday schools in NSW, from the 1800s right through to about 1870s were responsible for providing instruction in the three "R"s, and not just on scriptural teachings.  So, from about 1793, children in the penal settlement at Sydney Town were instructed in Reading wRiting, aRithmetic under canvas, Mon - Fri, and the entire community were expected to attend worship on Sundays under that same canvas. 
 
http://heritagegenealogy.com.au/blog/researching-schools-in-nsw/ 

http://www.nationaltrust.org.au/Assets/10323/1/SlatesandChamberpotsOGHTeacherResource.pdf

http://www.records.nsw.gov.au/state-archives/guides-and-finding-aids/archives-in-brief/archives-in-brief-19

http://www.records.nsw.gov.au/state-archives/guides-and-finding-aids/archives-in-brief/archives-in-brief-26


Cheers,  JM

[Erato]

I agree with Cell, too.  As best I can recall, I have found only one American ancestor who was described as illiterate on the census [starting in 1850].  They were almost all working class, mostly farmers, mostly in small villages.  And their children were listed as 'in school.'  This includes immigrant ancestors from Ireland, Scotland and England.  My grandfather commented that one of his grandfathers [born in Wicklow in 1820] had been educated in a CoE school and that the other [born in Down in 1805] was a stickler for mental arithmetic.

[Cell]

I know that there was a time here  in Qld ( Aus) that Qld modelled their education on the Irish national system. Apparently they also used the Irish readers( books too).

One of my local museums have a whole schoolroom set up as a permanent display (son loves going in there and sitting at the funny desks  - none of those whiteboards and modern desks that he's used to   ) . It's set up in that period (mid 1800's - 1859 ish I believe).  They have a Piano up front of the class, the old wooden desks with the ink wells, slates (my mother used slate in the 1940's in Ireland never mind the 1800's ),  books ( with the writing style)

Kind Regards