Piccadilly Mill, also known as Bank Top Mill [1] or Drinkwater's Mill, owned by Peter Drinkwater, was the first cotton mill in Manchester, England, [2] to be directly powered by a steam engine, [3] and the 10th such mill in the world. [1] Construction of the four-storey mill on Auburn Street started in 1789 [3] and its 8 hp Boulton and Watt engine was installed and working by 1 May 1790. [4] Initially the engine drove only the preparatory equipment and spinning was done manually. [5] The mill-wright was Thomas Lowe, who had worked for William Fairbairn and helped with the planning two of Arkwright's earliest factories. [6]
During the early 1790s the mill employed around 500 workers. [4] Robert Owen was employed as the manager in 1792. [5]
References
- ^ a b Kidd 2013.
- ^ Oxford Archaeology North (2005). "PICCADILLY MILL, PICCADILLY, MANCHESTER Post-Excavation Assessment" (PDF).
- ^ a b Nevell 2007, p. 198.
- ^ a b Nevell 2007, p. 199.
- ^ a b Miller & Wild 2007, p. 18.
- ^ Miller & Wild 2007, p. 64.
Bibliography
- Kidd, Alan J. (2013), "Drinkwater, Peter (1750–1801), cotton manufacturer", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, retrieved 23 December 2013
- Miller, Ian; Wild, Chris (2007), A & G Murray and the Cotton Mills of Ancoats, Lancaster Imprints, ISBN 978-0-904220-46-9
- Nevell, Michael (2007), "The Social Archaeology of Industrialisation: the example of Manchester during the 17th and 18th centuries", in Casella, Eleanor Conlin; Symonds, James (eds.), Industrial Archaeology: Future Directions, Springer, pp. 177–204, ISBN 978-0-387-22831-0, retrieved 23 December 2013
