at 5,035,798, being an increase of 1,402,105, or 38.5 per cent. over the aggregate in 1850, which was estimated at 3,633,693. The New England States possess 3,959,297, or 78.6 per cent. of the whole, while Massachusetts alone employs 1,739,700, or 29.3 per cent. of the number returned in the Union. The increase of spindles in the last decade was, in New England, 1,208,219, or 30 per cent. In the State of Maine, 186,100, or 163.3 per cent.; in the State of New Hampshire, 229,484, or 52.1 per cent.; in the State of Massachusetts, 451,609, or 35 per cent.; in the State of Rhode Island, 141,862, or 22.7 per cent.; in the State of Connecticut, 211,188, or 83.1 per cent.; while in Vermont it exhibited a decrease. The product per spindle varies in the different States, partly accounted for by the fact that many manufacturers purchase yarns which have been spun in other States. The product of cotton goods per spindle is as follows: In Maine, $22.12; Massachusetts, $21-12; New Hampshire, $24.87; Vermont, $18.13; Rhode Island, $16; Connecticut, $16. 46. The average in the New England States is $20. 30; in the middle States, $30.48, and in the whole Union, $22.86. The quantity of cotton used in the fabrication of the above goods was 364,036,123 pounds, or 910,090 bales of 400 pounds each. Of this amount the New England States consumed 611,738 bales, and Massachusetts alone 316,665. The consumption per spindle in that year in the various States and sections was as follows: When we consider the large number of hands, and especially of women and children, who find employment in this business, the quantity of raw material, of machinery and of fuel, exclusively of American production, employed in this branch, and the amount of comfortable clothing and household stuffs supplied at cheap rates, or the amount it contributes to the internal and foreign commerce of the Union - its progressive increase is a subject of the highest satisfaction, and its growth both here and abroad is one of the marvels of the nineteenth century. III. THE WOOLEN INDUSTRY, 1811-1860 A. Woolen Cloth for Army Uniforms, 18111 The woolen industry had been important from an early day, for the "homespun " worn by the colonists was made of wool. Although its manufacture fell behind that of cotton goods with the introduction of machinery, it continued to be increasingly important down to the breaking out of the Civil War. Even before the Second War with Great Britain the American manufactures were able to compete with the English product. In the woollen branch offers [of cloth for army uniforms] were abundant, and the finer the goods or the materials proposed the more ready the disposition, abundant the quantity in proportion to the demand and moderate the prices. The best cloths, suitable for the commissioned officers, were offered upon terms the least advanced above the European prices, owing to the spreading of the merino sheep. The cloths for the non-commissioned officers and privates, were offered upon terms advanced upon the next degree of moderation above the European prices, because the great body of our native or ld stock of sheep produce wool, which after picking out a little coarse and a good deal of fine, will do well for cloths suitable for these two purposes. B. Early Agitation for Sheep Raising, 18112 Friends of American woolen manufactures early called attention to the importance of increasing the flocks and of improving the breed of sheep in the United States. To this end they pointed out the superior advantages of the country in this respect over Great Britain. The following is a typical appeal: It will be found in Mr. Arthur Young's "Report (p. 367) on Lincolnshire" in England, that the whole land in that county is 1,848,000 acres; having on them 2,400,000 sheep of two heavy fleeced breeds, producing 21,610,000 pounds of wool, selling at one-sixth of a dollar (or 15 pence sterling) per pound. The whole value of un 1 Niles' Register (Baltimore, 1811), I, 45. manufactured wool is £810,000 sterling; equal to 3,600,000 dollars.This, at our prices for wool, would be equal in value to all the American cotton exported from the United States in a year, being 7 or 8 millions of dollars. The weight of this wool is greater than the weight of all the sheep wool yet made in the United States in any year. When it is considered, that the quantity of land in Lincolnshire (G. B.) is not more than one-fifteenth of the land in Pennsylvania, or in New York, a tenth of South Carolina, or one-twelfth of North Carolina, there can be no doubt of the immense capacity of the United States to produce wool. The county of Lincoln (G. B.) is in a great part fenny or marshy: in part it is heath: in parts dry and rich. Some of the fenny districts produce fleeces of fourteen pounds. It is probable that some of our richest drained swamps would be excellent for such sheep. Mr. Young states, that the average of the Lincolnshire sheep, of the two different breeds, is nine pounds of wool to the fleece: and those farmers who confine themselves to the Lincolnshire breed get ten pound. Some authorities say eleven pounds, are the true average weight of the fleeces of the true Lincolnshire breed. Let us increase our care of sheep, and omit to kill any lambs or sheep under three years old, and we shall have more wool in the next year or two for our army, navy, militia, and camp followers and all attendants and privateers, than will be requisite for any war with any power in Europe. C. State of the Woolen Industry in 18161 In 1816 the house committee on commerce and manufactures expressed the belief that a memorial from which the following extract is taken was substantially correct. At this time there are in the State of Connecticut alone twentyfive establishments for the manufacture of woollen cloths, employing twelve hundred persons, and as many more indirectly who do not immediately appertain to the establishment. The capital already invested therein amounts to four hundred and fifty thousand dollars; and they are capable of making, and probably do manufacture annually, equal in amount to three hundred and seventy-five thousand yards of narrow, or one hundred and twenty-five thousand yards of broadcloths. Besides this quantity made at the establishments, it is calculated there are five hundred thousand yards made annually in families and dressed in the country clothiers' shops; part of which 1 House Committee Report on Domestic Manufactures. Annals of Congress, 1815-16 (Washington, 1854), 1701-3. The value of all the is regularly sold to the country stores; woollen cloths thus manufactured, at the lowest estimate, is about $1,500,000, making a home market for a staple of nine hundred thousand pounds of wool, or the produce of four hundred thousand sheep. . . . A great proportion of the woollen manufacture is done by the assistance of labor-saving machinery, which is almost exclusively superintended by women and children, and the infirm, who would otherwise be wholly destitute of employment; whereas they are now able to maintain themselves. The manual labor employed is of that class who, from their previous habits and occupations in life, are wholly unfitted for agricultural pursuits; and who, if not thus employed would, in most instances, be a burden on society. SUMMARY Permanent capital in buildings and machinery. .$12,000,000. 7,000,000. 19,000,000. 12,000,000. In 1860 the woolen establishments in the United States numbered almost two thousand, represented an investment of more than $35,000,000, and gave employment to 50,000 hands. The returns of Woolen Manufacturers show an increase of over fifty-one per cent. in ten years. The value of woollen and mixed goods made in 1850 was $45,281,764. In 1860 it amounted to $68,865,963. The establishments numbered 1,909, of which 453 were in New England, 748 in the middle, 479 in the western, 2 in the Pacific, and 227 in the southern States.. The aggregate capital invested in the business was $35,520,527, and it employed 28,780 male and 20,120 female hands, 639,700 spindles, and 16,075 looms, which worked up more than eighty million pounds of wool, the value of which, with other raw materials, was $40,360,300. The foregoing figures include satinets, Kentucky jeans, and other fabrics of which the warp is cotton, though usually classed with woollens. In the 1 Preliminary Report on the Eighth Census, 1860. (Washington, 1862), 67. manufacture of these mixed goods the amount of cotton consumed is 16,008,625 pounds, which, with 364,036,123 pounds used in making cotton goods, as previously stated, amounts to 380,044,748 pounds, or 950,112 bales, exclusive of a considerable quantity used, annually, in household manufactures, and for various other purposes. The largest amount of woollens was made in New England, where the capital was nearly twenty millions of dollars, and the value of the product $38,509,080, but little less than the total value in 1850. More than half the capital, and nearly one-half of the product of New England belonged to Massachusetts, which had 131 factories of large size. Rhode Island ranked next, and had increased its manufacture 163 per cent. in ten years, that of Massachusetts being 48 per cent. The value of woollens produced in the middle States was $24,100,488, in the western $3,718,092, and in the Pacific and southern $2,538,303. The sectional increase was, in New England 52.1, in the middle States 54, and in the south 107 - the last showing the greatest relative increase. Pennsylvania, next to Massachusetts, was the largest producer, having 447 factories, which made $12,744,373 worth of woollen and mixed fabrics, an increase of 120 per cent. A value of $8,919,019 was the product of 222 establishments in the city of Philadelphia. The State of New York holds the third rank in relation to this industry, its manufactures amounting to more than nine millions of dollars. The woollen manufactures of Maryland exhibit an increase of 86 per cent. In Ohio, which produced in 1850 a greater value of woollens than all the other western States, there was a decrease on the product of 1850, owing, probably, to the shipments of wool to Europe, which, in 1857, was found to be the most profitable disposition of the rapidly increasing wool crops of that State. In Kentucky, now the largest manufacturer of wool in the west, the product was $1,128,882, and the increase in ten years 40.4 per cent.; while in Indiana, which ranks next, it was 31 per cent., and in Missouri 18.8, on the product of 1850. . . . The quantity of wool returned for the whole Union in 1850 was upwards of fifty-two and a half millions of pounds. Sheep raising has been greatly extended and improved since that date in Ohio, Texas, California, and other States, and the clip in 1860 amounted to 60,511,343 pounds, an increase of 15.2 per cent. in ten years. The yield still falls far short of the consumption, and large quantities continue to be imported, notwithstanding the amount of territory adapted to sheep husbandry. |