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Before the Industrial Revolution, most textiles were produced in the home, the "Domestic System". This was very important to the British textiles industry before the age of the factory. Almost two million pounds of raw cotton was imported into Britain in 1701, to be used in the cottages of hand-spinners and handloom weavers. Much of a family's production of textiles often provided a much needed additional income, and was typically combined with farming. Women, children and older members of the household would contribute, particularly in carding and spinning. When the men and older boys had finished their farming activities, they would undertake the tasks such as warping, sizing, drying and weaving the warp into cloth, the materials used usually cotton, wool, flax and silk. English cotton cloth made in the early 16th - 17th centuries was usually mixed with linen (fustian) or worsted yarn, but by the mid-1700s pure cotton cloths were being produced. Once the woven cloth had been produced, the household would sell their wares, or "pieces", to travelling clothiers - "chapmen" - who would bring their packhorse trains through the villages, taking the cloth on to market, to be sold at home (especially in the south of England) and abroad. Cloth pieces were often taken to "Piece Halls" - a good example being the large Halifax Piece Hall built in 1779. The Textile Industry before 1760 Wool was the major British textile industry throughout the Middle Ages. This was supplemented by linen, woven from flax which was both home grown and imported from Ireland; and to a lesser extent, hemp which was woven into canvas for sacking and some coarse clothing. As Wadsworth and de Lacy Mann (1963) point out '...commercial history and industrial organization of cotton cannot be separated from those of wool and linen...' This is especially true since the term 'cotton' was used in England from the 15th-17th centuries to describe a certain type of weave not a fibre or a fabric. Therefore during this time 'cotton' was a woollen fabric with a raised nap. "...the explanation of the word cotton may lie in the fact that it had also the sense of nap or down, and the process of raising the nap of woollen cloths was called 'cottoning' or 'frizzing' [frizes] ...at the end of the 16th century Manchester was 'eminent for its woollen cloth or Manchester cottons'...." (Montgomery, Florence. Textiles in America 1650-1870) In the Middle Ages the major textile area of England was East Anglia which was renowned for its woollen industry. At that time, Lancashire woollen cloths were regarded as inferior and 'somewhat shoddy'; although by Tudor times Manchester was gaining a reputation for 'small wares' (garters, laces, ribbons, thread, tapes and caps). During the 1320s, Edward III, who had a keen economic sense, realized that it would be more profitable if English exporters could sell woollen cloth as well as, or instead of, woollen yarn. English weaving skills did not, however, match those of European countries. Flemish weavers (from Flanders in Belgium) were held in particularly high regard and around 1330 Edward III invited a number of them to settle in England. Most of the Flemish immigrants stayed in East Anglia but some made their way to the Manchester area of Lancashire. In the latter part of the 1500s the descendants of the Flemish weavers who had settled in England were joined by Dutch and Walloon immigrants who were skilled in making fustian (a mix of linen and cotton). Before 1700 spinning and weaving of textiles (wool, flax and hemp) was a cottage industry. However the Flemings and Walloons were also skilled in weaving silk and it was with silk fabric production that the factory system started which would provide the basis for the cotton mills. The first textile mill was built in 1702 at Derby to produce silk fabric, but the technology was inadequate and the mill failed. One of those thrown out of work was an astute young engineer named John Lombe. John Lombe knew that the Italians had had efficient and effective water powered silk mills since the 1200s; and he determined that England should have the necessary technology to build a successful silk industry. He made his plans and sailed to Italy where he managed to obtain work at a silk mill in Piedmont. He worked hard and diligently. After a while he gained the trust of workmates and he was allowed to operate the water-powered machinery. Secretly he began to draw plans of the machines which he smuggled out of Italy in bales of silk shipped from Livorno to his half brother, Thomas Lombe, in England. Eventually the Italians became suspicious but John Lombe had completed his mission and returned hurriedly to England. Once home he built replicas of the water-powered machinery which he patented in 1718. In the meantime Thomas Lombe had built a new silk mill in Derby. The brothers began operations in 1719 and the mill proved to be a hugely successful venture. The Italians were furious and curbed silk yarn exports to England. Legend says that a beautiful young Italian lady secretly visited John Lombe in Derby and poisoned him in revenge for the act of industrial espionage which he had committed. Whatever the truth, John Lombe was dead by 1721 at the early age of 29. Thomas Lombe continued to run the silk mill until 1732 when he applied to Parliament for a renewal of the patent for the water powered machinery. This was not granted because it was felt that the monopoly was unfair, but Thomas Lombe was handsomely compensated. Other silk mills were built in the 1730s and 1740s in Macclesfield, Stockport, Chesterfield, Derby and Manchester. The industry expanded rapidly and by 1770 there were a dozen silk mills in Stockport alone. The water frame and the spinning jenny (invented by Thomas Highs in the early 1760s, and later improved and patented by Richard Arkwright and James Hargreaves respectively) were closely based on the water-powered machines, the plans for which John Lombe had smuggled out of Italy and paid for with his life. NR View the Before the factory collection to find out more > |
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