Victorian Britain Sources Questions.

Authors Avatar
Q: Read Sources D and G. These sources disagree about conditions in the domestic system. Does this mean that one of the must be wrong?

In source D, the idea given is that the domestic system was a tremendously more comfortable lifestyle than life in the city for children. Contrary to that in source G, it explores different ideas and gives a much more balanced view by saying that though the two lifestyles were tremendously different, the two may have been just as bad as each other.

However, the ideas of source D are quite unreliable, as there is a very strong bias. The writer was "a strong critic of the factories and their owners" and therefore would bring down factory works and its exploitations at any costs. The grudge was so strong that though not everything he wrote was a lie, there was much exaggeration and spinning off the truth on his part. It is most probably true that the "fresh country air" was better than the air at the factories of London, but it was not true that country children had the CHOICE to help out with their parents only OCCASIONALLY. That was not true, as children in those days were expected to work at a fairly young age.

Source G states that "children worked as soon as they were able to do so" and that "hours could be very long". Source G investigates many different issues and overall gives a much more balanced out and not biased view. Though the sources disagree with each other, it does not mean on is right and the other wrong as the two sources are talking about different cases. As one discusses the possibilities of domestic life being as hard as factory life, whilst the other source (Source D) says that domestic life was great.
Join now!


Q. Look at all of the sources. 'Up to 1850, children were worse off in the factory system than they had been in the Domestic System.' Do you agree? You must use the sources and your own knowledge of this topic to explain your answer.

The domestic and the factory system were indeed very different from one another. However it is fairly difficult to distinguish whether one was worse than the other. There are particular sources which say that factory life was much worse, though on the other hand there are certain sources which state that ...

This is a preview of the whole essay