World’s Worst Victorian Jobs
A Peek into the World of Flushers and Toshers
Dickens London. What do those two words conjure up in your mind? Foggy lanes? Ramshackle houses? Crowded streets with hawkers selling their wares? If that’s what you pictured, then you’re in good company. That’s what most people envision.
So I thought it was about time to add to that picture by delving beneath the streets of London to the tunnels of the tube—or as it was called back in the nineteenth century—the Metropolitan Railway, or sometimes underground railway. But it wasn’t only trainmen and passengers who frequented the underworld. Some people worked there.
Flushers were men employed by the city to free the sewers of debris and maintain them in good repair. They also kept down the brown rat population. Besides the obvious dangers of disease and bodily injury, drowning was a very real possibility. When a rainstorm began, an aboveground worker would raise the nearest manhole cover six inches then let it drop, the echo reverberating as a warning to those toiling down in the tunnels to beware of flash floods. Lest you think these valiant men are of bygone days, think again. Today there is still a team that goes underground every day to ensure things keep flowing.
A tosher was a scavenger, like the mudlarks on the banks of the Thames. They made their living by trolling through run-off pipes and sewers, picking up whatever they could find. And they did find things, usually to the tune of 6 shillings a day (about $50 in today’s money). They were colorful characters with colorful names: Lanky Bill, Short-armed Jack, One-eyed George. Usually they wore a long velveteen coat with enormous pockets and a canvas apron, and carried a bag on their back and an 8’ long pole in their hand. After 1840 it was illegal to enter the sewers without permission, and there was a £5 reward for anyone who snitched on them, so usually toshing was done secretly at night with a lantern.
In my newest release, The Thief of Blackfriars Lane, the feisty street-smart Kit Turner takes rookie officer Jackson Forge on a crazy chase through those tunnels, running into a tosher and experiencing the danger of what flushers frequently faced.
Do either of those sound like a job you might want to take up? Yeah. Me neither. But one thing you should take up is an entry into winning one of 5 signed copies of The Thief of Blackfriars Lane.
