Introduction

Summary

It's a ‘crisis’. In Calais thousands of migrants are preparing to cross the Channel. They hope to find work, attempting to overcome economic difficulties in their country of origin, but some are also fleeing for their lives, trying to escape persecution. According to British newspapers, such as the Nottingham Review, they have been met with ‘the greatest hostility’ in France. The migrants are not welcome in England either. After arriving here ‘wholly destitute’, hundreds of them are transported to distant countries, with which Britain has made special arrangements.

This tale of ill-fated migration sounds familiar to present-day newspaper readers. It has all the hallmarks of modern attitudes to migrants and official measures to stop them crossing the Channel or transport those who do cross, sending them to countries like Albania and Rwanda. But it happened in 1848, not the present.

In fact, it concerned lacemakers from Nottingham who had lost their jobs due to technical changes in lace production. During the 1830s thousands of them had migrated to Calais, where in 1848 they got caught up in unemployment and revolutionary disturbances. Their troubles were aggravated by a wave of Anglophobia. Many of the lacemakers wished to return to Britain. A British government enquiry was instigated. A charitable body, the Committee of Noblemen and Gentlemen for the Relief of British Workmen, Refugees from France, took up their cause and received royal support. A plan was forged to seek free passage for the lacemakers to emigrate to Australia. A public subscription raised funds to cover the expenses of the voyage. Colonial emigration commissioners relaxed regulations. Several hundred migrants left for Australia. However, on arrival there in 1849, they found little opportunity for lacemaking; the colony's economy was in recession and its labour market was overstocked. Life was hard and housing accommodation poor (in some instances worse than mud cabins). A few ended up minding sheep in the Australian outback, wishing they had never left England.

The Nottingham lacemakers were ill-fated migrants – a typical situation of immigrants who have the misfortune of arriving at a time of economic downturn, when they become a target of complaints in a receiving society.