Dictionary of Old Occupations
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Definitions of jobs Back Tenter - Banksman
Back Houseboy: a young male Domestic Servant working in the kitchen or scullery.
Bag Stitcher: a 19th century occupation, person employed in a saltworks to sew up bags / sacks of salt prior to dispatch.
Back Tenter: often a small child who cleared away loose fibre / rubbish from behind the working weaving looms, this was noisy and dangerous job.
Back Washer: cleaned wool as part of worsted manufacture. Worsted cloth is made from yarn of the same name and is associated with the English village of Worstead in Norfolk.
Backmaker: alternative term for a Cooper. More recently, may refer to someone working in the clothing industry, operating a sewing machine to assemble the backs of jackets and similar items.
Badger: a Hawker or seller of food.
Badgy Fiddler: boy trumpeter, a Private in the British Army.
Bagman: travelling salesman.
Bagniokeeper: In England prior to 1740 referred to the keeper of a coffee house which offered Turkish baths. The term evolved to refer to brothel keepers.
Bag Room Boy: odd job boy in the pottery industry who helps sort the bags for the press, which was used to remove moisture from the slip to make clay.
Bailie: alternate term for Bailiff, an officer of the court.
Bailiff: an officer of the court who maintained order in the courtroom, or in charge of a manor, town, castle, county etc. with the power to collect fines or take people into custody.
Baillie: alternate term for Bailiff, an officer of the court.
Bairman: Scottish legal term for a person who is a Pauper, i.e. left bare.
Baker Maker: in the pottery industry he hand-pressed clay to produce oval dishes.
Bal Maiden: a female surface worker in the mining industry.
Balancer: worked in coal mines, operating a coal hauling system.
Baler: a person who baled hay, or a mill worker who operated a hydraulic press to bale cotton.
Ballad Monger: alternate term for a Poetaster; a person who wrote or ballads, or who sold printed ballad sheets.
Ballast Heaver: a physical labourer loaded empty ships with ballast, which reduced the chance of capsizing in high winds.
Ballast Master: man in charge of ballasting vessels, in charge of Ballast Heavers.
Baller: measured out balls of clay for the thrower. (pottery industry term).
Baller Up: alternate term for a Baller in the potter industry.
Ballista Archer: military occupation, man who used an early form of the crossbow.
Balloon Blower: late 19th or early 20th century occupation, working in bicycle manufacture. The term balloon refers to rubber inner tubes.
Bandsman: an instrument player in a military band, or a worker in the coal mining industry who operated hoisting gear.
Bandster: seasonal worker (Harvest time) who binds wheat sheaves ready for stacking after the Reapers have cut them.
Copyright: Jane Hewitt. This dictionary is authorised for use on www.familyresearcher.co.uk only.
Bang Beggar: a Constable who carried a large stick (slang), or an Officer of the Parish who set a limit to the amount of time strangers could stay.
Bank Manager: supervisor at a coal mine.
Bank odd man: odd job man (Labourer) in the pottery industry.
Banker: a surface worker in the coal mining industry, or a drainage ditch digger.
Banksman: unloaded cages when they reached the surface of a coalmine and signalled the descent of the workmen / cage.
This dictionary is my own work, and copyright Jane Hewitt. I sometimes find unauthorised (i.e. stolen) copies of my website content appearing on other people's websites. If you should read a group of identical glossary definitions elsewhere on the web, consider whether such sites are reputable or not.
The Great British Bobby: A History of British Policing from 1829 to the Present by Clive Emsley
The Victorians called him 'Bobby' after Sir Robert Peel, the Home Secretary who created the Metropolitan Police in 1829. The generations that followed came to regard the force in which he served as 'the best police in the world'. If twenty-first century observers sometimes take a more jaundiced view of his efforts, the blue-helmeted, unarmed policeman remains an icon of Britishness, and a symbol of the relatively peaceful nature of our social evolution.
In The Great British Bobby, Clive Emsley traces the development of Britain's forces of law and order from the earliest watchmen and constables of the pre-modern period to the police service of today. He examines in detail such milestones in police history as the establishment of the Bow Street Runners in the 1740s, the Police Acts of 1839, the introduction of women police officers during the First World War, and the Macpherson Report of 1999 into the death of Stephen Lawrence.
Threaded through his narrative are case-studies of real-life Bobbies, drawn from police archives, evoking the day-to-day reality of the policeman's lot over two and a half centuries: the boredom of patrolling on foot in all weathers, the threats to life and limb of policing rough areas, and the diverse historical challenges of industrial unrest, the growth of cities, the arrival of the motor car and the ethnic diversification of society.
From Robert Grubb, patrolling the mean streets of Georgian London with rattle and cudgel, to Norwell Roberts, the first black officer to be appointed to the Metropolitan Police, The Great British Bobby presents a cast of mostly honest coppers performing a testing role to the best of their ability. A distinguished historian and criminologist, Clive Emsley is ideally placed to tell - candidly but affectionately - the fascinating story of Britain's police force.
