Night-soil men in Georgian London manually removed human waste from cesspits between midnight and 5am. Working in teams, a holeman would descend into the pit and shovel waste into tubs, while a ropeman pulled the tubs up for tubmen to empty into a cart. They were paid two to three times more than skilled laborers due to the difficult and unpleasant work. The waste was transported to farms outside London to be used as fertilizer or sold, with demand and prices high. However, as London grew and removal costs increased, waste accumulated in poorer areas.

1. Night-Soil Men, the Human Waste Collectors of Georgian
London
Sewer lines would not be laid in London until the mid-19th century, and the stench of rotting
garbage permeated the streets, even the best parts of town. A system to remove the enormous
amount of human waste that accumulated daily had to be organized. In those days the polite term
for human excreta was night soil, which was removed manually and used as manure or fertilizer. The
men who removed the waste were known as night-soil men. These men, who were near the top of
London's scavengers, worked as independent contractors.Human Waste Removal in Georgian
London
Night-soil men carted human, animal, and household waste in buckets from the back yards of
houses, and private and public cesspits, and transported the waste to the country. The men were
allowed to work only between midnight and five a.m. They arrived with a cart, and worked in teams
of four, consisting of a holeman, ropeman, and two tubmen. The team of men announced their
arrival by ringing a bell, which they hand carried. If the privy was located in a narrow back yard, and
if the only access the night men had was through the front door, they would have to carry out their
work through the house. The men carried their lanters and equipment to the entrance of the cesspit.
The holeman would descend first. He would go down a few feet into the pit, loosen the sludge, and
shovel it into a tub. A ropeman would then raise the filled tub, and the two tubemen would empty the
tubs into a waiting cart. As he emptied the cesspit, the holeman would descend further down the
hole. Pulling up the tubs, the ropeman would be careful not to spill too much waste. As the work
progressed, the tubmen could easily carry over 100 pounds of sewage. The men would lower a
ladder down the increasingly empty cesspit, and the process would be repeated, with the holeman
descending the ladder again and again, the ropeman pulling up the waste, and tubmen carrying out
oil recycling the sludge, until the waste was removed.

2. The Wages Made by Night-soil Men
Night-soil men were compensated for their hard and
unappealing labor by earning a wage that was two to
three times the salary of a skilled man. As the city
grew and expanded, and the distance that night-soil
men had to travel to remove the wastes increased,
their prices soared. Soon, the night-soil men were
charging a shilling per cesspool. This amount often
represented a poor working man's, woman's or child's
wage for a week. With the cost of night-soil removal becoming prohibitive, human waste began to
accumulate in the poorer sections of London.
Recycling Human Waste in Georgian London
As mentioned before, the night-soil men would cart the waste to farms outside the city. Demand for
this waste was high by farmers, who spread the manure over their farmland. Night-soil was graded
for its quality, and farmers would pay an average of 12 ½ p for the manure. Purchase of human
excrement ceased in 1870 when guano, or bird droppings, was imported cheaply from South
America.
Sources
Johnson, Steven. The Ghost Map: the story of London's most terrifying epidemic - and how it
changed science, cities, and the modern world. p. 1-10. Web. 17 April. 2010
Honey Pot Men of South Stockton. Online Articles, Commentaries, Papers. Web. 17 April. 2010