There's trouble at t'mill
Century-old records reveal terrible human toll of a Leeds museum's industrial past
A chance discovery of an old book, stuffed away in a box of forgotten records, deep in the archives of a Leeds museum, has opened a portal to the dangers endured by industrial workers over a century ago.
The find is an accident book, recording the harrowing injuries and tragic deaths of mill workers employed at what was once one of the world's largest textile mills. It reveals in stark detail the gruelling conditions workers endured, as they toiled to generate profits for the textile magnates of Edwardian times.
Back then, West Yorkshire was at the heart of the global wool textiles industry. Neighbouring city, Bradford was known as the 'Wool Capital of the World', while Armley Mills in Leeds was regarded as one of the world largest mills.
These days, the Grade II*-listed facility serves as the Leeds Industrial Museum; an altogether safer environment for employees and visitors alike, but as the discovery makes clear – it was a once a place where workers risked life and limb simply to earn their daily bread.
The trove of historic records was found stashed in a box by curators at the museum; a relic of its days as a working industrial facility.
Stark details
“We know that for hundreds of years, the museum was a bustling, hugely productive centre for the manufacture of textiles, which employed hundreds of people from the local area,” said John McGoldrick, Leeds Museums and Galleries’ curator of industrial history.
“But until now, we haven’t known a great deal about the individuals who worked here, so finding these documents is a real treasure trove of information from which we can start to build a much more complete picture of life at the mill.
“In particular, seeing such stark details of the injuries and deaths suffered by workers here more than a century ago paints a very vivid picture of how difficult and gruelling their working conditions must have been, and helps us to better understand the impact of the textile trade on the lives of people in Leeds.”
Carefully listed within the records were scores of incidents that lay bare those harsh working conditions and gruelling lifestyle endured by the city’s textile workers, shortly after the turn of the 20th century.
Among the tragedies described is the sad death of 44-year-old William Bell, who in February of 1905 was killed when a two-tonne milling machine he was moving with his fellow workers unexpectedly toppled onto him.
A newspaper report at the time described the death as a “tragic accident” and said Bell and his colleague Albert Holdsworth had been moving the cloth milling device from one side of a room to the other using rollers.
It added: “Suddenly, and without warning, the machine fell onto Bell and Holdsworth. Assistance was immediately at hand and the unfortunate men were extricated with difficulty.”
Bell, who had worked at Armley for four years, was killed instantly, leaving behind a wife and three children, while his co-worker suffered an injury to his left leg.
Sadly, the records reveal that Bell's was not the only death recorded at the site. In 1909, W Hinchcliffe, a 40 year-old engineer, was also killed while removing the firebars, used to support fuel, from a boiler before a formal inspection in September 1909.
Severed fingers
Other workers suffered many more injuries including severed fingers, and a fall down the stairs while carrying a warp, which was used to prepare fabric for weaving.
Later incidents saw Doris Gatenby, an 18-year-old weaver, fall foul of a common accident in weaving departments, when in May 1922 she received a cut near her temple after a shuttle flew out of a loom and hit her on the head.
And in September 1935 filler and minder Edna Atkinson had three fingers of her left hand crushed in the rollers of a ‘Scotch Feed’ carding engine. In June 1937, William H Waddington, a spinner, also fractured his arm while repairing the leather belt on a loom.
Also included in the documents, which all date from when the mill was owned and operated by Bentley and Tempest, is a list of the names and addresses for workers who, despite the harsh conditions, were aged under 16 and under 18.
“The textile industry played a huge role in establishing Leeds as an economic powerhouse and is part of the fabric of the city and its heritage,” said Councillor Jonathan Pryor, the city council's deputy leader and executive member for economy, culture, and education.
“But it’s also important that we consider how the industry impacted the city and the people who lived here, and it’s fantastic that the industrial museum continues to research and develop new aspects of that story.”
Built in at least the 1600s, Armley Mills was bought in the late 1700s by Colonel Thomas Lloyd, a Leeds cloth merchant. He expanded operations on the site dramatically, so much so that Armley was soon the world’s biggest mill of its kind.
Although production ended in 1969, the site reopened as Leeds Industrial Museum in 1982 and today displays vintage machinery, including traditional looms and other textile equipment once used by workers.
As for those records, their discovery certainly offers a fascinating – if grim – glimpse into the realities of the past, but the documents also surely serve a lesson as to why, in this modern age, we have statutory health and safety regulations intended to keep us safe at work.
Life, after all, is cheap when private profit reigns unfettered.
MC