Various - Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 725, November 17, 1877

Some time ago, while paying a professional visit at the house of a small tradesman in the town of B – , in the north of England, I made the acquaintance of an interesting old woman, who upon the occasion in question was nursing the tradesman's wife. There are persons, especially of the gentler sex, who will not be said Nay in their attempts to win your confidence; and such was Mrs Waters, the old lady whom I have named. We became intimate in a few minutes; and circumstances causing me to prolong my visit for several hours, I left the house as familiar with the dame's history as if I had known her for many years.

I have styled her an interesting woman. So she was. Her appearance, I grant, was not attractive. She bore no trace of beauty; neither had she refinement either of speech or manner, being somewhat brusque and hasty both in word and action; yet there was an irresistible power in the rapid glance of her large bright eyes; and although at first you might be led to believe, from the hastiness which marked all her movements as she attended to the requirements of the house and family, that she must be harsh and unfeeling in her disposition, she was really one of the kindest and most tender-hearted of women. I soon found out that she was a neighbour, and that she possessed independent means, which she had acquired by her own unaided industry; that she had also maintained an invalid husband for years, and had educated and given a profession to her only son and child.

I resolved to become better acquainted with the old dame; and as I did not scruple to put questions, I gleaned from her what shall form the subject of the present paper. Her designation as a 'knocker-up' will become plain as I proceed. In reply to an inquiry she said: 'O dear, no! I am not unwilling to tell you how I made my independency. Why should I be? An honest woman need not be afraid of anything. I made it, sir, by knocking-up; every penny of it. Ay, you may well look surprised, for I fancy you don't know what knocking-up is; or if you do, you are wondering how I could save a fortune out of such a line of action. No; I don't mean to say that I had no other way of making money. I started a shop after I began to knock up; but every penny I made by shopkeeping was spent in keeping my family; and when my son was put to business, some of my otherwise-made money went along with it; but every penny which I put by, and the income on which I now live, was got by knocking-up.

'You may well ask how I, a woman, should ever have thought of such a means of living, or should have ventured upon it. Well, to tell the truth, I never thought of it; that is, I did not invent it; it was brought before me; and I was in too great need to be very nice. I believe I was near the first, if not the very first who earned money by regularly knocking up; at anyrate I knew of none who were in that line. The thing was brought about in this way. My husband was a delicate man from our first acquaintance. And he was, bless you! as different from me in spirit and ways as a summer day is from a winter day. He had hardly a morsel of fend in him. I've often wondered what we should have done, or what would have become of us, had it been I that had been laid up instead of him. But you see, sir, Providence had a hand in the matter. It was well in many ways, I may say in all ways, that he was afflicted; for you see had it been me , what an ill-tempered impatient creature I should have been.

'Was it an illness that fell upon him which laid him aside, do you ask? No; not exactly; I'll tell you. We had been married about six years, and our son was about four years old, when Waters happened on a misfortune; he was in the act of lifting a heavy weight in the foundry in which he worked, when something snapped or gave way in his back. He was brought home between two men; and from that day until his death, more than fifteen years afterwards, he never did a stroke of work. Poor fellow!

'Yes; you're right; the knocking-up scheme followed. It was very singular. I had been down to the foundry one Friday evening for the bit of pay which the masters kindly allowed him for a while, when I got into conversation with one of the better sort of men who were employed in the works. I said to him that I believed I should have the home to keep over our heads, and that I was willing to do anything that would help therein, when he said quite suddenly like: "If you will knock me up at three o'clock every morning but Sunday, I will give you half-a-crown a week." At first I thought he was joking; but when I saw that he was sincere, I closed in with the offer; for something said within me that that would be the beginning of something better still.

'The reason why knocking-up is so widespread nowadays is this: people soon get so used to the alarum-clock that it fails to awake them, or if it awake them, they are at times so sleepy that they drop off again before the alarum runs out. This was the case with the person who asked me to awaken him; he had lost many mornings through over-sleeping the time. He was in the designing line; and he said he got more work done and of a better sort during the quiet hours of morning than at any other time. At anyrate this was his statement, though afterwards another reason was assigned for his habit; so he was anxious to be up at three o'clock. Well, I engaged with him; and a good thing it was for me, for before a year had gone over my head I had thirty customers of the like kind. No; not for the same hour in the morning, nor for the like pay – begging your pardon – but mostly for the time between five and six o'clock.

'I have no objection whatever to tell you what I used to earn; why should I? But let me tell you first how I went on adding to my business, if I may call it a business. At the end of the first year, as I have said, I had thirty customers. Year by year they went on increasing, until at the end of five years I had near eighty houses to go to; and for the thirty years that I followed knocking-up after that – thirty-five in all – I never fell below that number. Sometimes I had as many as ninety-five. What did they pay? All prices. When I got a few more early customers in addition to my first one, I knocked him a shilling a week off; for I could not fashion to take half-a-crown. So all who were knocked up before four o'clock paid me eighteenpence a week; those who had to be awakened soon after four gave me a shilling a week; whilst those who had to be aroused from five to six o'clock paid from sixpence to threepence weekly, according to time and distance. Of course the greater number of customers belonged to the threepenny class.

'You can't see how I managed to get through so large a number of houses in so short a time? But I did, at anyrate. I found system to be a needed thing, you may be sure. Then I found out near cuts to different neighbourhoods. And I took care not to let the grass grow under my feet. Besides, I fancy I had a knack of rousing my employers in a short time. Perhaps my knock or ring or way of tapping was more effective than that of other knockers-up. However that may be, I got through my engagements morning by morning. I see you are eager to get at my weekly earnings. Well, I'll keep you no longer in suspense. For thirty years I never earned less than thirty shillings a week; mostly thirty-five; and when I had a good lot of far-away or very early customers, I picked up as high as forty shillings in a week. You stare; but what I say is true. Two pounds a week for summoning folks to their work, of a morning.

'I am not a very strong or healthy body now; how can a woman of seventy years expect to be without ache or pain after a life like mine? But for thirty-five years wherein I followed the knocking-up line I never had what may be called a badly day. Bless you, sir, I hadn't time to be laid up! I believe my early rising, and the exercise in the open air, kept me in health; and when bits of cold got hold of me, why, my spirits did much towards helping them off again. Spirit, sir, is everything! Did I go to bed during the day? Never! I could not afford the time; for I had my shop to mind. You look surprised; but I told you at the beginning that I kept a shop. See you; I did not know how long my husband might linger; and then I was so wrapped up in my poor lad, that I determined he should be a doctor or a lawyer, or something smarter than a tradesman; so, having a good long day before me, I resolved upon opening a shop of some kind.