Men and boys working in a fork-grinding factory in Sheffield. Wood engraving by M. Jackson after J. Palmer, 1866.

Palmer, John, active 1856-1887

1866

1 print : wood engraving

Wellcome Collection

Men and boys work in a fork-grinding factory, with sparks flying from grinding wheels. The scene depicts an industrial setting with multiple workers engaged in their tasks. "The steel manufactures of Sheffield. In the numbers of this journal for Jan. 6 and Jan. 20 we gave some illustrations, from sketches by our own artist, of the interior of the workshops at Sheffield, in which certain operations of the steel manufacture are performed. The defective sanitary arrangements in most of these establishments, and the deleterious character of some parts of the work itself, were fully exposed by the last report of the Children's Employment Commission; and again, more recently, by the statements of Dr. J. C. Hall, the senior physician to the Sheffield Public Hospital and Dispensary, read before the National So