The vibrant, lead-glazed, Victorian ceramic ‘majolica’ was manufactured at Wedgwood for almost 90 years. Beginning production in the 1860s, it was a best seller with Victorian audiences until near the end of the 19th century, where it fell out of popularity due to changing tastes and an increasing awareness of the toxicity of lead. Despite this decline in interest, our records show that small amounts of majolica were still being produced by Wedgwood as late as the 1940s.
Over the course of Wedgwood’s majolica history, they became one of the country’s most prolific majolica manufacturers, with over 4000 majolica designs documented in their pattern books.
The story of Wedgwood is not only about ceramics like majolica – it’s also about people. The V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive holds over 100,000 documents relating to the Wedgwood company’s history spanning over 260 years, providing glimpses into the lives and creativity of the people who worked there. As part of the Majolica Project, funded by the Majolica International Society, I have been delving into the archive looking at the history of Wedgwood’s majolica production, exploring what life was like at the factory, and uncovering the stories of two majolica workers.
Life at the Factory
Wedgwood’s Etruria Works was opened in 1769 in the heart of the Staffordshire Potteries. Josiah Wedgwood (1730 – 95), the company’s founder, developed a workers’ village which enabled employees to live either onsite or in one of the nearby towns. Many people stayed in one place, working for one employer their entire lives, which often resulted in generations of the same family working in the same industry. These family groups in close proximity created a tightknit community among the workers at Wedgwood.
Majolica was developed by Mintons ltd. and introduced to the public at The Great Exhibition of 1851. Due to a period of financial difficulty, Wedgwood began producing majolica at Etruria nearly 10 years after it was first introduced. Despite this late beginning, Wedgwood majolica was quickly ranked among the best, with smooth, vibrant glazes and a wide selection of shapes to choose from. Many people were involved in the manufacture of majolica, with as many as 20 processes being applied to each piece, from sculpting, decorating, and firing the ceramics, to selecting and packaging orders for delivery.
The pottery industry could be very dangerous for workers, and many people suffered from diseases caused by dust inhalation such as ‘Potter’s Asthma’ and poisoning caused by the toxic minerals used to make glazes. Majolica in particular was known to be detrimental to workers’ health due to the extraordinarily high quantity of lead in its glaze.
The Etruscan Breadwinners
One of the V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive’s most significant employee records is a photo album called the Etruscan Breadwinners. Put together by designer, modeller, and decorator Harry Barnard (1862 – 1933) in 1898, the album contains group photos of some of Wedgwood’s different departments.
The Etruscan Breadwinners album is particularly significant because Barnard labelled each photo with the names of the employees depicted – helping us to literally put names to faces during our research.
The Majolica & Tile department photo shows 14 people who were involved in majolica production at Wedgwood during this time. Harry Barnard (bottom right) worked with this department himself and became the manager of the Tile department only one year after this photo was taken. Perhaps because of his personal connection with this team, Barnard has added an additional detail in his notes for this page, stating that Charlotte Cartlidge died “Aug 12th 1922” after 52 years of service. Using this information, I was able to find Charlotte in the UK’s census records and have managed to uncover more of her story using records from our archive.
Charlotte Cartlidge (1849 – 1922)
Born in 1849, Charlotte Cartlidge was the youngest of three children living in Tinkers Clough – only a 17-minute walk from Wedgwood’s Etruria factory. Her father, John Cartlidge (1821 – about 1877) worked as a Potters Handler for most of his adult life, and by 1871, Charlotte and her two brothers had all followed their father into the ceramics industry. It was common for generations of families to work at the same factories, with children starting work at a young age as Potters Assistants and Apprentices. From Barnard’s note about Charlotte’s 52 years of service, we know that she began working as a Paintress for Wedgwood at the age of 21 and based on her family home’s proximity to Wedgwood’s factory, it’s possible that her father and brothers would have worked there too.
Charlotte’s father died before the next census was taken in 1881, and the record of England and Wales Deaths (1837 – 2007) states that a ‘John Carlidge (b.1821)’ died in Stoke-on-Trent during the last few months of 1877. Shortly after his death, the family took in two lodgers, and by 1891, Charlotte and her family had moved out of her childhood home and were living on Argyle Street with her nephew, Fred (b.1878). This new house was a 20-minute walk away from Charlotte’s work at the Etruria factory, and only seven minutes from their previous home. She remained in this house until after 1911, where she moved in with Fred’s family on Remer Street.
Charlotte’s occupation is listed in the census records as a ‘Potters Paintress’, one of the roles commonly filled by women in the pottery industry. Jobs were often divided into men’s work and women’s work, with women taking on more of the decorative positions such as ‘enameller’, ‘transferrer’, and ‘paintress’. In 1911, Charlotte’s occupation is more specifically listed as a ‘Majolica Paintress’. Though it’s unclear when exactly she started this position, we know from the Etruscan Breadwinners album that she worked in the Majolica & Tile department from at least 1898.
In 1921, the census lists Charlotte’s employer as ‘Joscah [Josiah] Wedgwood, Pottery Manufacturer’, fully linking the census records back to the Charlotte Cartlidge in the V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive.
Charlotte Cartlidge is mentioned many times in our collection of Paintress Wage Books, stating how much she was paid, weekly, throughout her 52 years of service. Her final mention took place on the 28th of June 1922 where she was paid 1 pound, 16 shillings, and 9 pence – the equivalent of £93 in 2026. It’s unclear whether Charlotte retired or fell ill after this date, but she passed away two months later aged 73.
Harry Bentley (1875 – 1945)
Harry Bentley appears both in the Majolica & Tile department and the Warehouse department photographs in the Etruscan Breadwinners album. No additional information was written about him by Barnard, so I began my research by looking him up in Wedgwood’s Hiring Books. The Hiring Books are an invaluable resource for family research, since they contain the date of birth, hiring date, job title, and address of many Wedgwood employees.
The hiring book from the 1920s – 30s lists multiple Harry Bentleys, but only one is the right age to have been photographed for the Etruscan Breadwinners album in 1898. Harry Bentley, born in August 1875, was hired in 1888 and worked in the Warehouse packaging products for delivery. He would have been 25 years old when the Etruscan Breadwinners photographs were taken, which visually matches the age of the man in the album. The Hiring Book also lists his son, Harry Bentley Jr. (b.1908) who was hired at the age of 14 and went on to become an Assistant Department Manager.
Harry Bentley was the youngest of six children living with their parents in Newcastle-under-Lyme. His father was a collier (coal miner) who had worked as a potter himself in his youth. By the 1891 census, Harry was working as a warehouse lad for Wedgwood, where he had worked since the age of 13. At some point between 1891 and 1901, Harry’s mother, Emma Bentley (b.1835) passed away, leaving Harry living with his father, stepbrother, uncle, and niece.
The UK’s marriage records show that Harry Bentley married Ada Deakin (née Forrester) (b.1874) in 1904. Ada had a son from her previous marriage, Herbert G. Deakin (b.1899) and went on to have two children with Harry – Harry Jr. (b.1908) and Cecil (b.1911). Harry’s employer is listed as Wedgwood in the 1921 census, linking him back to the records in our archive.
The publicly accessible census records end there, but Harry Bentley’s story can be traced a bit further. When Wedgwood relocated their factory to Barlaston in the late 1930s, they held a Foundation Ceremony to celebrate the beginning of the factory’s construction. Eight longstanding employees were selected to place signed commemorative vases into a box set in the foundation of the new factory, along with a plaque inscribed ‘…By their works ye shall know them’. To acknowledge his 50 years of service to the company, Harry Bentley was selected by his peers to be one of the eight representatives.
In August 1938, the Staffordshire Sentinel newspaper published an article about the Foundation Ceremony, containing a short statement about each of the eight participants. The statement about Harry Bentley confirms some of the information provided by the census records and reveals details about his long career with Wedgwood. It says:
“Mr Bentley, who is in the warehouse, has 49 years’ service to his credit. He started at the works when he was 13 and now has two sons working there. In his early days, as a boy worker, he walked from Newcastle every day, reached the works at 6.30 a.m., spent half an hour earning extra money lighting fires and cleaning up, began his own work at seven, finished at six in the evening, and then walked home.“
The V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive contains detailed records on the development of the Barlaston Factory, including a photo album called ‘Barlaston Beginnings’ which contains photographs of the eight representatives as well as scenes from the Foundation Ceremony itself.
This image of Harry Bentley was used in newspapers to promote the event. According to the note written beside it in the Barlaston Beginnings album, Harry Bentley died on Christmas in 1945. This date matches a death record in the record of England and Wales Deaths (1837 – 2007) that states a ‘Harry Bentley (b.1875)’ died in Newcastle-under-Lyme in 1945, at the age of 70.
Conclusion
Majolica was made in Wedgwood’s factories for nearly 70 years, and this is just a small glimpse into that history. Due to the nature of the production process, it may never be known exactly what majolica was made or packaged by Harry Bentley or painted by Charlotte Cartlidge, but this research begins to uncover the complex history of their long careers with Wedgwood.
The V&A Wedgwood Collection Archive holds over 250 years of material which can help you to trace an ancestor or uncover the hidden stories of other Wedgwood employees. You can either view selected items online on the Search the Archives webpage or book to visit the Archive’s collection in person.
Click here to find out more about visiting the V&A Wedgwood Collection Archives.
