The slow conversion to modern industrial society began in the cities. New mechanical inventions and scientific discoveries spurred on a changing social order and caused a migration from agrarian life in the countryside to the creation of a mass urban society (Kagan 766). New railroads, canals and roads let people leave their birthplace much more easily and migrate (Kagan 768). By mid eighteenth century half the population of England already consisted of town dwellers (Kagan 767). A tremendous new strain was put on the resources of the cities as they were not ready for the huge population influx. Just a few of the deficiencies included inadequate housing, water supply, sewers and an inadequate food supply. This caused rapid spread of disease in the new booming slums. The poorest laborers usually lived in dungeon like cellars. Their possessions usuall

y consisted only of the tools of their trade, shabby wooden cupboards and chairs, a stove, a plank to place eating dishes on and dirty straw mattresses and scraps of blankets. The walls of the dwelling were usually coated with filth, the furniture worm eaten, the mattresses damp and disease infested and the smell of rotting garbage permeated everything (Kagan 779). Friederich Engles affirmed this with his personal account of a part of Manchester where laborers lived in 1844, “the only entrance to most of the houses is by means of narrow, dirty stairs and over heaps of refuse and filth. The first court below Ducie Bridge, known as Allen's Court, was in such a state at the time of the cholera that the sanitary police ordered it evacuated, swept, and disinfected with chloride of lime.”(Engles)

Working conditions in the factories themselves were dangerous and deplorable. It was often said that half of all deaths in England during the industrial revolution occurred in the workhouse (Industrial Revolution 242). Workdays were unbearably long and caused fatigue that made work around machines all the more dangerous. “It is about half past five by our clock at home when we go in....We come out at seven by the mill. We never stop to take our meals, except at dinner”(Textile Workers). Cotton factories were particularly dangerous places. Steam engines ran day and night making it tremendously hot. Moving parts of machines were left exposed and the danger of being seriously injured was great. The machines were often packed so closely together that children were given the task of moving between them because they were the only ones small enough to fit.

This tumultuous and highly unstable style of life led to a sharp rise in crime and protest in the form of large scale riots. The adoption of laissez-faire economics destroyed the ol

Some topics in this essay:
Industrial Revolution, Revolution Britain, Allen's Court, Workers Cotton, Friederich Engles, Dickens Engles, industrial revolution, england industrial revolution, industrial revolution 242, negative social, police forces, kagan 774, women children, revolution 242, england industrial,