7 Unusual Victorian Occupations

Victorian cities were plagued by rats. They consumed food supplies, damaged property and spread disease, making skilled rat catchers an essential part of urban life. Armed with traps, ferrets and specially trained terriers, these professionals hunted thousands of rodents in warehouses, factories, docks and private homes.

Some rat catchers became minor celebrities, demonstrating their dogs' abilities before paying audiences or supplying rats for sporting events. Although unpleasant and often dangerous work, successful rat catchers earned a respectable living while helping keep rapidly growing cities under control.

Long before alarm clocks became affordable, thousands of workers relied upon a human alarm service. Known as Knocker-Ups, these early morning professionals walked the streets before dawn carrying long bamboo poles or pea shooters.

For a small weekly fee they tapped bedroom windows until their clients were awake. Accuracy and reliability were essential, as missing the morning shift could cost a factory worker an entire day's wages. Some Knocker-Ups became so well known that families trusted them for decades, continuing the occupation well into the twentieth century before inexpensive alarm clocks finally replaced them.

Perhaps the strangest occupation on this list belonged to the Pure Finders. Their job was to collect dog droppings from city streets and sell them to leather tanneries.

Known simply as "pure", the material contained chemicals valuable for softening leather during the tanning process. It was unpleasant work requiring hours of searching through busy streets with little more than a bucket and shovel. Yet demand from the leather industry ensured that even this seemingly worthless material had commercial value. It serves as a remarkable reminder that Victorian cities found economic use for almost everything.

Before modern drainage and paved roads, many busy streets became muddy rivers whenever it rained. Crossing Sweepers earned a living by clearing narrow pathways across the mud so ladies, businessmen and visitors could cross without ruining their boots and clothing.

Armed with little more than a broom, they worked at busy intersections, politely requesting small coins from grateful pedestrians. Many were elderly people, injured labourers or children with few other employment opportunities. Charles Dickens frequently included Crossing Sweepers in his novels, reflecting their familiar presence throughout Victorian London.

Few occupations generated as much public outrage as the Resurrectionists, commonly known as body snatchers. During the early nineteenth century, medical schools desperately needed human bodies for anatomical study, but legal supplies were limited.

Some criminals recognised a profitable opportunity. Under cover of darkness they secretly exhumed recently buried bodies before selling them to medical institutions. Their activities terrified grieving families and prompted many cemeteries to install watch houses, iron coffin cages and armed guards.

Public outrage eventually contributed to changes in the law, providing legitimate sources of cadavers for medical education and bringing the notorious trade to an end.

At low tide, the muddy banks of the River Thames became a workplace for the Mudlarks. Often among the poorest members of society, they searched the exposed riverbed for anything that could be sold: coal, rope, nails, copper, discarded tools and countless other objects washed into the river.

The work was physically exhausting and frequently dangerous. Sharp metal, polluted water and unpredictable tides posed constant risks. Yet for many families, Mudlarking represented the difference between eating and going hungry.

Today, licensed Mudlarks still search the Thames, although they now uncover historical artefacts rather than simply trying to survive.

During much of the Victorian period, leeches were widely used in medicine for bloodletting and other treatments. Supplying this demand required Leech Collectors to gather the creatures from ponds and marshes.

Some collectors waded barefoot into shallow water, allowing hungry leeches to attach themselves before carefully removing and storing them for sale. It was slow, uncomfortable work that often left collectors with numerous bites and occasional infections.

Although modern medicine has abandoned many Victorian treatments, medical leeches are still used in certain specialised surgical procedures today, making this one of the few occupations on this list that survives in a highly specialised form.