. . .It broke out as early as 1825 when the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge reduced its prices and the master bookbinders working for it reduced wages. The strike which followed collapsed for want of funds. In 1833 the contest was resumed with the British and Foreign Bible Society. That year the five houses then employed by the Society reduced wages, and it appears that when the dispute was about to be settled by both sides accepting a compromise, a representative of the Bible Society instructed the masters to hold out. The men appealed to the Society, but were told that it could not intervene. No definite settlement was ever arrived at.

The first petition which the men addressed to the Society in 1833 made special reference to the condition of the women workers. "Your memorialists beg leave to state," they wrote, "that there are a number of females (about 200) employed in binding the books of your Society, the whole of whose wages have been reduced in con. . . Read More