Curious Conversations: Henry Mayhew and the Street-Sellers in the Media Ecology of London Labour and the London Poor

Abstract

Abstract Henry Mayhew is renowned as the chronicler and historian of London street-sellers and poor labourers. However, Mayhew’s relationships with his subjects, and their influence on the development of London Labour and the London Poor, is less often discussed. This article examines Mayhew’s productive and disruptive friendships, collaborations, and disagreements with the London poor, and situates these exchanges within the layered print and oral texts that comprise the extensive media ecology of London Labour. I argue that through their disruptive collaborations with Mayhew, some street-sellers, including Charles Alloway, memorialized as ‘The Crippled Street-Seller of Nut-Meg Graters’, strategically harnessed the media forms of London Labour for profitable self-representation. In contrast, a group of street-sellers known as the Street Traders’ Protection Association mobilized against Mayhew and critiqued his representations of their class. These disruptive collaborations reveal underlying kinships and conflicts between Mayhew and the street-folk, thus destabilizing his reputation as a neutral and authoritative observer in the history of poverty.