ABSTRACT
Manufacturing employed the largest proportion of the London workforce in the seventeenth century; consequently it is vitally important to assessing how the economic impact of the war affected London society. There is evidence of severe economic problems in London industry from the autumn of 1642. In November the hempmen of Bridewell complained that their employees had joined the army, and trading was so dead that they could not sell what they made. 1 The problems of London craftsmen in 1643 are illustrated by the experience of the turner, Nehemiah Wallington. He suffered from falling demand for his goods and his creditors called in their debts. His problems became particularly acute in the second half of the year. In November demand was so low that he was compelled to sell his wares below cost price, although he realized that this would ultimately be self-defeating.2 As late as 1645 he wrote that 'as for my estate it is something hard with mee. for our ware is deare because workmen are gon and trayding is dead & Costomers hard and taxes greate'. However, he also stated that those who supplied Parliament's armies, which included his brother, were doing well.3 By this period, large sums of money were going into the London economy from contracts to supply the New Model Army, but not all London craftsmen were able to benefit from this improvement. 4
With the exception of plumbers' solder and gold and silver plate, it is impossible to obtain statistics for industrial production for seventeenth-century London. However the trends in industrial production can be roughly estimated from apprenticeship enrolments. Industry in early modem London was labour intensive, demand for labour can therefore act as an indicator of levels of production. Moreover it was craft based and, consequently, labour was generally recruited and trained through apprenticeships. Apprenticeship enrolments can therefore be used as a guide to demand for labour. During the
Civil War apprenticeship enrolments fell by about two-thirds.5 It is likely that this indicates a substantial fall in industrial production. However many apprentices were enrolled in non-manufacturing trades. Moreover it should not be assumed that the war had the same effect on the output of all sectors of manufacturing. The numbers of apprentices enrolled in different crafts can be examined through the records of the livery companies. This evidence needs to be treated cautiously. There was no requirement for a freeman of the City of London to be a member of his craft's company. In some of the larger companies most members practised a trade other than that of their company. However the manufacturing companies, particularly the smaller ones, remained closer to their trades than others - for example at the end of the seventeenth century ninety per cent of the freemen of the Pewterers' Company were still working pewterers. 6
Apprenticeship enrolments need to be set against the context of military recruitment. In the early months of the war thousands of London apprentices joined Parliament's armies, it was reported that eight thousand were recruited in July 1642. It has been estimated that there were about twenty thousand apprentices in London at this time, consequently unless the recruits were rapidly replaced this would have substantially reduced the supply of labour in London.7 Many journeymen also joined the army and declining admissions of new freemen indicates they were not replaced. The resulting labour shortage caused problems in some crafts. In the Cordwainers' Company, where the number of new freemen dropped from forty five in 1641-42 to twenty five in 1642-43, the journeymen took advantage of the shortage of labour to join together to demand higher wages in the autumn of 1642. Similar agitation recurred from 1645 suggesting that demand for labour remained strong in the shoemaking industry. 8
There is also evidence that shortage of labour was a problem for London's bakers. On 16 September 1644 the Bakers' Company Court decided to petition the Court of Aldermen to allow them to employ foreign journeymen 'to bee continued till theis distracted tymes bee over, that therby the Company may bee in the meane tyme supplyed with servants to doe theyr worke' .9
However there is little other evidence from the records of the livery companies
