Mid-Victorian Britain 1851-75

The History of British Society

by Geoffrey Best

The Great Exhibition of 1851 represented the high-water mark of Victorian society and the two decades which followed form one of the most fascinating and fruitful areas of British’s history. What was life at home and at work like in that era? What motivated the mid-Victorians and what were their interests and concerns?

In this delightfully readable and informative study, Professor Best places mid-Victorian Britain in its social, economic and political context.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, British Literature

350 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

An historian of 19th and 20th century Britain, Geoffrey Francis Andrew Best was Emeritus Fellow of the British Academy, a former Fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, Professor of History at Edinburgh, Dean of European Studies at Sussex, Academic Visitor at the London School of Economics, and Senior Member of St Antony's College, Oxford.

Reviews

[Jan-Maat]

My biggest problem with this book is the time period . Covering the time after Chartism and the campaign against the Corn Laws but before the Great Depression of the 1870s onwards makes sense with regard to political history, or labour relations, one can understand the impact of the earlier period in Bagehot's championing of 'deference' and 'removable inequalities' and how these could be broadly acceptable notions in the period before the next major economic downturn but it's not a particularly meaningful time frame for understanding the social and economic changes which are the subject of the book.

However one theme that does repeatedly come up is the changes that were wrought by the coming of the railway, in leisure (competitive sports, brass bands, newspaper coverage, day trips and holidays), education (allowing the sons of the wealthy to be sent away ever further and with ever greater ease and convenience), crime, employment (with improved tramping and for the first time: commuting) and the city scape.

The book focuses on urban Britain. Possibly this is fair enough, the 1851 census was the first one in which the urban population was grater than the rural population, but I can't help thinking now this book misses out on arson as protest in the countryside or how the arrival of the railways was transforming the rural economy by bringing more products (particularly perishable ones like milk and water cress) and remote countryside areas into a national economy.

Something that I liked was how the period's championing of the doctrine of free choice, independence and self help found expression found expression in municipal politics with resistance to duties being imposed by Whitehall (causing a pre-postcode lottery in the availability of basic services, policing, or enforcement of building standards) in education (with compulsory schooling in England coming in only several years after legislation allowing local boards to set up elementary schools in 1870) and in poor relief with huge variation across the United Kingdom.

It's a serviceable read and a good companion to readers of Victorian fiction, but it's clear as the author confirms in the epilogue just how much remains unknown and under researched about this recent and well documented period. Comparisons between England, Ireland and Scotland are tantalising but incomplete, so very little is known about businesses and so answers to fairly basic questions about average earnings are still unknown (or at least were when this book was published).

[Emma · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting facts and figures here but definitely a textbook rather than a leisurely read so opted not to finish it.