Household Words and the Smithfield Controversy

Abstract

Victorians Journal 31 Household Words mio the Smithfield Controversy by Ronald Morrison Animals, so often invested with powerful and complex symbolic significance, remained present in a literal sense for Victorian writers in ways that are not entirely imaginable for twenty-first-century readers. Animals are omnipresent in Dickens’s fiction andjoumalism, just as they were omnipresent in Victorian culture, from the countryside to the very heart of the London metropolis. Why Dickens expressed concern for animals’ suffering remains open to speculation, although an initial answer is that animals provide an index of human suffering and, more abstractly, for the Condition of England. Through his dual roles as writer for and editor of Household Words, Dickens actively engaged with the humane—specifically, animal rights—issues marking the mid-Victorian era. This analysis is based on a series of articles from the early 1850s advocating the relocation of London’s Smithfield Market from the old City to the suburbs. Scholars of Dickens’s journalism often categorize these articles under the general heading of “sanitary reform,” since his treatment of Smithfield includes dire warnings about contagious diseases spreading through London sewers because of the offal dumped from the surrounding market. But these articles, written by Dickens and others in the first few volumes ofHousehold Words (HW), reveal that concern for the humane treatment of animals had become mainstream by mid­ nineteenth century, a position that both reflected and shaped middle-class readers’ sensibilities. In certain respects, //IT’s humane ideology expresses many of the common elements marking Victorian discourse about animals: the policing of the poor, the enforcement of middle-class values, and the exploitation of the symbolic value ofanimals to promote British superiority. In addition, these articles challenge some key elements of humane ideology and use the specter of international competition and generalized fears ofsocial degeneration to argue for the relocation of Smithfield, suggesting a more general reconsideration of humans’ interaction with animals. Dickens’s attitudes toward animals are difficult to characterize. In his history ofthe RSPCA, Arthur Moss claims Dickens was “a member and a great supporter” of the organization (46) but offers little evidence to bolster the claim. In 1864, the RSPCA invited him to speak at its meeting in Rochester; while politely declining the offer due to a busy schedule, Dickens notes: “I have a high opinion of the Society you represent, and believe that it does a great deal of good” {Letters 10: 359). Nevertheless, it seems likely that Dickens would remain suspicious of an organization classified by Henry Mayhew as a “Repressive and Punitive” agency targeting the poor and working classes (xxxiv). Regardless of the exact nature or degree of Dickens’s support for the RSPCA or other humane organizations, it was impossible for a writer attuned to both popular culture and the history of reform 32 Victorians Journal legislation in England to remain unaware of attempts to craft animal protection legislation, as well as the high profile activities ofthe RSPCA and its leaders. Like other Londoners, Dickens was aware of the problems created by Smithfield Market.1 A popular tourist attraction that posed certain threats to its residents, Smithfield appears with some regularity in his fiction and journalism, which echo complaints expressed in other HW articles.1 2 It was in the late 1840s and early 1850s that concerns over Smithfield came to a head. Reformers grew increasingly distressed over the noisy, bloody spectacle of the sprawling market and surrounding slaughterhouses, concerns expressed both as abstract moral arguments and as calls for specific reforms addressing economic and sanitary issues. Reformers argued that the “Capital ofthe World” was no place for such an establishment and advocated the creation ofa new market in the suburbs. Conservative voices, in contrast, vigorously defended Smithfield as a venerable cultural institution dating back to the Middle Ages, a powerful symbol ofEnglish superiority over its imperial rivals—particularly the French, whose diet and morals attracted British scorn. During this period, in his capacity as editor of HW, Dickens published several articles, one of which he authored in its entirety and another that he co-authored; both raised troubling questions about cruelty to animals under the existing market system and called for Smithfield’s...