Dewsbury Kills
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DEWSBURY KILLS Chapter VOIUME I I Page VI THE MILLS, 1831-1893 '438 VII PRODUCTIVE CAPACITY, 1834-1878 474 VIII FINANCE, 1832-1892 506 IX THE BLANKET TRADE, 1832-1863 571 i The Structure of the Industry 572 il The Foreign Trade 578 i i i The Home Trade 662 iv Government Contracting 703 X WOOL BUYING, 1832-1862 731 XI GOVERNMENT CONTRACT Li G AND THE LONDON AGENCY, 1863-1893 781 XII THOMAS COOK, 1787-1861 808 BIBLIOGRAPHY 838 7Î/ÜI CHAPTER VI 438 CHAPTER VI The M ills , 1851-95 The expansion of physical capacity rt Dewsbury Mills in the nineteenth century was mainly concentrated in the years 1844-75, w ith the major building a c tiv ity occurring in the mid-1340s, the la te 18503, the second h a lf of the 1860s, and the e a rly 1870s. Of the six plans appended to th is chapter, four illustrate the physical growth of the mill buildings on the Dewsbury M ills Estate and these are based on Thorp’ s map of the Dewsbury district published in 1331; on the 1851 Ordnance Survey map of the area which firs t appeared in 1854; on evidence drawn from Hagues, Coolc and Wormald* s private ledgers relating to the period 1865-75; and upon a plan of the Estate made for the partners in 1890 by Marriott, Son and Shaw, surveyors o f Dewsbury. The two ad d ition al plans re la te to Ratcliffo Mills, built in 1873 on a site, two acres in extent, a little to the south of the original Estate and adjacent to the Calderj and to Britannia Mills, covering an area of about five acres, situated in ’the Aldams' in the town of Dewsbury and also abutting on the Calder, which were bought in 1880 and (1) adapted and brought into U3e by the partners in 1881. (1 ) The ’ Aldams’ appears on ea rly maps of Dewsbury as ’ Annams' or ’Avenams’ . The name refers to one of the earliest of Dewsbury's enclosed fields which was recorded as such in the mid-fourteenth century. 439 The partners were experiencing a shortage of productive (1 ) capacity in the middle of the 1830s and particularly in 1836. A number of new mills were erected in the Dewsbury area during (2) the years 1835-7 in response to the market opportunities of the times, but Thomas Cook seems to have been very pessimistic about the long-run prospects of a high demand for Yorkshire (3) blankets in the American market. Furthermore, Cook was influenced by the fact that it was more difficult for the large manufacturer to compete with the small clothiers during times of trade depression if the former had added to his physical caoacitv during the boom, thereby increasing the burden of his C 4) fix e d costs when the market turned downwards. The partners \ seem to have been influenced by these fa c to rs when making the decisions necessary to adapt the firm to the changes in the market environment of the mid-1830s, and in the face o f a good deal of uncertainty they seem to have decided that flexib ility (5 ) of investment was the desirable object. To meet the pressure (1) See below, p. 6$5 . (2) ’ ... the new mills built since 1835 add one-fourth to the productive power of our tra d e .’ Thos. Cook to C.H. Russell, New York, 7 A p ril 1839. (3) See above, p. W-16 . (4) See below, p. 57W-. (5) For a useful discussion of ’flexib ility’ in investment decisions, see Koirstead, op. cit., chaps, iii and iv. 440 of demand, therefore, the partners resorted to three principal means of enlarging their production. They purchased blankets, either in the finished or the unfinished state, at Heckmondwike market and in the Leeds cloth h a lls ; they put out wool fo r spinning and yam for weaving to nearby m ills; and they took out a short lease on part of the nremises at Aldams M ill where (1 ) they employed a number o f hand-loom weavers. By these different means the partners avoided the risks of a large fixed investment at Dewsbury Mills during the 1830s and were able to postpone this kind of growth until the middle of the 'fo r t ie s . In view o f the depression which affected the industry from 1837 to 1842 the actions of the partners would appear to have been prudent, fo r any enlargement of the mills during the boom years of 1835-6 would certainly have resu lted in an embarrassment of excess capacity in the late 'thirties and early 'forties. Two other considerations seem to have contributed to the cautious decisions regarding capacity taken by the partners in the 'thirties. The partner ship was weakened by the death o f John Hague Senior in 1832, Cl) The former owners of Aldams Mill - the Hallileys - failed during the depression of 1834 and th is M ill wax put up for auction in June 1835, but no sale was effected. Cook and hi3 partners obtained a lease on part of the premises which they held until the summer of 1840. They also bought some of the hand-looms at the sale of e ffe c ts . See be lav, p. u-M-3 • 441 whose experience and wide knowledge of financial and mercantile affairs had been a great asset to his associates. This threw more of the entrepreneurial functions on to the shoulders of Thomas Cook who, with hi3 ea rly train in g as a merchant, mas particularly reluctant to commit himself or his partners to large fix ed investments. The second consideration stems from the relationship between the partners and the proprietors of the M ills and the nature of the tenancy agreement which existed between the two p a rti0 3. Landlord and Tenant The agreement which was operative at this time wa3 one which had been signed in 1824 providing the partners with a twenty-one years' lease of the land, premises and water power on the Estate at an annual rent of £1,600, of which sum the partners recouped £525 yearly from their under-tenants. The enlargement of existing buildings and the erection of new premises raised a number of problems for both parties. Such expansion could only be undertaken either directly by the proprietors or indorectly by the partners with the permission of the proprietors. Before the proprietors could undertake the finance of such building they had to satisfy themselves that further investment in this type of earning asset was likely to prove profitable by comparison with other forms of investment; that, having enlarged the fixed capital, the future prospects of obtaining an economic rent from the existing tenants or from new tenants were good; and that a tenancy agreement of suitable time-length duration could be negotiated. Prom the point of view of the partners, the provision of new buildings at their own expense, whilst it enabled them to plan their m ill arrangements to suit their particular mode of operations, involved them in the difficu lty CD of adding to the fixed capital stock of the proprietors; introduced long-term capital risks which were not always compatible with the partnership form of economic organisation; and placed them in a weak bargaining position at times when the tenancy agreement was being renewed. Th©3e risks, and the fact that the lease agreement of 1824 had s till 3ome years to run, probably contributed to the attitude adopted by the partners towards m ill expansion in the 'thirties. By the early 'forties, however, the picture had changed; the lease was now running out and the sale of Aldams M ill in 1840 had terminated the use by the Cl) 7/hether this particular ri3k could bo mitigated depended upon the n egotiation of a 'c a p ita l loss clause' in the tenancy agreement. Se<* below, p.vt-£l* 443 ( 1) partners of part of this particular property. Thomas Cook seem3 to haiTe beTi determined, at this time, to experiment with power weaving at Dewsbury M ills and this necessitated the erection of a new weaving shed and some improvement in the functioning of the water wheels in order to provide more C 2) driving power. In 1842 the partners had some preliminary discussions with the proprietors in respect of a renewal of ( 1) The partners built, at their own expense, a small ’weaving chamber to accommodate the hand-loom weavers displaced from Aldams M ill in 1840. A contemporary poster advert ising the sale of Aldams M ill in this yoar refers to the premises as constituting ’ one of the most complete Woollen Manufactories in the North of rhgland’ and the detailed description contains the following sentence: ’All that extensive Carding, Scribbling and Pulling Mill, called Aldams Mill, consisting of a Mill, sixty yards long by thirteen yards wide, and three stories high - with Counting House, three large Warehouses, Press Shops, Wool Chambers, Weaving Shops, ligh ted with Gas and heated by Steam, Y/ool and Piece drying house, heated by steam, Dyeing house, cistern , Gas House, Steam Engine of f i f t y horse power, with b o ile rs , shafts and going gear, five Willies, Fourteen Scribblers, Six single end five double Carders, Fourteen B illies, Two Tommies, Two Mules, three Raising Gig3, Ten Fulling Stocks, Three Rag Machines and one Washing Machine, and other machinery . ’ From a poster in the possession of the Librarian, Dewsbury Public Library.