Was it just boys that were sent up chimneys in Victorian times?

Small boys between the ages of 5 and 10 are sought to clamber up chimneys to clean out deposits of soot. Some of the chimneys are extremely narrow, perhaps only 18 centimetres (7 inches) square, and you may be reluctant at first to wriggle into them. However, plenty of encouragement is provided - by a lighted straw held beneath your feet or by pins stuck into you. You may suffer some cuts, grazes and bruises at first, but months of suffering will toughen up your skin to a leather-like quality.

Sweeps have other things to look forward to - twisted spines and kneecaps, deformed ankles, eye inflammations and respiratory illnesses. The first known industrial disease - 'chimney sweep's cancer' - appears in the testicles from the constant irritation of the soot on naked skin. Many sweeps are maimed or killed after falling or being badly burned, while others suffocate when they became trapped in the curves of the chimneys.

Although you will officially be apprenticed as a chimney sweep, there really is no work of any value to be had at the end of your years of training - despite your poor diet, you will have grown too large to be of any use.