Lizzie Littlefield became a weaver at the Pepperell Manufacturing Mill when she was fourteen. Her mother at first objected but “than like a foolish Child would not listen to advise of parents but fretted until I got consent of Mother to go in the Mill to work at weaving.” According to her diary she “enjoyed it hugely - dancing and other amusements, free from care and sorrow”. Free from parental authority girls like Lizzie earned their own money, some of them sending it home to family. The factory girls were mostly single, late teens and early twenties. They were known as “operatives” working twelve-hour days for a fixed hourly wage paid once a month. Most of the workers stayed in boardinghouses owned by the mill and room and board was subtracted from their wages. In 1845 Samuel Bachelder ran a newspaper ad offering a salary of $1.50 to $3.00 a week plus room and board. Steady work and pay appealed to women especially those living in rural parts of Maine. The boardinghouses were within walking distance of the mill which kept the girls making it to work on time and return home safely. They were under close supervision both at the boardinghouse and at work.
Factory work was dangerous. Machinery was fast-moving and accidents were frequent and sometimes fatal. The long-term physical effects included respiratory problems resulting from breathing in cotton and wool fibers. The work was very different from farm work. The mills were on a strict schedule with bells ringing signaling the mill gates opening and closing. Farm work depended on the sun and the seasons. Everything took place under one roof : half in sunlight - half in shade.
Girls could start working at age twelve and sometimes younger. The weaving in a cotton mill was done by older girls and women who ran four looms and averaged $1.00 per loom a week. Flora Haines, a special agent for the Bureau of Industrial and Labor Statistics for the state of Maine, submitted a detailed report about female wage workers in various industries including the textile mills. She observed and reported on the working and living conditions of mills in Biddeford and Saco. Besides the deafening noise in the weaving rooms, Haines noted that she sensed resentment of the American workers towards the French-Canadians. This resentment would become a bigger issue with the rise of anti-immigration and discrimination against foreigners coming to the United States for jobs and a better life.
In March of 1841 a strike occurred at Biddeford’s York Manufacturing. It’s company agent was Pepperell’s Samuel Bachelder. The working and living conditions and another wage reduction spurred the female operatives on a course of action called a “turn-out”. This was the first textile industry strike in Maine. On March 29th, 1841 women marched through the streets of Biddeford and Saco proclaiming “We scorn to be slaves”. They protested the cramped, unventilated boarding houses and that the rates kept rising. They also demanded a pay reduction be restored which did not happen. Bachelder made his own demand: return to work or don’t come back at all. Although the protestors lost many of their demands, “turn-outs” occurred throughout New England including Lewiston. The most famous was the 1912 “Bread and Roses Strike” in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Women workers found out their wages and hours were being cut. The strike lasted 9 weeks from January to March. A congressional hearing was held which exposed the terrible conditions in the Lawrence mills and led to a settlement between the mill owners and the workers, some getting a 20% raise.
Lizzie's Diary
The photo is of Lizzie Littlefield in her later years. She started her diary when she was forty-seven years old and wanted to record her life, in particular some of the hardships she faced including a friend's betrayal and her acrimonious divorce. Despite her difficulties Lizzie had a strong faith very influenced by the growing religious movements motivated by the Second Great Awakening. Lizzie attended tent revivals and camp meetings. She converted to Adventism and was active in the church until internal conflicts split the church.
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She started her diary on December 10th, 1888: “I suppose I am rather late in commencing a journal, but for a long time I have wished I had commenced one when I was young. I think I could have had a book of many interesting pages but time has passed so I will not try to recall to mind of my joys & sorrows, trials and triumphs, only note down a few thoughts of the past.”
Perhaps one of her greatest sorrows was the loss of her father William Libby. She records in her diary his death of January 3rd, 1857: “my dear father died. He went out from his home in perfect health to be brought home Cold in Death from a fall in the Wheal pit No. 2 Laconia. Never can I forget that night of anguish..” Lizzie was fifteen when he died.
In 1863, her mother remarries to Thomas P.S. Hanscom. Lizzie is not happy: [I] was not pleased… Home had lost its charm not but she [her mother] was just as loving and kind.. She decided to leave : "having a roving turn of mind I went away to work first at Lowell then Lawrence.
She returned three years later and met Hartley Littlefield whom she married on March 26th, 1869. “For about four years I could say were years of happiness. He was all I could ask for in a Husband. I worked and so did he, we were trying to get something ahead but hard times came.” Hartley lost his job but managed to get one at the mill in Salmon Falls, New Hampshire. Internal divisions within the church caused Lizzie, Hartley and other church members to lose confidence in many of the brethren and “grew cold in the cause of our Blessed Saviour”. Her sorrow turned to desperation when her mother mortgaged the house to pay the husband and in her confused state of mind she tried to burn the house down in order to obtain an insurance payoff. I then took it upon myself to clear it up and that presented me from going with my Husband as I should, she wrote in her diary. When she did get to Salmon Falls she found that a bad bold woman got hold upon him.
Lizzie left home and went to work at Lawrence with a friend she thought she trusted but turned on her, spreading rumors about her. Lizzie decided to fight back:
my Character was all I had left I could not
give that up without a strugle Martha and I hired
a team and drove to Great Falls to Lawyer Copeland
I told my story and got strong encouragement and
knowing I was inosent and God on my side I had no fears.
In the end Lizzie divorces Hartley who ended up having to pay restitution of $125.00.
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