Matthew Reed - ran away to sea
Many unhappy apprentices ran away to sea or joined the army but fared no better in later life. Matthew Reed ran away from an apprenticeship at the Davison and Hawksley mill in Arnold, Nottinghamshire to go to sea. This image shows the cottages where the apprentices lived whilst working at the Davison and Hawksley mill in Arnold (reference: DD/250/3).
He eventually ended up blind aged 63 and in a hospital in Greenwich with a wife to support and his original parish of settlement at Arnold was asked to take them back and pay their expenses (reference: PR/2,641 - within the Overseers' account book for Arnold).
See the removal order for Matthew Reed in more detail here [PDF 1299KB] 
See a transcript of the removal order here [PDF 20KB] 
The Master took a risk too in taking on an apprentice as there was no guarantee that the child would be a good or hard worker. In the eighteenth century a series of engravings called "Industry and Idleness" by William Hogarth showed the different outcome of the lives of an idle apprentice and an industrious apprentice with the former being eventually hanged for murder and the latter being made Sheriff and then Lord Mayor of London. The second sketch in the series shows the idle apprentice after he has been turned away by his master and sent to sea. His useless apprenticeship indenture has been thrown into the water beside the boat and he has disappointed his mother by his actions.
