Industry in the Early Modern Period III
- Created by: Alasdair
- Created on: 20-05-18 14:24
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- Industry in the Early Modern Period III: R. R. Angerstein’s Illustrated Travel Diary, 1753-1755
- Reinhold Rucker Angerstein
- 1718-1760
- Ironmaster, member of Jernkontoret (Swedish ironmaster's association, founded 1754)
- Founded to find solution to poor demand and low prices in Swedish iron industry
- Realised they should focus on quality
- Angerstein's Illustrated Travel Diary
- 900-page diary including detailed illustrations
- Acted as a sequel to Daniel Defoe's observations 30 years earlier
- Swedes concerned about threats to position of main exporter of bar iron to Britain in C18th from Russia and America (and technical innovations in British iron industry)
- Notes proposition of Swedish iron in ports and comparative prices, as well as reputation of Swedish iron
- Especially Oregrund iron from Dannemora mines
- Regarded as best iron for Steel manufacture
- Especially Oregrund iron from Dannemora mines
- Visited at time of gradual development
- Many key advances yet to be made
- e.g. Arkwright's water-power machinery
- Many key advances yet to be made
- Recorded traditional as well as innovative practices
- e.g. Hops grown in Kent, stockings knitted in East Midlands and Worcestershire
- Iron Industry
- Most furnaces still used charcoal in smelting despite claimed shortage of wood
- Angerstein suggests shortage due to unsatisfactory forestry which could be resolved by planting replacements for trees that were felled
- However, evidence suggests ironmasters did take forestry management seriously and it was not short of trees
- but costs of quantity of labour needed to produce charcoal that was main reason for attempts to replace it as fuel
- Clifton and Coalbrookedale furnaces were only ones using coke-smelting, but iron from these produced unsatisfactory bar iron and was used for castings
- Supports view that use of coke from iron smelting only spread slowly in first half of C18th
- The output of charcoal smelted iron likely reached its peak in 1750, despite Darby establishing first coke-fired furnace in 1709
- Most furnaces still used charcoal in smelting despite claimed shortage of wood
- Industrial Diversity in towns
- Nottingham
- Workers produced more than 20,000 pairs of stockings a week
- Built the frames themselves
- Derby
- Residents dammed River Derwent and tributaries to drive mills for silk manufacture and rolling and slitting of iron
- Also home to renowned porcelain and white-ware works
- Nottingham
- The Aston Blast Furnace
- Six workers at the mine
- Produce 17 tons per week
- Paid 3 shillings a week and 17 pence per ton of iron
- Furnace worked for 3 years except 11 days during last blast
- Six workers at the mine
- Iron Foundy
- Factory where metal castings are produced
- Observed methods of pouring iron, casting slabs, hammerheads
- Steel Furnace
- Single loading of furnaces takes 7 tons of iron
- Heating goes on for 6 days
- Used 16 tons of coal
- Workers paid 9 shillings per week
- Oregund iron used here (from Bristol, costs £22 per ton)
- Steel sold for £28 per ton
- Recording prices could be helpful for Swedes in attempting to replicate similar industries
- Single loading of furnaces takes 7 tons of iron
- Button Factory
- Observed the casting, stamping, turning, polishing and scouring of buttons with the aid of lathes (spindles split to hold loop of button)
- Brass works
- Counted 9 furnaces, 3 in each building
- Furnaces heated with mineral coal (15 tons used for each furnace-melting lasting 10 hours)
- Each furnace holds 9 pots, 14 inches high and 9 inches in diameter at the top
- Each pot charged with 41 pounds of copper and 50 pounds of calamine, mixed with coal
- Angerstein's interactions with Industrialists and workers
- Angerstein records in his diary that:
- Button manufacturers 'took a jaundiced view of strangers because they were quite jealous of their machines and workers'
- Owner of steel works allowed him into button factory, but owner of button factory berated workers for allowing him access
- Angerstein records in his diary that:
- What was a Swedish visitor like Angerstein particularly interested in?
- Metal works
- Innovative practices
- How did labour costs and lack of resources effect the pace of industrialisation in England and Wales?
- Not many cases where there was a lack of resources
- What is the most useful feature of Angerstein's text for a modern reader?
- Demonstrates aspects of English industry were desired to be replicated by other countries
- Precise details of industrial works of England
- Reinhold Rucker Angerstein
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