INTRODUCTION
Dedication
Foreword
The shops
Money in Witham, 1910-1939
THE QUOTATIONS
The day begins
Supplying the shops
Hard work
Delivery
Customers (1)
Customers (2)
Other ways of shopping
The end of the day
Money in Witham, 1910-1939
Values are of course expressed in 'old' money. Twelve pennies made a shilling (a 'bob'), and twenty shillings made a pound (£). A sovereign was a gold one-pound coin.
For men, farm work was still very common, with a wage between 10 and 15 shillings a week. Factory work could bring in £2 to £3 a week either in Chelmsford, or, after 1920, at Crittall's in Witham. The decreasing numbers of men working in shops earned a wage somewhere between that of farm and factory workers.
For women, the commonest employment was domestic service earning from 2 to 5 shillings a week; the glove factory in Witham only paid a little more. A female apprentice in a shop would only earn about a shilling a week, but a trained female assistant could earn about £1 in the 1920s and over £2 in the 1930s.