Working Class Heroes?

'Life Boat Monument, St Anne's on Sea', Wyndham Series Postcard, 1902

One thing that continues to fascinate me about William Birnie Rhind's Mexico Monument is the depiction of an ordinary man as the focal point of a piece of civic sculpture. In present times, with a now established interest in local history and 'history from below', we are much more used to seeing working-class heritage and the lives of ordinary people celebrated in sculpture.* For example, we have a recently unveiled monument to Wigan miners or, closer to home, The Shrimper in Lowther Gardens in Lytham.

Miners' Monument (2021), Steve Winterburn, Wigan

However, when the Mexico Monument was unveiled in May 1886 it would have been highly unusual to see an ordinary man, or for that matter, even an ordinary seaman or soldier, as the focal point of a piece of statuary in Great Britain. One of the few examples might be considered to be Rhind's memorial to the Black Watch, unveiled in 1887, which presents the figure of an ordinary soldier, although one from the previous century.

Whilst it was rare in statuary it wasn't quite so unusual for working people to be the focus of other cultural representations with Ford Madox Brown's painting Work being a significant example. Something lesser known but equally interesting is James Sharples engraving The Forge. This is particularly interesting as Sharples himself was a blacksmith, so this is a representation of working people by member of the working classes. This became quite celebrated in its day (although it didn't help Sharples’s finances much!) and both this and Work are referenced in Tim Barringer's book Men at Work.

Work (1852-1863), Ford Madox Brown, Wikimedia Commons

The Forge (1859), James Sharples, Wikimedia Commons

There was also a significant trend for literary biography to celebrate working people with writers such as Samuel Smiles celebrating the endeavours of 'noble workers' in texts such as Self Help. Whilst Smiles praises the working people (usually men) there is however, as Juliet Atkinson has noted, the sense that the he is setting up idealized versions of these types. People who made a way in the world through self-discipline and determination and might not, for example, belong to trades unions or challenge the functioning of society which mitigated against the material advancement of working people.

To a degree I think this is echoed in the Mexico Monument which, although it rightly and eloquently celebrates the bravery and heroism of lifeboatmen, and specifically the crew of the Laura Janet, doesn’t address the relative poverty in which they were living. At the time of the disaster a hard winter had made for difficult times for fishermen in the Ribble estuary. The Board of Trade report which followed the disaster noted that one of the crew,  Bonney, had 'stinted himself' for the sake of his family. That is, he was only eating sparingly to ensure that his children and family could be fed properly. I would imagine that Bonney (I’m not sure whether it was Thomas or James - both are named on the memorial) would have accepted this as part of his life and have thought nothing unusual about it, but it does speak of the harshness of the times for working people.

Similarly, The Great Lifeboat Disaster of 1886, an updated version of which was published in 2001, notes that in Southport ‘The families of the lifeboatmen were almost all in very poor circumstances’ and that ‘Several of the men had not earned more than eight or nine shillings as week for the last 18 months’ due to a scarcity of shrimps and a reduction in income from pleasure sailing during the summer months. Frank Kilroy has also noted ‘At St Annes the story was very much the same, many of the families had already been living just above poverty’.

There is some acknowledgement of the evident unfairness of this inequality at the time of the disaster and also at the unveiling. The Lytham Times article of 25 May 1888 has rather a curious passage which notes, in relation to the lifeboatman,  that ‘We do not endorse the sentiment that a working man settles down to his task believing and content with the reflection that when he is no longer able to work for his family they can only be admitted by the Guardians to the County Union and so supported by the public, or worse still go about door to door begging the very bread to enable them to live’. I have never been quite sure how to take this but there could possibly be an allusion to a report that at the time of the disaster a former coxswain of the Lytham crew was in the Fylde Union workhouse (I have definitely seen this but infuriatingly find the reference at the moment!).

In the light of their straitened circumstances the payment which the lifeboat men received for going out (about £1 at the time which would now be worth about £100) would be something of an incentive. Indeed. Andrew Miller has noted in The Great Lifeboat Disaster of 1888 that 'The main reason for the great demand for a place in the [Southport] lifeboat was undoubtedly poverty'. This is not much mentioned in reports about the disaster or the unveiling other when a Lieutenant Tipping of the RNLI noted the 'small sum’ which was allotted to the men. He rightly noted that this 'could never be any compensation for the loss of their lives or their health' but, whilst it was probably a small sum to him and many others, it would have made a considerable material difference to the lifeboatmen themselves and their families.

I think that some people feel chary of mentioning these payments as they might be seen as undermining the heroism of the men, but it is part of the story and one that we should acknowledged. Personally, I don’t think it negates the sheer physical courage of their deeds and, in risking their lives in the hope of earning some extra money to adequately support their families, their bravery becomes less of an abstract ideal and can be seen in a more human setting.

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_history

 Sources

ms6282, ‘The Wigan Mining Monument’, Down by the Dougie, 2021 <https://greatacre.wordpress.com/2021/01/17/the-wigan-mining-monument/> [accessed 6 January 2022]

‘The Shrimper | Art UK’ <https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/the-shrimper-267706> [accessed 6

January 2022]

Atkinson, Juliette, Victorian Biography Reconsidered: A Study of Nineteenth-Century ‘Hidden’ Lives, Illustrated edition (Oxford ; New York: OUP Oxford, 2010)

 Barringer, T. J., Men at Work: Art and Labour in Victorian Britain (New Haven, Conn. ; London: Yale University Press, 2005).

 Kilroy, Frank, The Wreck of the ‘Mexico’, Rev. ed.]. (Lytham: R.N.L.I., Lytham St. Annes Branch, 2012)

 Miller, J. Allen, The Great Lifeboat Disaster of 1886, ed. by Andrew N. Farthing (Southport: Sefton Council, Leisure Services Department, 2001).

 Murray, Digby and Chetwynd. Henry W, ‘The Life-Boat Disasters at  Southport and St. Anne’s : Official Report to the Board of Trade’ (Board of Trade), Lancashire Archives, Frank Kilroy Collection, DDX 3123.

'The St. Anne's Lifeboat Disaster - Unveiling of the Monument to the Crew', Lytham Times, 25 May 1888.

 Smiles, Samuel, Self-Help with Illustrations of Conduct and Perseverance (London : J. Murray, 1905) <http://archive.org/details/selfhelpwithillu00smiliala> [accessed 6 May 2020].

Andrew Walmsley, January 2022

https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/history/about/people/andrew-walmsley