The First Factories

25.2.3: The First Factories

The factory system was a new way of organizing labor made necessary by the development of machines, which were too large to house in a worker’s cottage and too expensive to be owned by the worker, who now labored long hours and lived under hazardous conditions in fledgling cities.

Learning Objective

Describe the effects the advent of factories had on British society

Key Points

  • The factory system was a new way of organizing labor made necessary by the development of machines, which were too large to house in a worker’s cottage and much too expensive to be owned by the worker. One of the earliest factories was John Lombe’s water-powered silk mill at Derby, operational by 1721. By 1746, an integrated brass mill was working at Warmley near Bristol. However, Richard Arkwright is credited as the brains behind the growth of factories, specifically the Derwent Valley Mills.
  • Between the 1760s and 1850, the nature of work transitioned from a craft production model to a factory-centric model. Textile factories organized workers’ lives much differently than did craft production. Handloom weavers worked at their own pace, with their own tools, within their own cottages. Factories set hours of work and the machinery within them shaped the pace of work. Factories brought workers together within one building to work on machinery that they did not own. They also increased the division of labor, narrowing the number and scope of tasks.
  • The early textile factories employed many children. In England and Scotland in 1788, two-thirds of the workers in 143 water-powered cotton mills were children. By 1835, the share of the workforce under 18 years of age in cotton mills in England and Scotland had fallen to 43%. The eventual transition of child workforce into experienced adult factory workforce helps to account for the shift away from child labor in textile factories. While child labor was common on farms and under the putting-out system, historians agree that the impact of the factory system and the Industrial Revolution generally on children was damaging.
  • Marriage during the Industrial Revolution became a sociable union between wife and husband in the laboring class. Women and men tended to marry someone from the same job, geographical location, or social group. The traditional work sphere was still dictated by the father, who controlled the pace of work for his family. However, factories and mills undermined the old patriarchal authority. Factories put husbands, wives, and children under the same conditions and authority of the manufacturer masters.
  • The factory system was partly responsible for the rise of urban living, as large numbers of workers migrated into the towns in search of employment in the factories. Until the late 19th century, it was common to work at least 12 hours a day, six days a week in most factories, but long hours were also common outside factories. The transition to industrialization was not without opposition from the workers who feared that machines would end the need for skilled labor.
  • One of the best known accounts of factory worker’s tragic living conditions during the Industrial Revolution is Friedrich Engels’ The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844. Since then, the historical debate on the question of living conditions of factory workers has been very controversial. While some have pointed out that living conditions of the poor workers slowly improved thanks to industrialization, others have concluded that in many ways workers’ living standards declined under early capitalism and improved only much later.

Key Terms

putting-out system
A means of subcontracting work, historically known also as the workshop system and the domestic system. In it, work is contracted by a central agent to subcontractors who complete the work in off-site facilities, either in their own homes or in workshops with multiple craftsmen.
spinning jenny
A multi-spindle spinning frame, one of the key developments in the industrialization of weaving during the early Industrial Revolution. It was invented in 1764 by James Hargreaves in Stanhill, Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire in England. The device reduced the amount of work needed to produce yarn, with a worker able to work eight or more spools at once.
Luddites
A group of English textile workers and self-employed weavers in the 19th century that used the destruction of machinery as a form of protest. The group was protesting the use of machinery in a “fraudulent and deceitful manner” to get around standard labor practices. They were fearful that the years they had spent learning the craft would go to waste and unskilled machine operators would rob them of their livelihood.
factory system
A method of manufacturing using machinery and division of labor, first adopted in Britain at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the late 18th century and later spread around the world. Use of machinery with the division of labor reduced the required skill level of workers and also increased the output per worker.

 

Rise of the Factory System

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, most of the workforce was employed in agriculture, either as self-employed farmers as land owners or tenants, or as landless agricultural laborers. By the time of the Industrial Revolution the putting-out system in which farmers and townspeople produced goods in their homes, often described as cottage industry, was the standard. Typical putting-out system goods included spinning and weaving. Merchant capitalists provided the raw materials, typically paid workers by the piece, and were responsible for the sale of the goods. Workers put long hours into low-productivity but labor-intensive tasks. The logistical effort in procuring and distributing raw materials and picking up finished goods were also limitations of the system.

Some early spinning and weaving machinery, such as a 40 spindle spinning jenny for about six pounds in 1792, was affordable to cottagers. Later machinery such as spinning frames, spinning mules, and power looms were expensive (especially if water-powered), giving rise to capitalist ownership of factories. Many workers, who had nothing but their labor to sell, became factory workers in the absence of any other opportunities.

The factory system was a new way of organizing labor made necessary by the development of machines, which were too large to house in a worker’s cottage and much too expensive to be owned by the worker.One of the earliest factories was John Lombe’s water-powered silk mill at Derby, operational by 1721. By 1746, an integrated brass mill was working at Warmley near Bristol. Raw material went in at one end, then smelted into brass to become pans, pins, wire, and other goods. Housing was provided for workers on site. Josiah Wedgwood in Staffordshire and Matthew Boulton at his Soho Manufactory were other prominent early industrialists, who employed the factory system. However, Richard Arkwright is credited as the brains behind the growth of factories and, specifically, the Derwent Valley Mills. After he patented his water frame in 1769, he established Cromford Mill in Derbyshire, England.

The Soho Manufactory, J. Bissett’s Magnificent Directory, 1800.

This early factory was established by the toy manufacturer Matthew Boulton and his business partner John Fothergill. In 1761, they leased a site on Handsworth Heath, containing a cottage and a water-driven metal-rolling mill. The mill was replaced by a new factory, designed and built by the Wyatt family of Lichfield, and completed in 1766. It produced a wide range of goods from buttons, buckles, and boxes to japanned ware (collectively called “toys”) and later luxury products such as silverware and ormolu (a type of gilded bronze).

Working Practices

Between the 1760s and 1850, the nature of work transitioned from a craft production model to a factory-centric model. Textile factories organized workers’ lives much differently than did craft production. Handloom weavers worked at their own pace, with their own tools, and within their own cottages. Factories set hours of work and the machinery within them shaped the pace of work. Factories brought workers together within one building to work on machinery that they did not own. They also increased the division of labor, narrowing the number and scope of tasks. The work-discipline was forcefully instilled upon the workforce by the factory owners.

The early textile factories employed many children. In England and Scotland in 1788, two-thirds of the workers in 143 water-powered cotton mills were children. Sir Robert Peel, a mill owner turned reformer, promoted the 1802 Health and Morals of Apprentices Act, which was intended to prevent pauper children from working more than 12 hours a day in mills. Children started in the mills at around the age of four, working as mule scavengers under the working machinery until they were eight. They progressed to working as little piecers until they were 15. During this time they worked 14 to 16 hours a day, often physically abused. By 1835, the share of the workforce under 18 years of age in cotton mills in England and Scotland had fallen to 43%. About half of workers in Manchester and Stockport cotton factories surveyed in 1818 and 1819 bagan work at under ten years of age. Most of the adult workers in cotton factories in mid-19th-century Britain started as child laborers. The growth of this experienced adult factory workforce helps to account for the shift away from child labor in textile factories.

Societal Impact

While child labor was common on farms and under the putting-out system, historians agree that the impact of the factory system and the Industrial Revolution on children was damaging. In the industrial districts, children tended to enter the workforce at younger ages. Many of the new factory owners preferred to employ children as they viewed them as more docile and their wages were lower (10-20% of what was paid to male adult workers, while adult women made about 25% of an adult male salary). Although most families channeled their children’s earnings into providing a better diet for them, the physical toll of working in the factories was too great and led to detrimental outcomes for children. Child laborers tended to be orphans, children of widows, or from the poorest families. Cruelty and torture was enacted on children by master-manufacturers to maintain high output or keep them awake. The children’s bodies become crooked and deformed from the work in the mills and factories.

Prior to the development of the factory system, in the traditional marriage of the laboring class, women would marry men of the same social status and marriage outside this norm was unusual. Marriage during the Industrial Revolution shifted from this tradition to a more sociable union between wife and husband in the laboring class. Women and men tended to marry someone from the same job, geographical location, or social group. The traditional work sphere was still dictated by the father, who controlled the pace of work for his family. However, factories and mills undermined the old patriarchal authority. Factories put husbands, wives, and children under the same conditions and authority of the manufacturer masters.

Factory workers typically lived within walking distance to work until the introduction of bicycles and electric street railways in the 1890s. Thus the factory system was partly responsible for the rise of urban living, as large numbers of workers migrated into the towns in search of employment in the factories. Until the late 19th century, it was common to work at least 12 hours a day, six days a week in most factories, but long hours were also common outside factories.

The transition to industrialization was not without opposition from the workers, who feared that machines would end the need for highly skilled labor. For example, a group of English workers known as Luddites formed to protest against industrialization and sometimes sabotaged factories. They continued an already established tradition of workers opposing labor-saving machinery. Numerous inventors in the textile industry, such as John Kay and Samuel Crompton, suffered harassment when developing their machines or devices. However, in other industries the transition to factory production was not so divisive.

The Leader of the Luddites, engraving of 1812, author unknown.

Although the Luddites feared above all that machines would remove the need for highly skilled labor, one misconception about the group is that they protested against the machinery itself in a vain attempt to halt progress. As a result, the term has come to mean a person opposed to industrialization, automation, computerization, or new technologies in general.

The overall impact of the factory system and the Industrial Revolution more on adults has been the subject of extensive debate among historians for over a century. Optimists have argued that industrialization brought higher wages and better living standards to most people. Pessimists have argued that these gains have been over-exaggerated, wages did not rise significantly during this period, and whatever economic gains were actually made must be offset against the worsening health and housing of the new urban sectors. Since the 1990s, many contributions to the standard of living debate has tilted towards the pessimist interpretation.

One of the best -known accounts of factory worker’s living conditions during the Industrial Revolution is Friedrich Engels’ The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844. Engels described backstreet sections of Manchester and other mill towns, where people lived in crude shanties and shacks, some not completely enclosed, some with dirt floors. These shanty towns had narrow walkways between irregularly shaped lots and dwellings. There were no sanitary facilities. Population density was extremely high. Eight to ten unrelated mill workers often shared a room with no furniture, and slept on a pile of straw or sawdust. Disease spread through a contaminated water supply.

By the late 1880s, Engels noted that the extreme poverty and lack of sanitation he wrote about in 1844 had largely disappeared. Since then, the historical debate on the question of living conditions of factory workers has remained controversial. While some have pointed out that living conditions of the poor workers were tragic everywhere and industrialization slowly improved the living standards of a steadily increasing number of workers, others concluded that living standards for the majority of the population did not grow meaningfully until the late 19th and 20th centuries and that in many ways workers’ living standards declined under early capitalism.

Attributions