Arkwright's Significant Contribution to the Industrial Revolution's Workforce. (A Free Education Fundraiser).

The industrial revolution brought about big changes in the way people were employed. However, it also brought some terrible working conditions and a surge in child labour. Children from 4 years of age were employed in factories; there was even at least one case of a 3 year old being employed. The children's size made them useful for work in places that adults couldn't fit. Orphans were often used pretty much as slaves, working long hours in return for food, board and clothing.

Child labour was a bonus for employers as they could be paid at a fraction of the rate that adults were, but for those living in poverty, any income was desirable. Children were often aids for the adult workers and mistakes were severely punished, often with beatings. Then there were the ever present dangers of machinery which could cause loss of appendages, limbs and sometimes even life. Conditions weren't much better for the post adult workers either.

So what fascinated me the most when we took a school trip to Cromford Mills many years ago, was the way that Sir Richard Arkwright treated his employees.

Richard Arkwright was born in Preston in 1732. In the 1760s he invented and patented a spinning machine superior to others available at the time. After running a horse powered mill in Nottingham, he went on to build cotton mills on the banks of the river Derwent in Cromford in 1771. At the time there weren't enough people in Cromford village to run the mills, so he brought in workers from further afield, building houses, a chapel and market to accommodate them.

Source. Arkwright's Mills.

The pay at his factories was higher than at many others bringing his workers out of extreme poverty. Children were only employed from the age of 7 (later, when Richard Arkwright Junior took over, the age was raised to 10) and he also provided them with education so that they could do the office work that their illiterate parents could not. The factory operated 24 hours a day, but the children were only employed during the day. Employees even got some time off each year, although they had to stay in the village.

The way that Arkwright ran his factories was so unusual that it was remarked upon by others. A visiting doctor, Sylas Neville, wrote of Arkwright that he “by his conduct appears to be a man of great understanding to know the way of making people do their best.” Another visitor, Joseph Farington, wrote in his diary that as the children came from their work he “was glad to see them look in general very healthy and many with rosy fine complexions.”

Arkwright's innovative way of running his factories didn't stop with him. In 1784 he went to New Lanark Scotland and picked out a suitable area for a mill there. He briefly partnered with David Dale, a partnership which was dissolved in 1785. Dale went on to build the mills and a large part of the work force was once again children, which was not unusual. According to his contemporaries, what was unusual was the way he treated them so well in comparison to other factories of the time. Not only did the children working for him receive education, but the younger children did too. By 1796 the school he established employed 16 teachers who taught over 500 children.

I like to think that people like this pioneer the way for change for the better.

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