Girls and Boys and Work

This feels illuminating: some 1851 census data quoted from 'A brief statistical sketch of the child labour market in mid-nineteenth-century London' (Continuity and Change 20 (2), 2005, 229–245) which shows the use of child labour (10-14 year olds) in London in 1851, for boys and girls. The first figure is the total in the 1851 census, the smaller figure is the percentage of children in that occupation, as opposed to adults (eg. 5.3% of female servants were aged 10-14). It reminds me again how many boys were 'messengers' of one kind or another in Victorian London, a major source of employment.

GIRLS 

Domestic servant (General)	6424	5.3
Milliner	1021	2.3
Domestic servant (Nurse)	666	8.6
Seamstress	564	2.7
Artificial-flower-maker	501	18.4
Silk manufacture	420	5.1
Shoemaker	344	4.8
Tailor	260	3.1
Brush, broom-amker	230	19.1
Others engaged about publications	222	7.8
Washerwoman	203	0.6
Domestic servant (Inn servant)	157	2.8
Other paper workers	145	11.8
Domestic servant (Housemaid)	138	1.1
Other workers, dealers in silk	117	8.2
Cap-maker	107	8.4
Others providing dress	107	4.3
Others dealing in wood furniture	76	7.8
Embroiderer	76	5.4
Employed about messages	75	28.6

BOYS

Messenger, porter, not govt.	10472	31.7
Domestic Servant, General	958	4.7
Shoemaker	932	3.0
Labourer	833	1.7
Printer	498	4.8
Commercial clerk	477	2.9
Butcher	414	4.3
Tailor	403	1.8
Silk Manufacture	340	4.5
Carpenter, Joiner	270	1.2
Domestic servant (Inn servant)	266	3.3
Paper-stainer	248	17.2
Baker	240	2.1
Others dealing in drinks, stimulants	238	5.0
Plasterer	231	5.3
Law Clerk	229	4.0
Painter, plumber, glazier	200	1.3
Draper	194	2.6
Ropemaker	168	11.4
Grocer	163	2.1