8 - Cotton

Summary

The cotton mill presents the most striking example of the dominion obtained by human science over the powers of nature, of which modern times can boast. That this vast aggregate of important discoveries and inventions should, with scarcely an exception, have proceeded from English genius, must be a reflection highly satisfactory to every Englishman.

Edward Baines, History of the Cotton Manufacture, 1835, p. 244

Cotton was the wonder industry of the Industrial Revolution. From small beginnings, employment reached 425,000 in the 1830s and accounted for 16 per cent of jobs in British manufacturing and 8 per cent of British GDP (Deane and Cole 1969, pp. 143, 166, 187, Wood 1910, pp. 596–9). Giant cities were conjured where mill operatives lived and worked. Explaining how and why the cotton industry became so big is fundamental to explaining the Industrial Revolution.

Technological innovation was a central part of the story. In the middle of the eighteenth century, England had a small industry by world standards. About 3 million pounds of yarn were spun each year in England (Wadsworth and Mann 1931, p. 521). France was the other leading European producer, and it was about the same size as Britain. Both were dwarfed by Bengal, which produced about 85 million pounds per year and was an important competitor for European producers in markets like Africa where cottons were exchanged for slaves.