Navvy
Encyclopedia
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
) or navigational engineer (USA) and is particularly applied to describe the manual labourers
Laborer
A Laborer or labourer - see variation in english spelling - is one of the construction trades, traditionally considered unskilled manual labor, as opposed to skilled labor. In the division of labor, laborers have all blasting, hand tools, power tools, air tools, and small heavy equipment, and act...
working on major civil engineering
Civil engineering
Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings...
projects. The term was coined in the late 18th century in Britain
Kingdom of Great Britain
The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...
when numerous canal
Canal
Canals are man-made channels for water. There are two types of canal:#Waterways: navigable transportation canals used for carrying ships and boats shipping goods and conveying people, further subdivided into two kinds:...
s were being built, which were also sometimes known as "navigations", or "eternal navigations", intended to last forever.
Nationalities
Brooke's study of 19th century British railway contracts coinciding with census returns demonstrates conclusively that the great majority of British-based navvies were English. He does however state that 'only the ubiquitous Irish can be regarded as a truly international force in railway construction'. By 1818, high wages in North AmericaNorth America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
attracted many Irish workers to become a major part of the workforce in the construction of the Erie Canal
Erie Canal
The Erie Canal is a waterway in New York that runs about from Albany, New York, on the Hudson River to Buffalo, New York, at Lake Erie, completing a navigable water route from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes. The canal contains 36 locks and encompasses a total elevation differential of...
in New York State and similar projects. They also participated in building canals in Britain, where by the 20th century they were the predominant workforce.
Migration from canal to railway projects
The construction of canals in Britain was superseded by contracts to construct railway projects from 1830 onwards, which developed into the railway maniasRailway Mania
The Railway Mania was an instance of speculative frenzy in Britain in the 1840s. It followed a common pattern: as the price of railway shares increased, more and more money was poured in by speculators, until the inevitable collapse...
, and the same term was applied to the workmen employed on building rail tracks, their tunnel
Tunnel
A tunnel is an underground passageway, completely enclosed except for openings for egress, commonly at each end.A tunnel may be for foot or vehicular road traffic, for rail traffic, or for a canal. Some tunnels are aqueducts to supply water for consumption or for hydroelectric stations or are sewers...
s, cuttings and embankment
Embankment (transportation)
To keep a road or railway line straight or flat, and where the comparative cost or practicality of alternate solutions is prohibitive, the land over which the road or rail line will travel is built up to form an embankment. An embankment is therefore in some sense the opposite of a cutting, and...
s.
Navvies working on railway projects typically continued to work using hand tools, supplemented with explosives (particularly when tunnelling, and to clear obdurate difficulties). Steam-powered mechanical diggers
Steam shovel
A steam shovel is a large steam-powered excavating machine designed for lifting and moving material such as rock and soil. It is the earliest type of power shovel or excavator. They played a major role in public works in the 19th and early 20th century, being key to the construction of railroads...
or excavator
Excavator
Excavators are heavy construction equipment consisting of a boom, stick, bucket and cab on a rotating platform . The house sits atop an undercarriage with tracks or wheels. A cable-operated excavator uses winches and steel ropes to accomplish the movements. They are a natural progression from the...
s (initially called 'steam navvies') were available in the 1840s, but were not considered cost effective until much later in the 19th century, especially in Britain and Europe where experienced labourers were easily obtained and comparatively cheap. Elsewhere, for example in the
- "United States and Canada, where labour was more scarce and expensive, mechanical diggers were used. In the States the machine tradition became so strong that [...] the word navvy is understood to mean not a man but a steam shovelSteam shovelA steam shovel is a large steam-powered excavating machine designed for lifting and moving material such as rock and soil. It is the earliest type of power shovel or excavator. They played a major role in public works in the 19th and early 20th century, being key to the construction of railroads...
."
Use of the term "navvy"
- In recent history, the term "navvy" has been used in a wide variety of circumstances, most notably a synonym for hitmanHitmanA hitman is a person hired to kill another person.- Hitmen in organized crime :Hitmen are largely linked to the world of organized crime. Hitmen are hired people who kill people for money. Notable examples include Murder, Inc., Mafia hitmen and Richard Kuklinski.- Other cases involving hitmen...
- More recently, in Britain "navvy" sometimes means a workman digging a hole in a public road to get access to buried services such as gas mains or water mains.
- In Britain the name "navvies" is sometimes given to members of the Inland Waterways Protection SocietyInland Waterways Protection SocietyThe Inland Waterways Protection Society was founded on the 21 April 1958 by the late Mrs Bessie Bunker of Sheffield, who became its Secretary....
and other canal restoration societies. - In AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, the term "navvy" is still applied to railway workers. Some areas of the country, particularly towns and cities along the sugarcaneSugarcaneSugarcane refers to any of six to 37 species of tall perennial grasses of the genus Saccharum . Native to the warm temperate to tropical regions of South Asia, they have stout, jointed, fibrous stalks that are rich in sugar, and measure two to six metres tall...
belt of the state of QueenslandQueenslandQueensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
, still employ teams of navvies on a permanent basis to lay and maintain the state's narrow-gauge cane-train tracks. Whereas Council workers who work on general civic projects advise of their worksites with fluorescent orange "Workers Ahead" signage, navvies use pale blue "Navvies at Work" signs. - In British ColumbiaBritish ColumbiaBritish Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
, "navvy jack" is a common term in construction and landscaping trades and in their respective supply stores for 1/2", 3/4" crushed rock and sand to be mixed with Portland cement to make concrete. The usage derives from "Navvy Jack", by ordinary name Jack Thomas, a former navvy who used a rowboat to mine good-quality gravel from beaches in West Vancouver, and who as time went on ran a rowboat-ferry for settlers on Burrard InletBurrard InletBurrard Inlet is a relatively shallow-sided coastal fjord in southwestern British Columbia, Canada. Formed during the last Ice Age, it separates the City of Vancouver and the rest of the low-lying Burrard Peninsula from the slopes of the North Shore Mountains, home to the communities of West...
and English BayEnglish BayEnglish Bay could refer to*English Bay - located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada*Anse aux anglais - known as "English Bay" in English, located on Rodrigues Island...
.
Working conditions for railway navvies
Many of the navvies employed building the railways in EnglandEngland
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
in the early part of the 19th century had to live in squalid temporary accommodations. The navvies working on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway
Liverpool and Manchester Railway
The Liverpool and Manchester Railway was the world's first inter-city passenger railway in which all the trains were timetabled and were hauled for most of the distance solely by steam locomotives. The line opened on 15 September 1830 and ran between the cities of Liverpool and Manchester in North...
were paid daily and their pay reputedly went on ale
Ale
Ale is a type of beer brewed from malted barley using a warm fermentation with a strain of brewers' yeast. The yeast will ferment the beer quickly, giving it a sweet, full bodied and fruity taste...
and porter
Porter (beer)
Porter is a dark-coloured style of beer. The history and development of stout and porter are intertwined. The name was first used in the 18th century from its popularity with the street and river porters of London. It is generally brewed with dark malts...
, leaving little for food. When the workers were unfit to work, monies were deducted from their wages and meal tokens were issued. These tokens could be handed in at meal caravans for a bowl of soup
Soup
Soup is a generally warm food that is made by combining ingredients such as meat and vegetables with stock, juice, water, or another liquid. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling solid ingredients in liquids in a pot until the flavors are extracted, forming a broth.Traditionally,...
and a portion of bread
Bread
Bread is a staple food prepared by cooking a dough of flour and water and often additional ingredients. Doughs are usually baked, but in some cuisines breads are steamed , fried , or baked on an unoiled frying pan . It may be leavened or unleavened...
. At first the token was a slip of paper called a "flimsy" because of its thickness. In today's terms it would be similar to a grade called "bank paper
Bank paper
Bank paper is a thin strong writing paper of less than 50g/m2 commonly used for typewriting and correspondence.Bank paper are also securities which banks instead of governments issue. See also Commercial paper, securities issued by corporations....
". As these tokens could be copied by the forger
Forgery
Forgery is the process of making, adapting, or imitating objects, statistics, or documents with the intent to deceive. Copies, studio replicas, and reproductions are not considered forgeries, though they may later become forgeries through knowing and willful misrepresentations. Forging money or...
s, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway supplied its contractors with six-sided food tokens that were surrendered for meals. These were cut from brass
Brass
Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc; the proportions of zinc and copper can be varied to create a range of brasses with varying properties.In comparison, bronze is principally an alloy of copper and tin...
and had the initials LMR stamped upon them. This reduced the problems of drunken navvies and eliminated the local farm labourers freeloading from the food caravans. Tokens and a description of their use can be found in the Museum of Science & Industry in Manchester.
In popular culture
- Alfred Doolittle in George Bernard ShawGeorge Bernard ShawGeorge Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
's playPlay (theatre)A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
PygmalionPygmalion (play)Pygmalion: A Romance in Five Acts is a play by Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw. Professor of phonetics Henry Higgins makes a bet that he can train a bedraggled Cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, to pass for a duchess at an ambassador's garden party by teaching her to assume a veneer of...
is referred to as a navvy. - Navvies are referenced throughout George Orwell's fictionalized memoir Down and Out in Paris and LondonDown and Out in Paris and LondonDown and Out in Paris and London is the first full-length work by the English author George Orwell , published in 1933. It is a memoir in two parts on the theme of poverty in the two cities. The first part is a picaresque account of living on the breadline in Paris and the experience of casual...
. - Gordon LightfootGordon LightfootGordon Meredith Lightfoot, Jr. is a Canadian singer-songwriter who achieved international success in folk, folk-rock, and country music, and has been credited for helping define the folk-pop sound of the 1960s and 1970s...
used the term navvies in his "Canadian Railroad TrilogyCanadian Railroad TrilogyThe "Canadian Railroad Trilogy" is a song by Gordon Lightfoot that describes the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway.This song was commissioned by the CBC for a special broadcast on January 1, 1967, to start Canada's Centennial year. It appeared on Lightfoot's The Way I Feel album later in the...
," a song written to commemorate CanadaCanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
's centennial in 1967: "We are the navvies who work upon the railway, swingin' our hammers in the bright, blazing sun." The song debuted on CBC's "100 Years Young" and later appeared on the album The Way I Feel. - Andy PartridgeAndy PartridgeAndrew John "Andy" Partridge is an English singer, songwriter, and guitarist. He has been known as Sir John Johns and Melchior and rose to fame as a founding member, guitarist and chief songwriter of the pop/new wave band, XTC. He lives in Swindon, Wiltshire, where he was raised.Partridge also...
's song "Towers of London" on XTCXTCXTC were a New Wave band from Swindon, England, active between 1976 and 2005. The band enjoyed some chart success, including the UK and Canadian hits "Making Plans for Nigel" and "Senses Working Overtime" , but are perhaps even better known for their long-standing critical success.- Early years:...
's album Black Sea is inspired by a Dickensonian perspective of the thankless contribution of navvies to Victorian eraVictorian eraThe Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
LondonLondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. - The first song on Pere UbuPere UbuPere Ubu is an experimental rock music group from Cleveland, Ohio.Père Ubu may also refer to:* Ubu, the enigmatic central figure of a series of French plays by Alfred Jarry, including Ubu Roi, and subsequent plays Ubu Cocu and Ubu Enchaîné...
's second album, Dub HousingDub HousingDub Housing is the second album by American experimental rock group Pere Ubu. Released in 1978, the album is now regarded as one of their best, described by Trouser Press as "simply one of the most important post-punk recordings."...
, is called "Navvy." - The PoguesThe PoguesThe Pogues are a Celtic punk band, formed in 1982 and fronted by Shane MacGowan. The band reached international prominence in the 1980s and early 1990s. MacGowan left the band in 1991 due to drinking problems but the band continued first with Joe Strummer and then with Spider Stacy on vocals before...
song "Navigator" is based on the life of a navvy. - The GenesisGenesis (band)Genesis are an English rock band that formed in 1967. The band currently comprises the longest-tenured members Tony Banks , Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins . Past members Peter Gabriel , Steve Hackett and Anthony Phillips , also played major roles in the band in its early years...
song "Driving the Last Spike" describes the life of the navvies. - In the Doctor WhoDoctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
episode "The Unquiet DeadThe Unquiet Dead"The Unquiet Dead" is an episode in the British science-fiction television series Doctor Who that was first broadcast on 9 April 2005 and is the first episode of the revival to be set in the past. In Victorian Cardiff, the dead are walking, and creatures made of gas are on the loose...
", the Doctor introduces himself to Charles DickensCharles DickensCharles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
, prompting Dickens to reply "Doctor? You look more like a navvy.". In "Destiny of the DaleksDestiny of the DaleksDestiny of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 September to 22 September 1979. The story introduces Lalla Ward as the newly-regenerated Romana....
", after RomanaRomanaRomana, short for Romanadvoratrelundar, is a fictional character in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
answers several questions about the chemistry of concrete, the Doctor says she "would make a first class navvy". - In the Gaelic StormGaelic StormGaelic Storm is a Celtic band. Their music includes traditional Irish music, Scottish music, and original tunes in both the Celtic and Celtic rock genres...
song "Don't Go for 'The One'Bring Yer WelliesBring Yer Wellies is the sixth album by Celtic band Gaelic Storm. It was released on July 25, 2007. "Wellies" is a nickname for Wellington boots, which feature prominently in the lyrics of "Kelly's Wellies" and on the album cover.-Track listing:...
", Tracey McCall is described as having "arms like a navvy and a face like dried fruit". - In Brendan Behan's _Borstal Boy_ the protagonist joins a prison navvy gang. see page 250
- The Bitmap BrothersBitmap BrothersThe Bitmap Brothers were a UK based video game developer founded in 1987. The company entered the industry in 1988 with the scrolling shooter Xenon. They quickly followed with the classic Speedball...
' steampunkSteampunkSteampunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, and speculative fiction that came into prominence during the 1980s and early 1990s. Steampunk involves a setting where steam power is still widely used—usually Victorian era Britain or "Wild West"-era United...
styled video game, The Chaos EngineThe Chaos EngineThe Chaos Engine is a top-down run and gun computer game developed by the Bitmap Brothers and published by Renegade Software in 1993. The game is set in a steampunk Victorian age in which one or two players must battle the hostile creations of the titular Chaos Engine across four landscapes and...
(1993), includes a playable character called "The Navvie", who is said to have single-handedly constructed the Banshee Boardwalk.