Henry Mayhew

Henry Mayhew, from London Labour and the London Poor (1861)

Henry Mayhew (born November 25, 1812 – died July 25, 1887) was an English social researcher, journalist, playwrighter and reformer]]. He was one of the two founders of the satirical and humorous magazine Punch, and the magazine's joint-editor, with Mark Lemon, in its early days. He is better known, however, for his work as a social researcher, publishing an extensive series of newspaper articles in the Morning Chronicle, later compiled into the book series London Labour and the London Poor, a groundbreaking and influential survey of the poor of London.

Biography

Early life

Henry Mayhew was born in London, one of seventeen children of Joshua Mayhew. He was educated at Westminster school before running away from his studies to sea, at the age of 12. He then served with the East India Company as a midshipman on a ship bound for Calcutta, India. In 1829, he returned to Britain where he became a trainee lawyer in Wales, working with his father for the next three years. After a while, he decided to enter the career of journalism and became a freelance journalist. He contributed to the The Thief, a readers digest, followed quickly by writing a play - Figaro in London in 1829. Along with continuing to develop his writing, Mayhew briefly managed the Queen's Theatre.

Paris and Punch Magazine

In 1835, unable to support himself by writing, Mayhew found himself seriously indebted, and along with a fellow writer, escaped to Paris to avoid creditors. He spent his time writing, gathering around himself a circle of friends, including William Thackeray and Douglas Jerrold.

Punch magazine was co-founded by Mayhew in 1841.

On July 17, 1841 Mayhew co-founded Punch magazine. At its founding, the magazine was jointly edited by Mayhew and Mark Lemon. Initially it was subtitled The London Charivari, this being a reference to a satirical humor magazine published in France under the title Le Charivari (a work read often while Mayhew was in Paris). Reflecting their satiric and humorous intent, the two editors took for their name and masthead the anarchic glove puppet, Mr. Punch. Punch was an unexpected success, driving many readers from all classes of society.

In 1842 Mayhew contributed to the pioneering Illustrated London News. By this time Mayhew had become reasonably secure financially, had settled his debts and married Jane Jerrold, the daughter of his friend Douglas Jerrold. She died in 1880.

In 1842, Mayhew resigned as joined editor of the Punch magazine, continuing only as an advisor. He severed his connection with the magazine by 1845. His brother, Horace stayed on the board of Punch until his death. The Punch years gave Mayhew the opportunity to meet talented illustrators whom he later employed to work from daguerreotypes on his London Labour and the London Poor.

Mid-career

After the experience with the Punch magazine, Mayhew became involved in several literary adventures, mostly the writing of plays. Two of his plays - But, However and the Wandering Minstrel were successful, whilst the others received minimal attention. In 1849 he received a journalistic assignment that would change his career. The project was sponsored by the Morning Chronicle newspaper, and it involved a large-scale survey of Britain's working poor.

Mayhew wrote series of articles on the life conditions in London’s slums. His writing style was uncompromising and often shocking, causing frequent censorship by the editors. By 1850 Mayhem quit the project, and continued to publish stories on the London poor independently until 1852. The articles were compiled into London Labor and the London Poor.

London Labor and the London Poor

The articles comprising London Labour and the London Poor were initially collected into three volumes in 1851; the 1861 edition included a fourth volume, co-written with Bracebridge Hemyng, John Binny and Andrew Halliday, on the lives of prostitutes, thieves and beggars. This Extra Volume took a more general and statistical approach to its subject than Volumes 1 to 3.

Mayhew’s approach was ethnographical, involving observation and interview. He interviewed everyone - beggars, street-entertainers, market traders, prostitutes, laborers, sweatshop workers, even down to the "mudlarks" who searched the stinking mud on the banks of the River Thames for wood, metal, rope and coal from passing ships, and the "pure-finders" who gathered dog feces to sell to tanners. He described their clothes, how and where they lived, their entertainments and customs, and made detailed estimates of the numbers and incomes of those practicing each trade.

Mayhew also included biographical sketches of people he met, including those of flower girls, cat and dog meat dealers, and pickpockets. The stories were often heartbreaking, describing the struggle to survive in Victorian London. The books make fascinating reading, showing how marginal and precarious many people's lives were, in what, at that time, must have been the richest city in the world.

In the fourth volume of the book, Mayhew described characteristics and activities of criminals in Britain. He drew detailed maps to illustrate the criminal statistics of each county. The volume also included different statistics – the number of illegitimate children per county, rates of teenage marriage, the number of crimes committed by women, etc. Mayhew’s maps were among the earliest attempts to study crime through geographical methods.

Later life

After 1852 Mayhem’s life seems to rapidly decline. He shortly lived in Germany several times, where he wrote three travel books (1856, 1858, 1864) and a biography of the young Martin Luther (1864). All four of those works received minimal attention. He also attempted, unsuccessfully at the end, to write children’s books. He and his wife separated, and in 1865 Mayhem completely disappeared from view.

He died in 1887 in London, England.

Legacy

Mayhew's work was embraced by and was an influence on the Christian Socialists, such as Thomas Hughes, Charles Kingsley, and F. D. Maurice. Radicals also published sizeable excerpts from the reports in the Northern Star, the Red Republican and other newspapers. The often sympathetic investigations, with their immediacy and unswerving eye for detail, offered unprecedented insights into the condition of the Victorian poor. Alongside the earlier work of Edwin Chadwick, they are also regarded as a decisive influence on the thinking of Charles Dickens.

Mayhew’s maps of criminal activities were among the early attempts to connect crime with geographical areas. His work helped understand the relationship between crime and other variables, such as urbanization, poverty, and disease. Today criminologists use maps to explore the spatial relationship between criminal activity and other ecological variables.

Publications

• Mayhem, Henry. 1864. The Boyhood of Martin Luther: Or the Sufferings of the Heroic Little Beggar-boy who Became the Great German Reformer. Harper & Bros
• Mayhew, Henry. 1874. London Characters: Illustrations of the Humour, Pathos & Peculiarities of London Life. London: Chatto.
• Mayhew, Henry. 1968 (original published in 1862). The criminal prisons of London, and scenes of prison life. Reprints of economic classics. New York: A.M. Kelley.
• Mayhem, Henry. 1985 (original published in 1851). London Labour and the London Poor. Penguin Classics. ISBN 0140432418

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Bookrags.com. Henry Mayhew. Retrieved on June 13, 2007, <http://www.bookrags.com/biography/henry-mayhew-dlb/>
• Humpherys, Anne. 1977. Travels into the Poor Man's Country: The Work of Henry Mayhew. Athens: University of Georgia Press. ISBN 0820304166
• Humpherys, Anne. 1984. Henry Mayhew. Twayne's English author’s series, TEAS 396. Boston: Twayne Publishers. ISBN 0805768823
• Taithe, Bertrand. 1996. The Essential Mayhew: Representing and Communicating the Poor. Rivers Oram Press. ISBN 1854890468
• Vlock, Deborah. 2004. Mayhew, Henry (1812–1887). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press.

External links

• Henry Mayhew – Biography on BookRags.com
• Henry Mayhew – Biography on Spartacus
• London Labour and the London Poor: Volume 1 Bolles London collection
• London Labour and the London Poor: Volume 2 Bolles London collection
• London Labour and the London Poor: Volume 3 Bolles London collection
• London Labour and the London Poor: Extra Volume Bolles London collection
• On Punch Magazine – On the history of Punch magazine
• Punch Magazine – Official website of the magazine

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