Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

For this reason various entrepreneurs started to experiment with mechanisation. In
the mid-eighteenth century Edward Holmes, needlemaker, appears to have been using
Washford water-mill in Studley, which may have been harnessed for needle scouring as
early as 1730 by Simon Milward. 257
At about the same time it is said that Forge Mill in
Redditch began to be utilised for making needles after its bar-iron production had
ceased. 258
This would explain the increased concentration of needlers in Redditch in the
latter part of this period. Other needlemakers, such as Richard Mills and Robert Walker,
both of Sambourne, had mill-houses, but these appear to have contained horse-driven
mills. Although Richard Mills’ needlemaking equipment totalled less than £5, he was
obviously running a substantial operation with a pointing-mill, scouring-benches,
straightening-rings, and other tools for various processes. 259
Horse-mills apparently predated
water-power in the needle industry, perhaps starting as early as 1700. 260
The
Tolley family of Middletown in Sambourne is said to have used a horse-mill in this
period and to have concentrated several workers in a proto-factory. 261
Both Mills and
Tolley may have employed more than the usual ‘fistful of apprentices’ typical of family
manufacturing businesses at the time, but most needlemaking was probably still carried
out within a family’s cottage workshop. 262
257 N. Land, The History of Redditch and the Locality, (Studley, Brewin, 1986), p. 35.
258 Land, The History of Redditch and the Locality, p. 36. Forge Mill now houses the National Needle
Museum. Other people who may have used water-power at this time include George Hanson of
Feckenham who appears to have been a miller and needlemaker. Rollins, The Needle Mills, pp. 10-11,
also discusses John Archer of Alcester who geared up mills for needlemaking in this zone.
259 WoRO, probate of Richard Mills, Sambourne, (Coughton), needlemaker, 1748, £659-14-4, and of
Robert Walker, Sambourne, (Coughton), needlemaker, 1727, £300-8-9½.
260 VCH Warwickshire, ii, pp. 234-5, states that the Biddell/Biddle family in Sambourne was the first to use
a horse-gin for needlemaking c. 1700. Bartleet and Woodward in Timmins, Birmingham and the Midland
Hardware District, p. 198, refer to a needlemaking horse-mill in Studley in 1700.
261 Redditch Indicator 22 Dec. 1860, Hemming’s article on the history of the needle industry mentions the
Tolleys’ workshop and horse-mill. There is also evidence that the Tolleys provided employment for poor
parish apprentices in the next period.
262 The ‘fistful of apprentices’ is a quotation from R. Porter, English Society in the Eighteenth Century,
(London, Penguin, 1990), p. 214.
302