Description:Just who were the Radical Society of Shopkeepers and Others who produced this list of rules, orders and regulations?
It is most likely that anonymous local employers published this notice in order to ridicule local shopkeepers who criticised the practice of paying workers in goods rather than cash (this was known as the 'truck system.')
Whatever the injustices of the truck system, the practice meant that less hard cash was spent in local shops.
Accusations that the following 'rules' simply revealed the shopkeepers' self-interest were perhaps not completely unfounded!
'Rule Fist'
Shopkeepers are accused of spreading discontent amongst the Potteries workforce, with one eye on their own profits:
"A president should encourage, as far as he can, dis-loyalty, dis-union, malice and hatred, between workmen and their employers, by laying informations against those who pay and feed them, assisted by Secretary, Treasurer and Committee... The Society expecting a handsome profit from persons found guilty."
Rule Second
To ensure that workmen receive their earnings only in cash.
Any workmen who inform aganist an employer should receive support from the society, until they have the chance to inform on yet another unsuspecting employer!
Rule Third
That any pottery owner paying his workmen by any means except cash should be "at liberty to close his works, and send his work people adrift."
Rule Fourth
That any boot or shoe maker paying his workers in boots or shoes should be presented to a magistrate.
After all, the society has many poor quality shoes to sell, as well as mousetraps and sweet meat - and all goods should be bought from them!
Rule Fifth
That members should inform against any trader paying his workers partly in food.
Various common informers "who will swear any thing" have been engaged for this purpose.
Rule Sixth
That only five members should speak at once in "the more regular, orderly and uniform" meetings.
Any rude sixth speaker who interrupts should be bought a glass of "thunder and lightning," or called gin and bitters!
Rule Seventh
Anyone guilty of:
picking pockets;
drinking more than six quarts of ale;
consuming more than twenty glasses of gin;
smoking fifteen pipes of tobacco;
vomiting in the committee room;
should be turned out, "or agree to turn common informer, in which case he shall have the support of the Society."
Rule Eighth
That makers and sellers of oatcakes, penny pies, black pudding, tripe, cow-heels, toffy, and matches (especially traders fraudulently fiddling with weights and measures) should gain the special protection of the society!
Rule Ninth
That beesom makers shall be helped in their efforts to gain payment in cash.
Rule Tenth
That the society requires sureties to guarantee that the treasurer handles the society's cash properly.
Each will be paid one shilling and three half pence each, even though the treasurer has never had more than two shillings to spare!
John Velveteen, President;
Joe H. Fleece'em, Secretary;
Josiah Timber, Tresaurer.
Committee Members
Sam Sartinly;
Jack F. Haselet;
Saml. Trap Box;
John Tapeyed;
Jerry Scamp;
Dubbin Scratch;
Andrew Puff Cheaper;
Geo. Humbug Sheepface;
Sam Sum;
Mic. Dowlass;
Tailor Saucer Eye;
Joe Pinchcrust;
Jerry Cheat'em.
About this document
This document was collected by Burslem pottery manufacturer Enoch Wood, and it is now among the collections at Stoke-on-Trent Museums.