Oldham Historical Research Group

Scan and page transcript from:
Historical Sketches of Oldham by Edwin Butterworth
Pub. 1856

Historical Sketches of Oldham by Edwin Butterworth

employed in manufactures and machine making was 7004. In 1814 the sum which the moderately efficient hand-loom weavers of the township of Crompton could earn in a week, working ten hours and a half each day was 13s. 9d.; in 1833 the same description of weavers could only earn for the same quantity of work 4s. 6d. per week; the net sum which they earned per week at the former period, deducting expenses of rent, fuel, &c., was 10s. 11/2d. and at the latter period 2s. 9d.

Of the 49 cotton manufactories or 62 mills which the township of Oldham contained in 1831, 18 of these concerns employed, in June, 1833, an aggregate of 3459 hands. At the same period there were 22 cotton concerns within the borough which employed 1318 adult males, 824 adult females, 813 male children under eighteen years of age, and 820 female children under the same age. The number of male children under fourteen years of age employed was 442, female 398, total 840. Of the male children 575 were in the direct employ of the operatives, and 196 in the direct employ of masters. Of the female children 506 were in the direct employ of masters, and 276 in the direct employ of operatives. The aggregate average number of hands then engaged in these concerns was 3,775. The aggregate amount of their net earnings for the month ending May 4, 1833, was £7,577 3s. 3d. The total number of hands employed in the cotton mills of the township of Oldham in 1833 was about 11,000.

The extensive and efliciently managed cotton manufactories of Messrs. James Lees, Son, and Co., Wallshaw mills, and Mr. James Lees, Green bank mills, were considerably extended in the period comprised from 1830 to 1835. In 1830, when Joseph Jones junr., Esq., was the possessor of Wallshaw mills, the number of adult operatives employed there was 152. In 1846 Mr. Jones and his partners employed 400 hands, of whom 160 were power-loom weavers. The number of

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