The Archaeology of Britain: An introduction from ... - waughfamily.ca

• 290 • Kate Clark
production took place in the home, assisted by factors who purchased materials in bulk, and ‘put
out’ work. Large windows on the top storeys of buildings in many small towns, such as Newtown,
Powys, indicate that lofts were used for weaving. The earliest purpose-built mills, such as Lombe’s
factory in Derby, were well lit, five storeys high, long and narrow, with line shafting to carry
power from an engine, and lots of repetitive spaces supported by brick or cast iron columns.
Because they were vulnerable to fire, most of the earliest mills have now been burnt down or
altered almost beyond recognition. Most were simple, brick structures, and although largely
functional, the use of classical detailing such as pediments and clock towers became common.
Such buildings were generally located on streams, and thus concentrated in areas where water
power was available. In the 1780s a form of fireproof construction, involving cast-iron beams
and shallow brick jack arches, was developed. This was used at Stanley Mill in Gloucestershire, a
‘fire proof ’ woollen mill, where the use of Palladian windows and decorative cast iron also illustrates
the architectural pretension of the mill complex.
Steam was applied to spinning in 1785, making possible factory buildings in towns, close to
sources of labour and materials. The mill buildings of the Ancoats area in Manchester exemplify
the way in which urban areas became transformed by concentrations of multistorey textile
complexes, although there is plentiful evidence to show that ‘out-working’ persisted as a mode of
operation (by the mid-nineteenth century only half the textile workers operated in factories). A
survey of Yorkshire textile mills places rural water-powered mills in their landscape context, and
demonstrates the importance of looking at where and how mills were built as well as studying the
buildings themselves (Giles and Goodall 1992).
It is easy to forget that mills were usually only one element in a large industrial complex that
might include single-storey weaving sheds, dye houses, engine houses, carding buildings, offices
and a multitude of other small structures needed for the factory’s operation. In Manchester, the
huge textile warehouses represent the role of marketing and distribution in the industry. At
Saltaire in Bradford, West Yorkshire, the mill became part of a social experiment where the mill
owner, Titus Salt, built rows of houses for employees, adding a church, hospital, baths and schools.
Such structures are usually very vulnerable, and archaeology can play a role in ensuring that the
more obvious structures are placed in their context.
Building technology
Textile mills are only one of a wide range of new building types that began to appear in the late
eighteenth century as a result of industrialization. Some categories were very specific and a direct
reflection of the process they housed, such as iron furnaces or gas holders, whilst other buildings
depended upon a vocabulary of features that were designed to provide light, shelter, access, fireproofing
and perhaps power for industrial processes. Building technology evolved rapidly as
early building types were found to be unsuitable for industrial processes, and often burnt down
or were shaken to bits. The introduction of iron to support buildings, fire-proofing, and new
construction techniques involving the use of concrete and rolled steel, zig-zag north light roofs
to bring in more light, and the use of steel framing all created extraordinarily innovative buildings.
It should not be assumed that all such buildings were purely functional and without pretension.
The earliest eighteenth-century factories made use of the Palladian idiom in their deployment of
pediments and ornate roofs, and the industrial buildings of the Victorian period—such as the
Egyptian style Temple Mill—illustrate all of the major themes in the architecture of the period.
Workers’ housing
Industries depended upon people, and many historians have commented upon the population
changes in Britain during the period of industrialization. The population grew, and the centres of