The Great Western Cotton Factory was opened on a site in Barton Hill, Bristol in April 1838 [1] to spin and weave cotton into cloth. [2] The cotton processed at the factory was brought from America to the port of Liverpool and carried by water to Bristol. [3] It was the only example of a cotton mill in the south west of England, most other factories being in Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cheshire and Derbyshire. [3]
The Barton Hill district of Bristol was a rural retreat from the busy city centre up until the early nineteenth century when the digging of the Bristol Feeder Canal brought industries including the Great Western Cotton Company, keen to use the water as transport. [4]
Strong links with the cotton mills of Manchester and Liverpool were forged through a partnership between northern businessmen and sixteen other shareholders from prosperous mercantile Bristol. [2] By 1864 when the business became a limited company, two directors were Bristolian, three were from Manchester, one from Liverpool and one from Eccleshall. [4] Expert workers, many of them women, were employed directly from northern England to get production started and work the specialist machinery: [4]
A lot of the finance for new investment in Bristol in the nineteenth century was derived from profits from the Atlantic slave trade, as well as compensation paid to owners of slaves following the Slavery Abolition Act 1833. [2] Robert Bright and George Gibbs, West India merchants, Gibbs Bright & Co. were active in the slave trade and both were original shareholders in the Great Western Cotton Company [5] alongside the Manchester cotton manufacturer, Joseph Bell Clarke. Other Bristol merchants, bankers and businessmen who were shareholders of the Great Western Cotton Factory included William Edward Acraman, Alfred John Acraman, Peter Maze, Richard Ricketts, Frederick Ricketts, Henry Bush Thomas Kington the younger, Charles Pinney, Robert Edward Case, Henry Bush, Philip William Skynner Miles, George Henry Ames, Peter Freeland Aiken, James George, Daniel Cave and Joseph Cookson. [2]
Slavery compensation was used by a number of these shareholders to form initial investments in the Great Western Cotton Company. For example, Henry Bush invested some of his share of £7,247 compensation (relative value in 2014: £9,836,000 as income) [6] for the emancipation of slaves on a Barbados plantation in the Great Western Cotton Company. [7]
By the end of the nineteenth century, board members included Albert and Lewis Fry, and members of the Miles and Harford banking families. [1]
The later nineteenth century saw a wave of strikes and threatened strikes from workers across Bristol. The Great Western Cotton Works was subject to strikes in 1858, 1864, 1865, 1869, 1873, twice in 1875, 1878, 1879, 1882, 1884, 1889 and 1900, almost always regarding cuts to pay or pay increases not being in line with those in Northern England. [2]
In 1925 the company had to go into liquidation following a recession, and the building was used by the Western Viscose Silk Company until 1929. [4] In 1968 the building was demolished, [1] leaving only the remnants of the weaving sheds in the Barton Hill Trading Estate [8] on Cotton Mill Lane. [2]
Records of the Great Western Cotton Factory are held at Bristol Archives, (Ref. 13423/1-5) and (Ref. 12142).
The spinning jenny is a multi-spindle spinning frame, and was one of the key developments in the industrialization of textile manufacturing during the early Industrial Revolution. It was invented in 1764 or 1765 by James Hargreaves in Stanhill, Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire in England.
A power loom is a mechanized loom, and was one of the key developments in the industrialization of weaving during the early Industrial Revolution. The first power loom was designed in 1786 by Edmund Cartwright and first built that same year. It was refined over the next 47 years until a design by the Howard and Bullough company made the operation completely automatic. This device was designed in 1834 by James Bullough and William Kenworthy, and was named the Lancashire loom.
A cotton mill is a building that houses spinning or weaving machinery for the production of yarn or cloth from cotton, an important product during the Industrial Revolution in the development of the factory system.
Textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution in Britain was centred in south Lancashire and the towns on both sides of the Pennines. In Germany it was concentrated in the Wupper Valley, Ruhr Region and Upper Silesia, in Spain it was concentrated in Catalonia while in the United States it was in New England. The main key drivers of the Industrial Revolution were textile manufacturing, iron founding, steam power, oil drilling, the discovery of electricity and its many industrial applications, the telegraph and many others. Railroads, steam boats, the telegraph and other innovations massively increased worker productivity and raised standards of living by greatly reducing time spent during travel, transportation and communications.
Samuel Greg was a British entrepreneur of the early Industrial Revolution and a pioneer of the factory system. He built Quarry Bank Mill, which at his retirement was the largest textile mill in the country. He and his wife Hannah Greg assumed welfare responsibilities for their employees, many of whom were children, building a model village alongside the factory. At the same time, Greg inherited and operated a slave plantation in the West Indies.
Eccles is a town in Greater Manchester, England, and a part of the City of Salford. Eccles is 2.7 miles (4.3 km) west of Salford and 3.7 miles (6.0 km) west of Manchester city centre, split by the M602 motorway and bordered by the Manchester Ship Canal to the south. The town is famous for the Eccles cake.
Barton Hill is an area of Bristol, just to the east of the city centre and Bristol Temple Meads railway station.
The Amoskeag Manufacturing Company was a textile manufacturer which founded Manchester, New Hampshire, United States. From modest beginnings in near wilderness, it grew throughout the 19th century into the largest cotton textile plant in the world. At its peak, Amoskeag had 17,000 employees and around 30 buildings.
Bagley & Wright was a spinning, doubling and weaving company based in Oldham, Lancashire, England. The business, which was active from 1867 until 1924, 'caught the wave' of the cotton-boom that existed following the end of the American Civil War in 1865 and experienced rapid growth in the United Kingdom and abroad.
Curzon Mill, later known as Alger Mill was a cotton spinning mill in the Hurst district of Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester, in England. It was built between 1899 and 1902 for the Ashton Syndicate by Sydney Stott of Oldham. It was a sister mill to the Atlas Mill. It was sold to the Alger Spinning Co. Ltd in 1911, and closed in 1942. It was then used as a cigarette factory by the J.A. Pattreiouex company until 1966, and then sold to the Qualitex company for the production of artificial fibres. It was still spinning artificial fibres in the 1990s and was demolished in 1994; the site being used for a housing estate.
Waterside Mill, Ashton-under-Lyne was a combined cotton spinning weaving mill in Whitelands, Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester, England. It was built as two independent factories. The weaving sheds date from 1857; the four-storey spinning mill dates from 1863. The spinning was taken over by the Lancashire Cotton Corporation in the 1930s. Production finished in 1959. Waterside Mill was converted to electricity around 1911.
Stalybridge Mill, Stalybridge is a cotton spinning mill in Stalybridge, Tameside, Greater Manchester, England. It was built in 1868, and the engine reconfigured in around 1925. It was taken over by the Lancashire Cotton Corporation in the 1930s and passed to Courtaulds in 1964.
Monton Mill was a cotton spinning mill in Eccles, Greater Manchester, England, built in 1906. It was taken over by the Lancashire Cotton Corporation in the 1930s and passed to Courtaulds in 1964. After production ended, it was demolished and replaced with housing; its name is preserved in the street name.
Mars Mill was a former cotton spinning mill in Castleton, Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England. Castleton joined the Borough of Rochdale in 1899. Queensway, Castleton was a hub of cotton mills; Mars, Marland, and Castleton Mill were a group of three. It was taken over by the Lancashire Cotton Corporation in 1935 and passed to Courtaulds in 1964 and demolished in the 1990s; Marland survived until 2004.
Kingston Mill, Stockport is a mid nineteenth century cotton spinning mill in Edgeley, Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. It was taken over by the Lancashire Cotton Corporation in the 1930s and passed to Courtaulds in 1964. Production finished, it was made over to multiple uses.
Harle Syke mill is a weaving shed in Briercliffe on the outskirts of Burnley, Lancashire. It was built on a green field site in 1856, together with terraced houses for the workers. These formed the nucleus of the community of Harle Syke. The village expanded and six other mills were built, including Queen Street Mill.
Hannah Greg was an English diarist significant in the early Industrial Revolution. While her husband Samuel Greg pioneered new ways of running a cloth mill, she supervised the housing and conditions of the employees, including the education of the child workers. The Gregs were considered enlightened employers for the time, and though in the 1830s the apprentice system was questioned, Quarry Bank Mill maintained it until her death.
Tootal is a brand name for a range of British ties, scarves and other garments. The brand is now owned by Coats Viyella. It originates from a textile spinning and manufacturing company established in Manchester in 1799, which later became Tootal Broadhurst Lee, and subsequently Tootal Ltd. The company held patents in crease-resistant fabric.
William Atherton, was a merchant and wealthy landowner from Lancashire, England, who operated and co-owned sugar plantations in the former Colony of Jamaica. He was a slave owner, as well as an importer of slaves from Africa.
Coordinates: 51°27′10″N2°33′46″W / 51.452821°N 2.562899°W
