RICHARD ARKWRIGHT AND TECHNOLOGY1

RICHARD ARKWRIGHT AND TECHNOLOGY’

J E N N I F E R T A N N University of Aston in Birmingham

ECONOMISTS HAVE LONG recognized that technological innovation is a vital ingredient of successful entrepreneurship. J. A. Schumpeter based his theory of fluctuations and growth cycles almost exclusively on the work of the innovating entrepreneur, Arthur H. Cole placed innovation first in his list of the functions of the entrepreneur, whilst Youngson saw the innovating entrepreneur in a broad context as the ‘initiator and organizer of economic change’.2 Important studies have been made both of individual entrepreneurs and of the progress of science and technology in the Industrial Revolution. But studies of entrepreneurs have usually centred around the entrepreneur as provider of capital and as business manager, whilst the studies of science and technology have, with some notable exceptions,3 tended to ignore the process of innovation. Thus the innovating entrepreneur has received relatively little attention. How necessary was it for the innovating entrepreneur to be know- ledgeable about science and techology and skilled in practical mechanics ? Could he be a successful innovator by relying on the advice and skills of others? There is a problem of definition. When did a new invention cease to be new and the adoption of it change from innovation merely to new investment? It is difficult to determine when pioneering ceased.

I

Most entrepreneurs had no formal training, and little initial knowledge of science and technology, but many of them made a conscious and positive attempt to acquire new knowledge or skills sometimes at first hand, sometimes through a manager. Musson and Robinson4 have shown that some eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century entrepreneurs consulted and even, occasionally, employed leading scientists and engineers. Some manufacturers such as

I am grateful to Professor J. R. Harris for his comments on an earlier draft of this paper. * J. A. Schumpeter, Business Cycles (New York, 1939); Arthur H. Cole, ‘An Approach to

the Study of Entrepreneurship’, in Frederick C. Lane and Jelle C. Riemersma (Eds.), Enterprise and Secular Change (London, 1953) 185-187; A. J. Youngson, Possibilities of Economic Progress (Cambridge, 1959), 60. For a recent discussion see A.E. Musson, Science, Technology & Economic Growth (London, 1972), 1-68.

E.g. R. S. Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, The Strutts and the Arkwrights (Manchester, 1958); A. E. Musson and E. Robinson, Science and Technology in the Industrial Revolution (Manchester, 1969) ; J. R. Harris, ‘Copper and Shipping in the Eighteenth-Century’, Econ. Hisf. Rev. 2nd Series xix (1966), 550-68; W. G. Rimmer, Marshall’s of Leeds Flax Spinner’s (Cambridge, 1960) ; Charles Wilson, ‘The Entrepreneur in the Industrial Revolu- tion in Britain’, History, xiii (1957), 101-17.

29 A. E. Musson and E. Robinson, ibid. 87-189.

30 RICHARD ARKWRIGHT AND TECHNOLOGY

Boulton, Wedgwood and Marshall set about acquiring the requisite knowledge by purchasing books on chemistry and mechanics, even carrying out controlled experiments of their own. They became members of philosophical societies, where the interplay of ideas was a stimulus to their researches, and several of them made important original contributions to scientific knowledge, receiving the accolade of the scientific world in being elected Fellows of the Royal Society. But only well-established manufacturers could afford the time or money to become involved in scientific experiments, and they did not all possess the aptitude. The largest group of all were the empiricists. They did not advance knowledge by controlled experiments in laboratory or dyehouse but acquired their expertise by careful observation in the day-to-day running of an industrial enterprise. It is from this group that the majority of innovating entrepreneurs came.

The innovating entrepreneur was beset by problems which modern historians have tended to underplay. He had to decide, when confronted by reports which were often conflicting, whether to innovate, postpone making a decision, or reject. There were problems of obtaining reliable information, even for the foremost inventing and innovating entrepreneurs. Charles Bage, of the Shrewsbury flax-spinning firm Benyon, Benyon and Bage, wrote in haste to William Strutt5 in August 1810, requesting a reply by return: 'I have rumours of improved modes of bleaching in Lancashire, about Man- Chester or Preston or Wigan, of the employment of steam, of using no ashes, etc. If there is anything new or worth notice I think you are probably acquainted with it.' Scientists and engineers, however, were inclined to be intolerant of the entrepreneur's caution which they interpreted as stubbornness and prejudice. Few people were able to appreciate the problems of both scientist and entrepreneur, but one such was Chaptal who wrote as follows :6

The manufacturer might easily ruin his fortune and his reputation, were he to regulate his conduct, or ground his speculations on calculations made in the closet, on the petty results of the laboratory, or on specious, but delusive adver- tisements . . . innovations should not be introduced into manufactures but with the greatest circumspection . . . experience ought to have decided the superior advantages of the projected changes, and the new process should have received the sanction of practice and even the approbation of the consumer. Without these salutary, prudent and necessary precautions which the theorist is pleased to term obstinacy, prejudice and ignorance, the fairest establishment is soon dis- organised. . . . But though I commend the cautious prudence of the manufacturer who, almost inaccessible to new ideas, adopts no change till it has undergone the test of practice and of experience; I blame the obstinacy of him who rejects, without examination, all the improvements that are proposed to him: for he who does not endeavour to keep pace with the arts will soon be left behind. He finds that his production gradually becomes disliked; he can no longer afford them at so low a price as his competitors; and instead of limiting them he censures their new processes which he treats as dangerous innovations.

In Chaptal's view the scientist and entrepreneur had distinct functions. The scientist suggested new methods while the entrepreneur had to judge and

Shrewsbury Public Library, Bage Papers, C. Bage to W. Strutt, 5 August 1810. W. J. A. Chaptal, Chemistry Applied to Arts nndkfanufactures (London, 1807), xvi-xviii.

JENNIFER TANN 31

decide, basing his decision ‘on a multitude of facts and circumstances which the chemist can neither know or appreciate’, and without the scientist’s detailed knowledge of the process concerned. In this respect the entrepreneur’s position was an unenviable one :

The manufacturer is therefore placed between two rocks; that of blind credulity which risks his fortune in hazardous speculations; and that of obstinate mistrust, which undermines the foundations of his establishment by preventing the introduction of methods that are capable of improving it.

Matters were further complicated for the entrepreneur in that he had to select the sheep from the goats in the scientific world. A number of people mas- queraded as scientists who in fact were little more than quacks. To accept their advice was to risk being misled and to be involved in considerable financial loss.’

I1

Historians tend, when investigating the careers of individual entrepreneurs, to categorize them as scientifically minded or as good businessmen. In the well-known Boulton and Watt partnership, Watt has been portrayed as the mechanical and scientific genius who was inept as a businessman, whilst Boulton was the managerial wizard.8 Benjamin Gott, by his own admission, ‘became a manufacturer rather from possessing capital than from understanding the manufacture. I paid for the talent of others in the different branches of manufacture.’ Historians have not disagreed with this self-portrait, but it should be remembered that Gott instigated a series of carefully controlled experiments in the dyehouse of his Leeds mill and his attempts to employ steam heating in dyeing vessels received the approbation of Count Ri~mford.~

Arkwright,’O who ‘amassed a large fortune and raised himself to great eminence’, epitomizes the successful late eighteenth-century businessman. His ‘indefatigable perseverance, unity of object and able management of the men he had to deal with”’ has never been disputed. Arkwright’s genius was, we are told, ‘that of the successful innovating entrepreneur’, his success was due ‘to his business capacity of which he gave proof almost at once’.’’ But of ‘ E.e. John Sutcliffe. A Treatise on Canals and Reservoirs . . .. (Rochdale. 1816). 61. for I . ,_ ~

a descFiption of the piifalls awaiting the unwary.

Parliamentary Papers, 1828,515,289; Brotherton Library, Leeds, Gott Papers, 193/117; Sanborn C. Brown (Ed.). The Collected Works of Count Rumford, 11 1, essay ‘On the Use of

* H. W. Dickinson, Matthew Boulton (Cambridge, 1937), 75-112.

. . Steam as a Vehicle for Transporting Heat’, lCL-11.

l o For a discussion of Arkwright’s career, see: A. P. Wadsworth and J. de Lacy Mann, The Cotton Trade and Industrial Lancashire (Manchester, 1931); R. S. Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, op. cit.; S . D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masters (Newton Abbot, 1967); S. D. Chapman, ‘Fixed Capital Formation in the British Cotton Manufacturing Industry’, in J. P. P. Higgins and Sidney Pollard, Aspects ofcapital Investment in Great Britain 1750-1850 (London, 1971); C. Charlton, P. Strange, D. Hool, Arkwright and the Mills at Cromford (Arkwright Society, 1971).

l1 Richard Guest, A Compendious History of the Cotton Manufacture with a Disproval of the Claim of Sir Richard Arkwright to the Invention of its Ingenious Machinery (Man- Chester, 1823), 20.

l 2 P. Mantoux, The Industrial Revolution in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1928), 223.


his knowledge of machines and his practical expertise there has been serious doubt. How inventive was he? Naturally enough, ever since the cancellation of his patents in 1785 discussion has concentrated on the subjects of those patents:’ the water frame and carding machine. Modern historians are inclined to agree with Guest14 that ‘With no original invention to boast of in the department of mechanics, to which he devoted himself, he possessed unwearied zeal and patience in obtaining the discoveries of others.’ They point out his failure to modify the water frame for worsted and his non- adoption of the mule: ‘he could lay small claim to the title of inventor, and indeed, showed little originality as a mechanic’.15 Since it seems unlikely that much new material concerning the origins of Arkwright’s water frame or carding machine will come to light, any reassessment of Arkwright’s significance as an inventor and innovator must be made through an investigation of his application of knowledge in other fields of science or engineering. In the pages which follow an attempt will be made to review Arkwright’s position as an inventor and innovating entrepreneur through an investigation of his employment of power systems, since it is in this area that new evidence has been found.

I11

It is well known that Arkwright used horses to provide the motive power at his Nottingham factory, and this when the potential of water power for factory production had already been demonstrated by Lombe and other silk throwers nearby at Derby and elsewhere, and by Cave at the Northampton cotton The reasons for Arkwright’s move to Nottingham, a town poorly supplied with potential water power, were clearly economic, as has been admirably shown elsewhere.” Hargreaves was already established there and Arkwright must have recognized the possibilities of exploiting the serious shortage of cotton yarn in the town. In addition neither he nor his partner, John Smalley, possessed great capital and the existence of the Wright brothers’ bank was an added attraction.

But the choice of a site at which it was impossible to use water power may not have been the disadvantage that it at first appears. Although a precedent for the water-powered factory had already been set, Arkwright was not, after all, throwing silk, an altogether simpler operation, and the Northampton cotton mill, using Wyatt’s machinery, was a commercial if not technical failure. A crucial stage in the development of a machine is that in which its power requirements are ascertained. It would clearly have been difficult for

E.g. P. Mantoux, The Industrial Revolution in the Eighteenth Century, 220-34. l4 R. Guest, op. cit., 20 l5 S . D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masters, 69. l6 Sir Frank Warner, The Silk Industry of the United Kingdom its Origin and Develop-

ment (London, 1921); John H. Thornton, ‘The Northampton Cotton Industry-An Eighteenth-century Episode’, Northampton Natural History Society and Field-Club, iii.

l7 S . D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masfers, 62-3; R. S . Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, op. cit., 60-3.

1959,241-59.

JENNIFER TANN 33

Arkwright to discover the power requirements of his spinning frame with a waterwheel, when the power generated by waterwheels was only estimated by rule of thumb. By employing horses it was a simple matter to discover, by the addition or subtraction of animals to the wheel, a ratio of the horse power per spindle required. By obtaining this information at the outset Arkwright facilitated both the development of his Nottingham enterprise and the planning of his other factories. Indeed, even if Cave’s earlier attempt to establish a water-powered spinning factory had succeeded, and the example had been available to Arkwright, he would still have been prudent to employ, at first, a simple power system in which the power could, in a sense, be observed.

There were other advantages in employing animal power at the outset. At a period when skilled millwrights and mechanics were scarce there was every reason to use a power system that was simple and robust, particularly when the spinning frame was by no means perfect. Machinery being made on the premises in many early spinning mills meant that it was often several years -seven in the case of Arkwright’s Shudehill Mill’”-before a factory was working to capacity. The employment of a horse-wheel allowed the power to be augmented as required. It is significant that the millwright John Sutcliffe, perhaps with Arkwright’s success in mind, recommended a horse-powered workshop/factory as the optimum unit for a manufacturer entering the cotton industry.l9

Arkwright may have seen horses employed to turn carding frames on Paul’s or Bourne’s principles in Lancashirein the 1760s-they were common by the 1770s-and his millwright would have been conversant with the use of animal rotary power in a wide range of industries.z0 By the 1780s he was using nine horses to turn a 27 ft. wheel in the Nottingham mill and, as Boulton and Watt reminded him, Arkwright, on his own admission, ‘wrought them very hard and changed them often which makes an essential difference in their power’.’l On the assumption that Arkwright worked his horses harder than other manufacturers Boulton and Watt recommended 1 hp. per 100 spindles when supplying steam engines to water frame spinners.

When capital became available, through the partnership with Need and Strutt which commenced in 1771, Arkwright began to develop the water- powered site at Cromford. It has been suggested that Arkwright chose a poor site for water but recent workz3 has shown that, far from reaching its final phase of development with the building of the second mill between 1776 and 1777, the Cromford site was developed substantially over a period of at least twenty years, ‘very considerable’ additions being made in 1789.

Birmingham Reference Library (B.R.L.), Boulton & Watt MSS., P. Drinkwater to Boulton and Watt, 3 June 1789. All MSS. letters subsequently referred to are amongst the Boulton and Watt MSS. in the B.R.L. Where no additional reference is given the letters are catalogued, but for clarity all Arkwright’sletters are given full location references since six of these are uncatalogued.

l9 J. Sutcliffe, op cit., 62-3. Mill horses were also cheap, costing about t 5 in the late eighteenth century.

2o Jennifer Tann, The Development ofthe Factory (London, 1970), 7. zi Boulton and Watt to R. Arkwright, 30 June 1789. zs E.g. S. D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masters, 64-5. 23 C. Charlton, P. Strange and D. Hool, op. cit.


The second mill was powered by two large waterwheels and the power for the first mill and the adjoining building was augmented in 1785-6. Clearly this is inconsistent with the view that water power at Cromford proved inadequate. Moreover, all the evidence seems to suggest that the power installations at Cromford were technologically advanced. Whereas many woollen manufacturers in Wiltshire and Somerset were prepared to build multi-storey factories to be powered by uncomplicated wooden paddle Ark- Wright installed high breast or overshot wheels probably made partly of iron, only shortly after Smeaton had made known the superior advantages of these types of wheel. Complicated and ingenious mill leats and tail races were constructed in order to maximize the efficiency of the system. One mill leat was designed so that the water could flow in either direction and the tail race for the second mill was an impressive tunnel designed to prevent the wheels running in backwater.

The locations selected by Arkwright for his other water-powered factories and the remains of the power systems at the sites provide further evidence of Arkwright’s ability to select a promising site and to use the power potential of each to the full. Even where, as at Cromford, Arkwright took over a site already occupied by a water-powered mill, there was no proof that there would be enough power, since the power requirements of most early eighteenth- century mills were small compared with the amount necessary for the factory production of cotton yarn. At Bakewell, the second Derbyshire site to be developed by Arkwright, a reservoir covering some six acres was constructed to provide power for the 199 ft. long mill built in 1777.25 The original wheel appears to have worked satisfactorily for nearly fifty years until a Hewes and Wren wheel was installed in 1827. At Masson, a large curved weir of the type described by Fairbairn as ‘the most perfect’26 dammed back a head of water for the wheel. A similar weir was built at Shudehill, Manchester. A half-mile leat took water from the river Dove to Rocester Mill, where it provided a considerable fall for the two wheels before returning to the river by a long tail race, thereby avoiding the problem of backwater in flat land. The Falls of Clyde at New Lanark are well known, but even here extensive engineering work was required in order to obtain the most efficient power system.*’

Lack of specific data inhibits a discussion of the cost of Arkwright’s water power systems. In a recent article2* one of Smeaton’s estimates29 of 6d. per running yard for a 3 ft. deep mill leat was used for a calculation of the cost of excavation and construction of a number of reservoirs (including Arkwright’s) per cubic yard. In doing this two assumptions had to be made. First, that Smeaton’s mill leat in question was 3 ft. wide and, second, that all reservoirs were 3 ft. deep. Unlike steam power, however, where comparisons of cost can

24 As can be seen in the surviving structures. 2 5 A drawing in B.R.L. (Portfolio 1334) shows the building to have been 199 ft. by 30 ft.

and four storeys high. 26 W. Fairbairn, Mills and Millwork (4th ed., London 1878), 83-5. 27 J. Butt (ed.), Robert Owen, Prince of Cotton Spinners, 215-16.

of the Textile Industry’, Midland History, vol. I, no. 2 (1971), 5-11. 2 9 Reports of the Late John Smeaton (2nd ed., London 1837), vol. 2, 392-3.

S. D. Chapman, ‘The Cost of Power in the Industrial Revolution in Britain: The Case

JENNIFER TANN 35

be made between like engines, a water power installation is, in many respects, unique. The cost of different wheels can be compared provided it is known whether they were made of wood, iron or both, and whether they were under- shot, breastshot or overshot. But few examples of actual wheel costs are known and the cost of the wheel itself may have been only a small proportion of the cost of the whole system. Smeaton, as has already been noted, estimated 6d. per running yard for a mill at one site. But at another he estimated 2s. 4d. per running yard?’ Had this figure been used in the calculations a rather different picture of the cost of water power would have been obtained. Obviously the cost of cutting leats and reservoirs through rock was more than for cutting them in clay. The amount of embanking necessarily depended on the width of the valley, and the height of the dam depended on its gradient. Mill leats varied at different sites in width from as little as 18 ins. to 10 ft. or 12 ft., and reservoirs varied in depth, the depth rarely being constant at one site. Even such an experienced engineer as William Whitmore underestimated the cost of constructing a new dam at Compton Verney, Warwicks, between 1815 and 1818.31 This raises the question of how close any estimate was to the actual cost of engineering works at a water-powered factory. Leaving aside the varying charges for water rights in different parts of Britain, another unknown quantity, the difference in terrain at each factory site, makes a comparison based on a single per square or cube yard estimate of reservoirs or a per running yard estimate of leats tempting but, at the present state of knowledge, unrealistic.

The available evidence, admittedly sketchy, shows that Arkwright’s water wheels were of advanced design. A cost of between E350 and E500 per wheel may be a conservative figure, but there is little reliable data.32 Arkwright is likely to have spent at least E800 to E1,OOO on water power engineering at each factory, and at Cromford considerably Many, perhaps the majority, of owners of water-powered factories would have spent less than this. But Arkwright’s investment was justified in the long term. Large water wheels could produce more power than the rotary steam engines in early mule spinning mills. The mule, however, required one-tenth less power per spindle than the water frame. Entrepreneurs spinning on Arkwright’s principle were able, if supplied with good water power, to withstand the competition of mule spinners for a

30 Jbid., vol. I, 170. 31 R. A. Chaplin, ‘The Landscape Lakes at Compton Verney’, Warwickshire History

vol. I. no. 1 (196Y), 18. 32 Figures based on the highest insurance valuations for water wheels at the period;

Guildhall Library, Policy Registers of Sun and Royal Exchange Cos. But the reliability of these figures is questionable. In some valuations ‘millwrights work‘ (gearing and shafting) is included whilst in others it is not. Moreover it is by no means always clear how many wheels are included in one valuation. The oak wheel (with iron binding round axle) at Belper West Mill cost f629. 19s. 4td. in 1795-7 (Fitton and Wadsworth, op. cit., 210-1 1).

33 It is known that the engineering works at Belper West Mill cost considerably more than the wheel-over E l 142-and this excluded the main reservoir. For other examples see Jennifer Tann, op. cit., 65-8.

34 Partly because of their higher powered wheels but also because they were supplying different ends of the market. Water frame spinners produced coarse yarn while mule spinners produced fine yarn.


The fact that Arkwright built his factories at good water power sites does not imply that power was the sole criterion in his selection of a site for manufacturing, although a contemporary observer writing of New Lanark certainly thought so: ‘Its only recommendation was the very powerful command of water. . . in other respects, the distance from Glasgow and the badness of the roads were rather unfav~urable.’~~ Clearly other factors such as the existence of local partners, the availability of water rights and land for building, the absence of local opposition and, perhaps, as Chapman36 has suggested, the desire for social advancement, were important. And this begs the question of just how important adequate water power was. Some manufacturers built factories by streams,which could not possibly have supplied all the power that would have been required when the factory was working to capacity. When it was taking up to seven years before spinning factories reached full production some manufacturers clearly estimated their water power requirements in the short-term rather than the long-term, just as some did with steam power.37 When the water power proved insufficient, supple- mentary sources were sought. Good or poor water power was not the crucial factor in the success or failure of a firm; for entrepreneurs at factories well supplied with water power failed whilst others with insufficient water power succeeded. There were, after all, other sources of power available. Boulton, for example, used a horse wheel at Soh0 Manufactory during the summer months when the water was low. Arkwright built at sites which were, on the whole, capable of supplying his long-term needs for water power. There is no evidence that he installed a horse wheel to supplement the power at any of his factories. He did, however, experiment with steam, both as a supple- mentary source and as the sole prime mover.

IV In contrast to his mastery of water power, Arkwright’s understanding of steam power seems, at first sight, shaky. His overbearing attitude in ‘pre- tend(ing) to improve the fire engine’ was strongly resented by Watt : moreover he appears irresolute, first inquiring after a Boulton and Watt engine in 1777, again in 1780, only ordering one in 1790. Yet this apparent indecisiveness is misleading. The ‘advantages’ of the Boulton and Watt engine were not so clear in practice as its makers claimed. The choice between a steam engine and other forms of power, or between one variety of steam engine and another, was affected by local conditions which were not static. The evidence, admittedly incomplete, shows Arkwright to the forefront in experimenting with different forms of steam power.

Arkwright must be credited both with being the first cotton spinner to recognize the advantages of the application of steam power to the cotton industry, and with being the first to put the idea into practice. In 1777, only

35 Sir John Sinclair (ed.), The Statistical Account of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1791-5),15,46. 36 S. D. Chapman, The Early Factory Masters, 67. 37 Jennifer Tann, op. cit., 59-87.

JENNIFER TANN 37

two years after the commencement of Boulton and Watt’s partnership, and several years before any other cotton spinner investigated the potentialities of steam power, Arkwright, having sometime previously visited Soho, wrote to Boulton and Watt requesting an estimate for a steam pumping engine to be erected at Cromford to return water to the The reply emphasizes how premature the request was, for the manufacture of Boulton and Watt engines was then in its infancy. Arkwright was told that an engine such as he required would consume about 3 cwt. of coal per hour, but ‘As to the expense of the machine I cannot speak accurately to that point, as all we have erected have been very much larger or smaller than the engine you want but as near as I can guess . . . the engine will cost about €400 besides carriage, the workmen to put it together. . . also the mason and carpenters and Boulton and Watt’s annual premium. Nothing more was heard for three years, during which time the second mill at Cromford was put into production powered by water wheels.

In 1780 Arkwright’s water supply was threatened as Watt described: ‘Mr. Arkwright sent for me last night, he has built a mill and the miners have let down his water so that it cannot move.’4o This time Arkwright asked the price of an engine capable of raising 10 tons of water per minute 18 ft. high?’ Several authorities4’ have stated that Arkwright followed this inquiry with an order for an 8 h.p. engine, but there is no documentary evidence in support of the assertion, neither is there any evidence of steam power at the site of Crom- ford Mills. Perhaps it was Boulton and Watt’s estimate of a coal consumption of 1 cwt. per hour and an inclusive price of something in the region of E700 for the engine, as well as the hope of settlement with the miners, that deterred Arkwright from proceeding with the matter. At all events, Arkwright’s inquiries should not be taken as evidence that water power at Cromford was inadequate under normal conditions. For instance, Arkwright’s neighbours, the Robinsons of Papplewick Mill, Notts., installed a steam engine in 1785. This has usually been interpreted as evidence of the Robinson’s inadequate water power. But it is clear that the engine was installed as an insurance in case they should lose their normally adequate water power in a lawsuit with a neighbouring landowner, Lord Byron. When the case was finally settled to the Robinsons’ satisfaction they attempted to sell their engineP3

There is no evidence that Arkwright reconsidered the question of installing steam power at Cromford and he did not approach Boulton and Watt again until 1789. Instead of laying aside the idea of steam power, however, he began to investigate the potentialities of the atmospheric engine at two other

38 The engine was to be capable of pumping 6 tons of water per min. 29 ft. high. R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, November 1777 (Parcel A). For a discussion of the measurement of the work done by steam engines in the cotton industry see R. L. Hills and A. J. Pacey, ‘The measurement of power in early steam-driven textile mills’, Technology & Culture, 13 (1972), 25-43.

39 Boulton and Watt to R. Arkwright, 30 November 1777. 40 J. Watt to M. Boulton, 12 October 1780, quoted Wadsworth and Mann, op. cit., 491. 41 Boulton and Watt to R. Arkwright, 12 October 1780. 42 R. S. Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, op. cit., 80; S . D. Chapman, The Early Fuctory

43 Boulton and Watt MSS, J. Southern to Gardiner, 27 February 1792. Musters, 65.


factories. In 1780, the year in which he decided for the second time against a Boulton and Watt engine, he installed an atmospheric engine in his newly erected mill at Wirksworth, three miles from Cromford. This was the first engine to be installed in a cotton factoryp4 and the fact that it was installed here rather than at Cromford may indicate that Arkwright’s second inquiry to Boulton and Watt was for this mill and not for Cromford-the two inquiries were for engines of different capacity. No details of the engine are known, but Boulton was sufficiently interested to record in his journal ‘coals at Arkwright’s Engine at Wirksworth 9s. per It was, presumably, a pumping engine -Boulton would have been a great deal more interested if it had been a rotary one-and may have been made by the Smiths of Chester- field, for they supplied engines to several Midlands factory masters.

About a year later Arkwright endeavoured to take the application of steam power to the cotton industry a stage further at his Shudehill Mill. He attempted to obtain rotary power from an atmospheric engine. Although Wasborough and P i ~ k a r d ~ ~ had succeeded in this several years earlier, they had applied rotary steam power to corn milling, a process employing relatively stout machinery compared with the delicate mechanisms in cotton spinning. Whether Arkwright used the ratchet and pawl of Wasborough or Pickard’s crank is not known. His attempts attracted the attention of Boulton, who wrote in 1783: ‘I have heard of no engine improvements at Manchester except what Arkwright has pretended to’;’ but two years later he acknowledged the possibilities for his own establishment in supplying Manchester manufacturers: ‘If we were to receive an order for a Mill Engine at Manchester it would do us no harm, as it would show that there are other men in the world almost as ingenious in the Engine way as Arkwright and might be a useful example.’48 But success was short-lived, for by July 1783 Bateman told Scale that ‘Mr. Arkwright’s works to go by fire engine are all to pieces’?’ By October Arkwright had given up the attempt to use rotary power and the engine was converted to pumping as Wilkes noted: ‘I find Mr. Arkwright was obliged to alter (a steam engine) he erected at Manchester to a water wheel.’50

Arkwright therefore failed to apply rotary power from an atmospheric engine in cotton spinning. But his failure, which has been interpreted in the past as evidence of Arkwright’s lack of mechanical abilities, should be seen in the context of other attempts to apply rotary power to spinning. Other spinners who attempted, some time after Arkwright, to use rotary atmospheric engines found difficulty in applying the power to cotton or worsted spinning sati~factorily.~’ Watt suggested that this was a foregone c o n c l ~ s i o n : ~ ~ ‘We

44 The Shudehill Mill engine has, until now, been thought to be the first steam engine installed in a cotton mill.

45 Assay Office, Birmingham, Boulton’s Notebook 25, p. 81. 46 Jennifer Tann, op. cit., 73. 47 Boulton to Watt, 28 October 1783, quoted in Wadsworth and Mann, op. cit., 491. 48 Boulton to Watt, 28 October 1783, quoted ibid., 491. 49 Boulton and Watt MSS. J. Bateman to J. Scale. 6 Julv 1783. 50 J. Wilkes to Boulton and Watt, 19 October 1783. 51 E.g. Davison and Hawkesley of Arnold near Nottingham. 5 2 J. Watt to J. Wilkes, 20 October 1783; J. Watt to M. Boulton, 21 October 1783.

JENNIFER TANN 39

told Mr. Arkwright that the machine which he proposed to erect at Manchester would not answer; but he was obstinate and the event verified our predictions.’ But Watt was hardly likely to have been objective in the circumstances. In- deed the claims Watt made for his rotary engine at the time of Arkwright’s failure at Shudehill were premature: ‘From trials we have made there appears to be no difficulty in working any kind of mill regularly by means of our steam engines.’ The first spinners to use Boulton and Watt rotative engines experienced the same technical difficulties as those who tried atmospheric engines. W i l k e ~ ~ ~ asked whether a Boulton and Watt engine ‘will work as steady as water’ and noted ‘our friend Mr. Peel of Burton is in some doubts as about an Ingin being smooth enough’. This was not the only problem. John Marshall 54 of Leeds inquired whether ‘the crank is ever liable to turn the wrong way round as we understand it is in engines of the common construction’. It was. When in 1785 Boulton and Watt supplied their first rotary engine to a cotton spinning mill the engine erector reported that the ‘fly wheel . . . is very liable to go the contrary way, in setting on and stopping the engine which is very hurtful to the machinery in the It was to be several years before Watt’s rotary engines passed beyond the experimental stage. Viewed in this light Arkwright’s failure was to be expected. Indeed had he succeeded in applying rotary power to cotton spinning two years before Watt’s engine was installed at Papplewick under the expert guidance of men froin Soho, Arkwright’s mechanical abilities would have rivalled Watt’s.

When Arkwright approached Boulton and Watt for the third time he had had the opportunity of weighing carefully the advantages and disadvantages of Boulton and Watt’s steam engines against other kinds of engines, and of comparing rotary engines and pumping engines. The first Boulton and Watt rotary engine to be used in the cotton industry was installed by the Robinsons in 1785. Several Nottingham cotton spinners followed by replacing their horse wheels with steam engines.56 Arkwright’s inquiry of 178957 did not even raise the question of cost but required to know by return ‘in how short a time you could erect him a fire Engine . . . as he will want one. . . very shortly’. In spite of the initial desire for haste, delays were incurred at several stages and the matter was left until 1790, when Arkwright requested that the ‘long talked of’engine should be sent as soon as possible.58 It was usual for Boulton and Watt to make the precision parts of the engine themselves and to order the heavy castings from a reliable foundry near the customer. But Arkwright, in order that ‘there will be no doubt of doing well’, requested Boulton and Watt to send ‘everything that is needful in the Cast mettle way’.59

53 J. Wilkes to Boulton and Watt, 19 October 1783. 54 Marshall, Fenton & Co. to Boulton and Watt, 25 February 1789. 5 5 R. Dayus to Boulton and Watt, 21 February 1786. 56 E.g. T. Harris (1785); Pearson and Grirnshaw (1787); Boulton and Watt MSS. Engine

Book. 57 J. Fletcher for R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 20 June 1789 (Box 4A). 5 8 J. Fletcher for R. Arkwright, 26 June 1789 (Box 4A); J. Fletcher for R. Arkwright

23 February 1790 (Box 36); G. Truman for R. Arkwright, 12 March 1790 (Box 36); J. Fletcher for R. Arkwright, 26 June 1789 (Box 4A); Boulton and Watt to R. Arkwright, 30 June 1789.

5 9 G. Truman for R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 12 March 1790 (Box 36).


The engine gave satisfaction at first and Arkwright indicated that he had ‘some thoughts of erecting one of this kind at Wirksworth‘.6° But the satisfaction was short-lived. Less than a month after the engine had been set to work Arkwright reported that ‘the Engine has stoped [sic] two or three times’. But he was prepared to admit that it might have been the fault of the engine- men: ‘Whether it is the fault of the Engine or the people which is the managers of the same (I do not know) but probably it may be the Managers, they being unacquainted with the management of it.’ He added: ‘If it should stop at different times it will be attended with a very great loss but hope it will not any more.’61 In December 1790 Arkwright sacked the managers of his Not- tingham mill, but they took their revenge for ‘the son who had learned to work the Engine said he would not instruct any other and since he left the Engine has worked very indifferently . . . People are of opinion they may have done something with it.’62 Boulton and Watt appear to have lent a man to put the engine in order.

Arkwright’s business sense came to the fore when he received Boulton and Watt’s statement of the actual cost of the engine. He wrote immediately to inquire whether ‘Peels of Warrington paid the same proportion for their^'^ and when he received a bill for putting the engine together he requested to be informed by return what discount he would be all0wed.6~ He also queried the length of time taken in erecting the engine, requesting details of ‘Lowe and Sons time worked at Nottingham Mill that is what days they work in every week from their first coming to their leaving. I have large charges at Notting- ham for what wasincurrd [sic] through the Fire Engir~e.’~~Arkwright was clearly not exaggerating when he admitted that the engine had cost more than he had expected. The basic cost of a 12 h.p. Boulton and Watt engine was about E630, whereas the inclusive cost of Arkwright’s engine was ‘say upwards to nine hundred pounds. This was more than I was led to believe it would amount to, am apprehensive this Business has not been attended to as it should have been.’66 The costs of engine house, framing and erection were not included in the estimates for Boulton and Watt engines and they frequently appear to have amounted to more than the customer expected. While these extra costs would not have been a serious threat to the financial stability of a large enterprise like Arkwright’s they could adversely affect the smaller firm. It may partly have been pique, but when Arkwright told Boulton and Watt ‘This large expense will prevent me having one at Wirksworth‘ he had probably considered the situation carefully. The advantage of a lower coal consumption and reduced possibility of failure of a Boulton and Watt engine were off-set by the disadvantages of a higher capital cost, an annual premium and the fact that it was a more complicated engine to run. Where, as at Wirksworth,

6o W. Gibson for R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 16 September 1790 (Box 4A). W. Gibson for R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 16 September 1790 (Box 4A). R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 30 December 1790 (Parcel A).

63 R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 18 September 1790 (Box 4A). 64 W. Gibson for R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 29 October 1790 (Box 4A). 6 5 R. Arkwright to Boulton and Watt, 23 December 1790 (Box 4A). 66 Zbid.

JENNIFER TANN 41

steam power was merely an auxiliary to water power, Arkwright would probably have agreed with Samuel Unwi,n, whose factory at Sutton in Ashfield was nearby. Unwin told Boulton and Watt that he was ‘at a loss to discover how any advantage would arise to us from one of your engines’, for apumping engine was ‘less expensive that an Rotative one because we only had to pay for the coals consumed in proportion to the power to make up temporary deficiencies in the reservoir or ~tream’?~

Arkwright’s skill as an innovator in the employment of power lay partly in his appreciation of new opportunities presented by developments in power technology, but also in his ability to question whether a more advanced system would necessarily be of any advantage to him in a particular situation. He exploited horse power to the full and experimented to find an effective horse power per spindle ratio. He showed perception in the choice of water power sites, maximizing the potential of each by an intricate system of watercourses which supplied wheels of improved design. He investigated the possibilities of steam power, being both the first to recognize the potential application of steam power to the cotton industry and first to employ it.

IV

In the preceding pages, due to the paucity of new evidence on other aspects of Arkwright’s activities, discussion has been confined to his employment of power. But it was only one of a number of technological questions that had to be considered in a factory system of production. In addition to being an innovator of power systems Arkwright pioneered the application of heating systems in factories. The credit for the innovation-even the invention-of warm air convection hcating has, until now, been given to William S t ru tP who, in 1792, warmed one of the Belper Mills by this means. Strutt may have improved Arkwright’s system, but Arkwright seems to have installed a form of warm air heating system in the late 1780s. Two of the Cromford Mill buildings, dating from between 1786 and 1789, contain remains of heating systems and, in addition, the first two mills at New Lanark, built during David Dale’s partnership with Arkwright, contained warm air ~ysterns.6~

To return to the vexed question of Arkwright’s contribution to textile engineering. Discussion has always revolved around the question of whether or not he invented the water frame and carding engine. Interesting though this is, it has obscured a more important point. Even if Arkwright did invent these machines, which is doubtful, his contribution to production engineering was of far greater significance. Arkwright’s skill lay in combining ‘a number of (machines) in a series of engines (forming) a complete system of carding and roving (prior to spinning) by machinery’. Guest’s view was that ‘To

67 S. Unwin to Boulton and Watt, 30 March 1798,30 January 1798. 6 8 C. L. Hacker, ‘William Strutt and the Application of Convection to the Heating of

Buildings’, Annals of Science, 24 (1968), 73-87. 69 C. Charlton, P. Strange and D. Hool, op. cit. (no pagination); Jennifer Tam, op. cit.,

113, 118. Both the first and second mills, completed in 1786 and 1788, contained warm air heating systems by 1796 and it is likely that they were installed at the time of building.

H--E


combine, to arrange, to put in execution, though secondary to the merits of original invention (i.e. of individual machines) are nevertheless necessary to the perfection of the art. Without Mr. Arkwright, the water frame would probably have had a slow and tedious introduction or might have perished.’70 To connect a series of machines, modified and perfected by himself (for there is little evidence of the technical success of the individual links in the production chain before Arkwright), in the first example of what amounted to a logically planned continuous flow production system in cotton spinning is inventive and therefore indisputably innovatory.

The invention of a continuous production line involved, moreover, the planning of the entire industrial complex, the layout and dimensions of the factory, the organization of its power system and the disposition of the machinery relative to the source of power. Arkwright’s contemporaries were ready to concede his inventiveness in this field: as Peel later commented: ‘Arkwright originated the buildings, we all looked up to him and imitated his mode of building.’71

The patenting of a newly invented machine or process was difficult enough in the eighteenth century, as Watt found. But a new system of production caused even more problems, for the essence of the invention lay not in the discovery of a single machine or process, but in the co-ordination of a number of separate processes, some of the individual parts of which could be of questionable originality, though they were frequently improved. The question of whether or not to submit a detailed specification was never so fraught with uncertainty as in this kind of patent. Generally, as in Arkwright’s second patent of 1775,’2 the individual links in the production chain were described and this played into the hands of those wishing to discredit the patent, for it was frequently possible to find people who could vouch for the existence of an earlier model. Matters were made no easier by the fact that there were no guidelines for prospective patentees who found it ‘next to impossible to specify an invention in a way that would satisfy the courts since it had never been laid down exactly what a specification should d ~ ’ . ’ ~

Arkwright’s predicament is paralleled by Henry Cort’s. Cort took out patents in 1783 and 1784 for specified processes in the production of iron including hammering, rolling through grooved rolls and puddling. In doing so Cort invited charges of plagiarism, for hammering was commonplace at every forge, grooved rollers had been patented by Purnell in 1766, and John Onions, in his patent of 1783, described a process almost identical to puddling which was covered by Cort in his 1784 patent.74 Like Arkwright, Cort’s

70 Richard Guest, op. cit., 22, 28. 71 S. D. Chapman, ‘Fixed Capital Formation . . .’, in J. P. P. Higgins and Sidney Pollard,

op.cit.,61; JenniferTann,op. cit.,9-20,29-31;P.P., 1816,111,134. 7 2 The most important individual machines mentioned in this patent were the carding

machine, the crank and comb, the roving frame and the feeder. At Arkwright’s trial before theKing’sBenchin 1785eachone of thesemachines wasshowntohavebeeninusebefore 1775.

73 Eric Robinson, ‘James Watt and the Law of Patents’, Technology and Culture, 13

74 H. W. Dickinson, ‘Henry Cort’s Bicentenary’, Trans. Newcomen Society, 21, (1940-1), 31-47; G. R. Morton and N. Mutton, ‘The Transition to Cort’s Puddling Process’, Journ. Iron and Stwl Institute, 205 (July 1967), 722-8.

(1972), 115-39.

JENNIFER TANN 43

great achievement was as production engineer in combining and co-ordinat- ing the separate improvements into a single continuous process. Cort’s patents came under attack from the ironmasters, surviving initially, but finally being cancelled due, not as in Arkwright’s case, to a dispute as to their originality, but to the misappropriation of public funds and their investment in Cort’s works by Jellicoe. In regard to the patent law, though not in other respects, Cort was more fortunate than Arkwright.

Arkwright’s failure to protect his patents was as much a reflection of his ability to antagonize other prominent cotton spinners and engineers, as it was to a lack of recognition of the necessity of lobbying influential members of society and Parliament. It is worth reflecting whether, had the Government required good quality cotton in large quantities as urgently as it required malleable iron, Arkwright would have received more support in his attempt to uphold his patents in a court of law.

Arkwright’s defeat on questions of originality, and the vagueness of his patent specifications, raised serious questions for other holders of patents, notably James Watt. For if, as Erasmus pointed out to B o ~ l t o n , ~ ~ ‘patents are to be so easily overthrown, does your patent or Act or Parliament stand on firm foundation ?’ It was Darwin’s opinion that at Arkwright’s trial the decision was ‘unjustly given against him’. He also singled out the composition of the jury for criticism, raising the question of whether a normal jury was equipped to deal with the highly technical business of patents: ‘I think it hard . . . that his right to invention should be so easily infringed for want of an intelligent or mechanic jury.’

Arkwright’s failure to protect his developments at law undoubtedly goes a long way towards explaining why economic historians have, on the whole, seemed reluctant to reopen the question of whether or not he was an inventor since Paul Mantoux’s and Wadsworth and Mann’s airing of it. The logicality, efficacy and justness of the eighteenth-century patent laws have received scant a t ten t i~n’~ and historians seem, without question, to have accepted patentability as the main criterion in defining invention. This is convenient but unsatisfactory considering the state of patent law in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Arkwright received little formal education, let alone a training in the sciences, but his acknowledged desire for self-improvement is proof of his willingness to learn. Scattered amongst the accusations and invective of his contemporaries are a number of references to Arkwright’s practical abilities. As a wjgmaker he is said to have possessed ‘a valuable chemical secret’ for dyeing hair.77 A favourite pastime was noted to have been the making of geometrical shapesfrom cardboard pieces and ‘A Hundred knacky things that one cannot find words to explain’.78 It was not only Thomas Ridgway who reported that ‘His genius for Mechanics was observed, it was perceived in his

75 Assay Office, Erasmus Darwin to Matthew Boulton, 26 January 1785. 76 But see Eric Robinson, op. cit., 115-39. ’’ Richard Guest, op. cit., 21.

T. Ridgway to R. Arkwright Jnr., 25 March 1799, printed in R. S. Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, op. cit., 61-2.


common conversation. . . (he was) allowed by all his acquaintance to be a very ingenious man’;79 Josiah Wedgwood also found Arkwright ‘a very sens- ible intelligent man but his views confined chiefly to mechanics’.80 He undoubtedIy received assistance from Highs and Kay of Warrington, besides others, but it is not without significance that, Strutt excepted, Arkwright chose as his partners, not men possessed of particular mechnical knowledge or skill but men with capital. The success of Arkwright’s enterprise must be credited not only to his genius as a businessman but also to his skills as inventor and innovator in the development, planning and control of the means of production.

7 g T. Ridgway to R. Arkwright Jnr., 25 March 1799, printed in R. S. Fitton and A. P. Wadsworth, op. cif. 61-2.

8o A. Finer and G. Savage, The Selected Letters of Josiuh Wedgwood (London 19651, 284.

Documents

RICHARD ARKWRIGHT AND TECHNOLOGY1