[1] Baines, History of Cotton Manufacture, pp. 38-43.

[2] A. Schaube, Handelsgeschichte der romanischen Völker des Mittelmeergebiets, pp. 159-160.

[3] F. Bourquelot, Etudes sur les foires de Champagne, i. 273.

[4] E. Nübling, Ulms Baumwolleveberei im Mittelaltes in Schmollers Forschunsen, Bd. IX.

[5] Ashley, Economic History, vol. i., pt. i., ch. 3. Unwin, Gilds and Companies of London, pp. 42-46.

[6] Unwin, Industrial Organisation, pp. 30-31; A. H. Johnson, History of Drapers Company, i. G. des Marez, Organisation du Travail à Bruxelles.

[7] Keutgen, Der Grosshandel im Mittelalter in Hansische Geschichtsblätter, 1901, p. 67.

[8] Unwin, Industrial Organisation, pp. 32-36.

[9] W. J. Ashley, James and Philip van Artevelde, pp. 162-163.

[10] A. Doren, Die Florentiner Wollentuchindustrie, pp. 124-242.

[11] G. des Marez, Organisation du Travail à Bruxelles, pp. 118-119, and Le Compagnannage des Chapelier Bruxellois, pp. 17-19.

[12] Bronnen tot de Geschiedenis van de Leidsche textielnijverheid, I. xxi. Ed. N. W. Posthumus.

[13] Unwin, Industrial Organisation in the 16th and 17th Centuries, pp. 52-61, 126. Commerce and Coinage in Shakespeare’s England, i., p. 330.

[14] G. Espinas, Jehan Boine Broke, Bourgeois et drapier-Douasien in Vierteljahrschrift für Social und Wirthschaftsgeschichte, vol. ii., pp. 53-70.

[15] A. Doren, Die Florentiner Wollentuchindustrie, chap. v.

[16] J. M. Lappenberg, Urkundliche Geschichte des Hansischen Stahlhofes zu London, p. 175.

[17] Acts of the Privy Council for 1550, p. 19.

[18] R. Ehrenberg, Hamburg und England, chap. iv.

[19] W. Harrison, Description of England, Book III., chap. iv.

[20] W. R. Scott, Joint Stock Companies, 1720, i., p. 88.

[21] Eliz., State Papers Domestic, cci.

[22] W. R. Scott, op. cit., i., chap. v.

[23] Memoirs of Sir T. F. Buxton, ed. by his son, 288-289.

[24] Outside the area mentioned, Glasgow and neighbourhood is the only centre in the United Kingdom where the industry is carried on to a considerable extent (Report of Committee on Textile Trades (1918), pp. 45, 49. (Cd. 9070)).

[25] Published in 1835, p. 96.

[26] Gras, The Early English Customs System (1918), pp. 119, 161, 167, 193, 222, 271, 452, 503, 554-555, 635, 647, 696. In 1507 there is an entry of cotton wolle “spowne.”

In a Chronological History of Bolton to 1873, compiled for The Bolton Chronicle, it is stated that cotton yarns were spun at Horwich in 1510.

[27] Fustians were imported into Lynn at the end of the fourteenth century, and there are many references to the import of cotton-russet in 1509 (Gras, ibid., pp. 436, 581 et seq.). In the inventory of the goods of Alexander Staney (1477) “12 yards of white osborner fustian” are mentioned (Lancashire and Cheshire Wills, Chetham Society, vol. iii., N.S.).

[28] 6 Hen. VIII., c. 9; 27 Hen. VIII., c. 12. In view of what will be said later, it may be noticed that, in the first of these statutes, regulations were laid down regarding the delivery of wool, by clothiers, for breaking, combing, carding and spinning, and the amounts of wool or yarn to be redelivered by workpeople.

[29] Baines, History of the Cotton Manufacture, p. 96.

[30] The Itinerary of John Leland, edited by Thomas Hearne (1711), vii., p. 41.

[31] 5 and 6 Edw. VI., c. 6.

[32] 2 and 3 Philip and Mary, c. 11.

[33] 4 and 5 Philip and Mary, c. 5. Ashley, Economic History (1909), vol. i., pp. 233-235. Unwin, Industrial Organisation in the XVIth and XVIIth Centuries (1904), pp. 92-93. In 1558-1559 and 1575-1576 other places were exempted, and in 1623-1624 the Act was finally repealed.

[34] 8 Eliz., c. 12.

[35] Vict. County Hist., Lancs., ii., p. 296.

[36] State Papers Domestic, Eliz., vol. iii., 38. Economic Journal, x., p. 24. According to the 1551 statute, a piece of cottons had to be 22 goads in length, 3/4 yard in breadth and 30 lbs. in weight. In 1566 the length had to be 21 goads or 20 goads at least, the same breadth as before, but only 21 lbs. in weight. In 1551 a piece of frieze had to be 36 yards in length, 3/4 yard in breadth and 48 lbs. in weight. In 1566 the length was 35 to 36 yards, the same breadth as before, but only 44 lbs. in weight.

[37] 39 Eliz., c. 20.

[38] S.P.D. Eliz., vol. cclxix. 45.

[39] 43 Eliz., c. 10.

[40] These facts are borne out in the writings of the apologists for regulation. Cf. John May, A Declaration of the Estate of Clothing now used within this Realme of England (1613).

[41] 4 Jas. I., c. 2.

[42] At the end of the sixteenth century Camden referred to Manchester as “eminent for its woollen cloth or Manchester cottons” (Britannia, Gibson’s edition (1772), ii., p. 143).

[43] 11 and 12 Wm. III., c. 20.

[44] S.P.D. Eliz., vol. ccliii. 122.

[45] Ibid., vol. cclv. 56. In 1580 the merchants and citizens of Chester petitioned that Chester might be made the only port for Manchester cottons, which petition was ultimately granted (Ibid. Add., vol. xxvi., 90. Ibid., vol. clviii. 2). In 1605 it was stated that “the most part of English cloth transported for France is made up of the coarsest wools as kerseys, cottons, and bays, serving for linings” (Ibid. Add., vol. xxxvii. 60).

[46] In the eighteenth century a writer well acquainted with Manchester manufactures still referred to cotton as wool (Infra, pp. 37-38).

[47] The Treasure of Traffike (London, 1641), pp. 32-34.

[48] W. H. Price, “On the Beginning of the Cotton Industry in England,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. xx., pp. 608-613. He quotes from London Guildhall Library, vol. Beta, Petition and Parliamentary Matters, 1620-1621, No. 16 (old No. 25). My attention was drawn to this reference by its being quoted by S. J. Chapman in V.C.H. Lancs., ii., p. 380. Mr. Price also gives a reference (State Papers Domestic, lix. 5) of the presumed date, 1610, where a petitioner asks the Earl of Salisbury for confirmation of a grant made to him for reformation of frauds daily committed in the manufacture of “bombazine cotton such as groweth in the land of Persia being no kind of wool.”

[49] See note infra, pp. 195-196.

[50] See infra, p. 197.

[51] P. 22.

[52] The fact that the writer of the pamphlet makes no mention of cotton in connection with fustians raises a speculation as to the character of the following species of new drapery. He certainly implies that it was something distinct from the “cottons” mentioned so frequently in the sixteenth century: “A sort of cloth is made called Manchester or Lancashire plaines to make cottons, which containe about a yard in breadth; these are often bought by merchants and others, which cut them to length according to a kersie, and hath them dressed and dyed in forme to a kersie, the which are not onely vented in foreign parts, but many of them vented in the Realme; which cloth proves very unprofitable in wearing” (p. 32).

[53] Pp. 33-34.

[54] Cunningham, Growth of English Industry and Commerce, ii. pp. 82-83.

[55] Smiles, The Huguenots (1870), p. 56.

[56] Ibid., p. 83.

[57] Baines, ibid., p. 99.

[58] Scott, Joint Stock Companies to 1720 (1912), i., p. 253.

[59] Calendar of State Papers Domestic, lxvi., Feb. 1, 9.

[60] Ibid., lxix. 7.

[61] Dehn, The German Cotton Industry (1913), pp. 1-2.

[62] Worthies of England (1662), ii., pp. 106-107.

[63] Infra, pp. 25, 27, 29.

[64] Baines, ibid., p. 346. Scott, ibid., ii., p. 11.

[65] Scott, ibid., pp. 323, 326, 335.

[66] Records of Fort St George, Despatches from England, 1670-1677, pp. 4, 27 et seq. Ure, Cotton Manufacture, i., p. 355, 1861 edition.

[67] S.P.D., Petition Entry Book, i., p. 96. S.P.D., Warrant Book, xxxv., p. 434.

[68] Ibid., H.O. Warrant Book, vi., p. 335.

[69] Ibid., p. 115.

[70] Ibid., Petition Entry Book, i., p. 154.

[71] Ibid., H.O. Warrant Book, vi., p. 125.

[72] Ibid., Petition Entry Book, i., p. 178.

[73] Ibid., H.O. Warrant Book, vi., p. 164. For a reference to this patent see French, Life and Times of Samuel Crompton (1859), pp. 233-234.

[74] S.P.D., Petition Entry Book, i., p. 198. It is apparent that it was much the same set of men who were interested in all Barkstead’s schemes. Another assistant in the silk-winding company appeared with Barkstead as assistant in the copper mines company. I have been unable to find any trace of the cotton company, and Professor W. R. Scott informs me that he does not think the company was actually floated even if a charter was granted. By those acquainted with the exhaustive character of Professor Scott’s work his statement will be regarded as conclusive.

[76] Scott, ibid., iii., pp. 450-452.

[75] Scott, ibid., ii., p. 152.

[77] 11 and 12 Wm. III., c. 10.

[78] Journals of the House of Commons, xiv., pp. 280, 283, 284.

[79] Ibid., xix., p. 182 et seq.

[80] 7 Geo. I., c. 7.

[81] Espinasse, Lancashire Worthies (1874), pp. 297-298.

[82] J.H.C., xix. 208.

[83] Ibid.

[84] J.H.C., xix. 295.

[85] Ibid.

[86] Ibid., xxii. 566.

[87] “I proceed to another visible increase of trade, which spreads daily among us, and affects not England only, but Scotland and Ireland also, though the consumption depends wholly upon England, and that is, the printing or painting of linen. The late Acts prohibiting the use and weaving of painted callicoes either in clothes, equipages, or house furniture, were without question aimed at improving the consumption of our woollen manufacture, and in part it had an effect that way. But the humour of the people running another way, and being used to and pleased with the light, easie, and gay dress of the callicoes, the callicoe printers fell to work to imitate those callicoes by making the same stamps and impressions, and with the same beauty of colours, upon linen, and thus they fell upon the two branches of linen called Scots cloth and Irish linen. So that this is an article wholly new in trade, and indeed the printing itself is wholly new; for it is but a few years ago since no such thing as painting or printing of linen or callicoe was known in England; all being supplied so cheap and performed so very fine in India, that nothing but a prohibition of the foreign printed callicoes could raise it up to a manufacture at home; whereas now it is so increased, that the parliament has thought it of magnitude sufficient to levy a tax upon it, and a considerable revenue is raised by it” (A Plan of the English Commerce (1728), p. 296, quoted in Baines’ Cotton Manufacture, pp. 260-261). A good brief account of the early development of calico printing in this country is given in two lectures by Edmund Potter, of Manchester, vol. iii., The Monthly Literary and Scientific Lecturer, 1852. The trade began in the neighbourhood of London in the last years of the seventeenth century and was first established in Lancashire in 1764. Shortly afterwards the first Robert Peel became interested in it and carried it on with great vigour. “Peel was to calico printing what Arkwright was to spinning.” See also Report of Committee on Manufactures, Commerce, and Shipping (1833), p. 237.

[88] J.H.C., xxii., p. 551.

[89] Ibid., pp. 566-567.

[90] 9 Geo. II., c. 4.

[91] J.H.C., xxii., pp. 589, 605. The weavers claimed to be manufacturers of worsted stuffs and stuffs made of silk and cotton.

[92] Ibid., xxii., pp. 593-595.

[93] Baines, History of the Cotton Manufacture, pp. 346-347.

[94] Quoted from Aikin’s A Description of the Country from Thirty to Forty Miles round Manchester (1795), p. 154. The description originally appeared with “A Plan of Manchester and Salford taken about 1650.” This plan was inserted in the sheet of another “Plan of the towns of Manchester and Salford,” first published in 1741, and republished with small alterations in 1746 and 1751. The 1751 plan has been reissued with Procter’s Memorials of Bygone Manchester (1880). These plans are important for our purpose as the letterpress accompanying them contains a description of Manchester and Salford from which the second quotation in the text is taken. The whole of the letterpress is given by Procter, ibid., pp. 350-356.

[95] See tables infra, pp. 67-68. In 1603, and in 1613, the Town Jury of Manchester dealt with complaints of the keeping of a Friday market in the open street for the sale of “Sackclothe, Incle-points, Garteringe, Threede, Buttons, and other Smallwares” to the prejudice of the Saturday market (Manchester Court Leet Records, vol. ii., pp. 189, 287).

[96] Republished in 1887 under the title of Manchester a Hundred Years Ago, and edited with an introduction by William E. A. Axon. A comparison of the portion of Aikin’s Manchester dealing with the trade of the town will show that this is the “printed account” from which his information was obtained. The references in the above text are to the 1887 reprint.

[97] Ogden, ibid., p. 73.

[98] Ogden, ibid., p. 78-79.

[99] Ibid., p. 81.

[100] Ibid., p. 82.

[101] Ibid., p. 74.

[102] Infra, p. 67.

[103] Ogden, ibid., p. 82.

[104] Infra, p. 67.

[105] Ogden, ibid., p. 75.

[106] Ibid., pp. 75, 77.

[107] J.H.C., pp. 76-78, 1737. In his evidence on a petition relating to linens, threads, tapes, etc., John Marriot, threadmaker, Manchester, stated that the thread manufacture in Lancashire had more than doubled during the preceding twenty-four years.

[108] Warrington was especially noted for this manufacture. In March, 1749 (J.H.C.), it was stated in evidence from Warrington that 5000 people were thus employed. In the evidence given on this occasion instances were mentioned of one manufacturer at Reading having 500 families, comprehending 2000 persons, on his books as employees. Another at Deptford had 46 looms employed and 500 poor families. See also J.H.C., xxvi., p. 781, 1754. Three principal hosiers at Nottingham had 100 frames each. For evidence as to manufacture of sail-cloth at Warrington, see also Aikin, Manchester, p. 302; Pococke, Travels Through England, i., p. 9.

[109] Ogden, ibid., p. 74.

[110] By Ure and Espinasse definitely, by Baines more cautiously. Ure, Cotton Manufacture, i., p. 223. Espinasse, Lancashire Worthies, p. 415. Baines, ibid., pp. 101, 322.

[111] Ogden, ibid., pp. 78-79. After referring to various goods produced in Manchester, certainly before 1770, he proceeds: “To these succeeded washing hollands all cotton in the warp which were a good article with the housewives, till yarn was mixed with the warp and ruined their character.” He also refers to the manufacture of cotton goods for the African trade. The statements of the other writers are, of course, based upon the fact that it was difficult to spin a cotton thread suitable for warp with the existing appliances. Even so, cotton goods were made in other countries, and cotton yarn was imported. As regards the use of the word “yarn” in the eighteenth century in England, it was not often used with reference to cotton, but usually to linen yarn. Cf. Ogden, ibid., p. 92: “If cotton comes down to a reasonable price, the warps made of this twist would be as cheap as those made of yarn, and keep the money here which was sent abroad for that article, there being no comparison between yarn and cotton warps for goodness.”

[112] J.H.C., xvii., p. 377.

[113] Ibid., xvi., pp. 311-324, 509-511.

[114] Hollingworth, Mancuniensis, Willis’s Edition (1839), p. 28. In the introduction to this edition the following facts are given of the author:—Richard Hollingworth was a Fellow of Christ College, Manchester, and died on 11th November 1656, in Manchester, after being imprisoned and deprived of the income arising from his fellowship in consequence of the breaking up of the collegiate body by Colonel Thomas Birch of Birch Hall, near Manchester, acting under the command of the Committee of Sequestration. In the Chetham Library there are two manuscript copies, and in both the date is given as 1120, but in one it is corrected “a mistake for 1520 about 12 H. 8,” a correction which is obviously justified.

[115] 33 Henry VIII., c. xv., quoted by Baines, ibid., pp. 92-93.

[116] 5 and 6 Edward VI., c. 7.

[117] S.P.D. Eliz., vol. cxvii. 38, quoted Economic Journal, x., p. 23.

[118] In 1578 the will of James Rillston, of Manchester, “cotton man,” was proved at Chester. Evidently he was in partnership with his cousin, who resided in London, to whom he used to send “packs” of cottons, worth £11, 11s. each. He owned “houses, shoppes, chambers, and warehouses” in Deansgate. One of his sons became a citizen and grocer of London, and married the eldest daughter of Richard Tipping, Linen Draper of Manchester. In the will of Edward Hanson, mercer and grocer of Manchester (1584), the statement appears that “Wm Napton, Wm Woodcocke, and Thos Sawell citizens and grocers of London oweth me for six packs of cottons at 10l. xvs. a pack the sum of 64l. 10s.” Mr. Hanson was Boroughreeve of Manchester in 1569 (Manchester Court Leet Records, vol. i., pp. 203-204, 245).

[119] Lancashire and Cheshire Wills, Chetham Society, New Series, vol. iii.

[120] Lancashire and Cheshire Wills, ibid., N.S., vol. xxviii., pp. 15 et seq. If the sum mentioned were not raised the £500 had to be put out at eight per cent. interest for ten years, and of the annual £40 thus raised, £5 had to be used for repairing the Parish church of Manchester, £5 to be devoted to the support of poor scholars of the free schools in Manchester, Middleton or Rochdale going to either university, £10 to the maintenance of bridges and highways in the Parish of Manchester, £10 to fuel and apparel for the poor of Manchester and Salford, £5 to the poor of Rochdale, and £5 to poor folks next of kin to the testator and to his wife. At the end of the ten years the £500 had to go to his children.

[121] Ibid., p. 35.

[122] Lancashire and Cheshire Wills, ibid., p. 24.

[123] Ibid., p. 15 et seq.

Cloth at Home and Abroad

	£	s.	d.			£	s.	d.
70 pieces of broad Whites ready dressed at 45s. a piece	157	10	0		At Robt. Bowker’s: 46 broad Whites at 46s. 8d. a piece	107	6	8
38 Graies at 30s. a piece	57	0	0		34 Graies at 30s. a piece	51	0	0
13 Cottons at 32s. a piece	20	16	0		At Roger Nayden’s Mylne:
1 Black Cotton	1	10	0		30 Graies at 30s. a piece	45	0	0
12 pieces Rett (?) canvas	10	10	0		At Wm. Wardleworth’s Mylne:
					6 Cottons and one Graie	10	10	0
					At Jno. Heywood’s Mylne:
					7 Graies at 30s. a piece	10	10	0
	£247	6	0			£224	6	8

[124] Raines and Sutton, Life of Humphrey Chetham, Chetham Society, N.S., vol. xlix.

[125] Ibid., pp. 8-11.

[126] Ibid., p. 11.

[127] Ibid., pp. 12, 21-22.

[128] Ibid., p. 7. This system of having a branch in Manchester and one in London was apparently customary at the time. It seems to have obtained in the case of William Mosier, mentioned above. Cf. ante, p. 32, note.

[129] Ibid., pp. 14-15.

[130] Raines and Sutton, Life of Humphrey Chetham, pp. 8-15, 123-124. Chetham employed people in Manchester, Ashton, Hollinwood, Eccles and other places.

[131] Ibid., p. 30.

[132] Cf. Unwin, Industrial Organisation in the XVIth and XVIIth Centuries, pp. 235-236, where a classification of clothiers is given from a State document, 1615.