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Belfast as 'Linenopolis'
In 1750 Belfast was a small town with little importance for the Irish textile industry. By the outbreak of the First World War, however, it had been transformed into the largest linen producing centre not only in Ireland but the world. The change in Belfast was caused, as was the case with so many towns in the British Isles, by the coming of the Industrial Revolution.In the middle of the eighteenth century, linen, the most common textile manufactured in Ireland, was not produced in towns or factories, but domestically, in rural areas. It went hand in hand with agriculture: the family grew flax along with its foodstuffs, the wife and children prepared it and spun the yarn, and the husband wove the yarn into cloth. The woven cloth was taken to one of the brown linen markets where it was bought by bleachers for finishing, then exported to England, the main market, and elsewhere.
Though linen making was concentrated in Ulster, and remained so, the opening up of new markets - especially in South America - encouraged people in the other provinces - particularly Connacht, to turn to linen making as a means of boosting the family income. Irish linen was of a fine quality, and was used for such things as sheets, tablecloths and clothing. The profitable export trade was controlled by merchants operating through Dublin. However, in the second half of the eighteenth century the bleachers of the Lagan valley gradually built up direct links with English merchants, sending their linens through Belfast. This brought about an important shift in the trading pattern. By 1783 Belfast's linen exports had grown to such an extent that the bleachers decided to build a hall in which white linens could be bought and sold. Ten thousand pounds was raised by public subscription, and in 1785, amid much ceremony and acclaim, the prestigious White Linen Hall was opened. Its symbolic significance can not have been lost on many, least of all the Dublin merchants.
However, some years before the White Linen Hall was first mooted, the seeds had been sown for the transformation of Belfast from a market town and linen exporting centre into a large industrial city. Ironically, the route for this transformation was not a direct one from the domestic production of linen in the town's hinterland to its industrialised production inside the city's boundaries. Rather it took a diversion by way of the cotton industry, which grew out of an experiment started in Belfast's Poor House in 1778.
In that year the Belfast Charitable Committee decided that the children of the Poor House could be usefully employed spinning cotton by hand. Nicholas Grimshaw, a committee member, provided a carding machine and spinning wheel for the operation. About a year later Robert Joy and Thomas McCabe offered to install machinery which would enable them to carry on their spinning on a larger scale. This offer was readily accepted and so, in effect, part of the Belfast Poor house became the town's first spinning mill. By 1780 the operation employed ninety.
From this unusual beginning the Belfast cotton spinning industry expanded rapidly because the cost of mill spinning drastically undercut the cost of hand spinning. Furthermore, although Belfast cotton spinners experienced certain disadvantages vis à vis their Lancashire [English] rivals, they were protected from this competition by a high tariff barrier.
By 1820 over 2000 people were employed in about fifteen cotton mills spread over the city and out as far as Lisburn, Bangor and Larne. The centre of the industry, however, was the Smithfield area [of Belfast]. Here, John McCracken's mill employed 200, operating 14,000 spindles, while the workforce of McCrum, Lepper and Co. was 300. Their mill, which was sited behind the Artillery Barracks, was 200 feet long, 40 feet wide and 5 storeys high - a massive structure for the time. Another mill in Winetavern Street was 70 feet long, 36 feet wide and 5 storeys high, with 5364 spindles and 24 carding machines. In 1815 this mill was bought by Thomas Mulholland, who later acquired one in Francis Street, and in 1822 built another in Henry Street, becoming one of the largest manufacturers in the town. He was to play a vital role in the development of Belfast's textile industry.
This article was extracted from the Appletree Press title
Belfast - The Making of the City
Click here to buy the Appletree Press book from Amazon.co.uk. For more information of the Appletree Press title, click on: "Belfast - The Making of the City".
What does Helena Blunden have to do with Linenopolis?
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