Nail making was a cottage industry in Gornal during the 18th and 19th centuries, as it was with several surrounding areas of the Black Country.
This was a hard existence and women and children laboured in small cramped workshops adjoined or adjacent to their dwellings with very little pay making the iron nails, whilst the Iron Masters grew wealthy.
The nailers of the area were exploited by the 'Foggers' - agents of the Iron Masters, who would supply the raw materials on credit, and collect their nails, often payment was in the form of tokens or 'checks' with which they could exchange for food and drink.
Poverty, poor moral and social conditions were a normal way of life for these folk.

A Parliamentary report 1843 from the Mining Commission describes conditions in the South Staffordshire Coal Field.
Although the report is centred on mining, it does touch upon the nailing industry, of which Lower Gornal took no small part.

James Boydell, managing partner of the Oak Farm Company's works, gives an account of Lower Gornals nailers.

He goes on to say....

Boydell obviously had a disdain for the 'Foggers' (middlemen)....

The nailers of Lower Gornal were gradually moving to other occupations during the later part of the 19th Century.
The Census shows that in 1881 there were around 500 folk from Lower Gornal who gave their occupation as part of the nail trade, ten years later this had decreased to 200 and by the turn of that Century, there were just 27 still working as nail makers.