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The Industrial Revolution and the Pottery Industry

The pottery industry of Staffordshire is full of examples of ways in which potters adopted a rational approach to manufacturing problems and solved them in a methodical, determined and logical way.

Although there was a minimum of machinery even by 1795, pottery manufacturers had adopted the system of the division of labour and used hand-operated making machines in order to increase production to meet the growing demand from an increased population at home and increased business from overseas.

Some other examples are:

Pottery manufacture grew as an industry from a very strong base. By 1740 North Staffordshire was already the centre of production for England, by 1800 it was the most important centre in the world.

Manufacturing and decorating :

Raw materials, bodies and glazes 
Ball clay and flint had been introduced before 1720, despite the great difficulties of transport. This allowed white glazed stoneware and creamware to be produced. Water power was harnessed to crush and grind in water the flint which was now being prepared on an increasing scale to meet the growing demand.

Water mills on streams around the Potteries were converted from grinding corn or built purposely to carry out the much heavier task of grinding calcined flint. The grinding of flint in water was patented in 1726 by Thomas Benson and on improving the method in 1732. James Brindley, improved the method still further in about 1757 and his method was used until recently.

The method of preparing the raw materials had been to mix them together in the wet form and evaporate the surplus water in the open air in what were known as 'sun pans'. In about 1730 Ralph Shaw introduced the coal fired slip kiln which by removing the need for sunshine, allowed clay bodies to be made when needed.

In 1747 kaolin or china clay, and petunze or Cornish stone were discovered after much research by William Cookworthy in the south west of England.

Enoch Booth developed a method of suspending lead oxides in a fluid to allow articles to be immersed in a fluid glaze instead of applying the lead sulphide as a powder, the start of 'dipping'. Dipping lead to a change in firing. Previously the lead powder had been sprinkled on the clay ware and fired together to produce a once fired piece. Now with the dipping of ware into a fluid glaze, it was important to fire the ware first to the 'biscuit' stage and then after to dip the biscuit ware into the glaze and refire at a lower temperature.

Moulds for shaping clay articles had been made of alabaster, fired pottery, wood and other materials, but on his return from Paris in about 1745, Ralph Daniel began to use plaster of Paris. It is quarried as gypsum and then burnt under controlled conditions. Potters now had a good absorbent material to use for mould making.

As the need for more of these raw materials became greater, so did the need for power. The larger manufacturing units preferred to have the control of their grinding in their own hands, and many potters owned the water mills on nearby rivers.

One or two manufacturers built windmills, such as the one designed by James Brindley in Burslem, and reputedly, another one was built by Josiah Wedgwood at Etruria. These were attempts to overcome the lack of a flowing stream.

The answer was found by Josiah Spode, who in 1779 erected a steam pumping engine which raised the water to a tank from which it flowed over an overshot water wheel. The power, though fairly small, was sufficient to power the mills for grinding flint and stone, some glazes and colours, as well as driving the throwing wheel and turners lathes.

In 1782, following James Watts' patent rotary motion steam engine, Josiah Wedgwood ordered one for his Etruria works and this was installed in 1783. By 1785 Staffordshire was second only to Cornwall in the number of steam engines in the county . By 1795 Staffordshire had installed more Watt steam engines than any other county in England.

Developments in making 
The use of plaster of Paris for mouldmaking, introduced into the Potteries about 1745, made producing more elaborate shapes, such as the pineapple and cauliflower teapots which were popular at that time, possible.

Some of this ware would have been pressed from plastic clay, but by 1750 a new method had come into use. This was slip casting, using clay in suspension. It was suitable for making small items, but until special additives were introduced at the beginning of this century, large moulds would have been saturated with water before the clay deposit was thick enough.

The other major development at this time was the introduction of the string throwing wheel. It is supposed that a man called Alsager introduced these improvements about 1735. It would have increased the production of thrown wares.

Firing 
As production increased, so the size of oven would be enlarged and the number of firemouths increased. This needed an increasing amount of control to ensure the correct firing of the ware without undue losses. Early kilns would consist of grates from which the hot flames would lead straight into the kiln and out through holes in the top - the simplest type of up-draught oven. The hovel part might be built directly on top of the kiln itself, but as increased control was demanded and the size of the oven increased, so the kiln was often separated from the hovel, and the space used for storing coal. Under floor flues were needed to allow the centre of the oven to be heated properly.

Another aspect of firing was the correct measurement of the work done on the ware by the heat. This was easier to measure than the exact temperature of the kiln. Josiah Wedgwood developed a system of pyrometric beads, made of a varying mixture of ceramic materials which would contract according to the heat work done on them. He devised a simple scale by which the size of the beads could be measured and an approximate temperature read off the scale.

Saggars had been necessary for many years, but in the process of salt glazing these saggars had holes cut into them to allow the action of the salt vapour to take effect on the red hot surface of the clay. With the increasing use of lead as a glazing material, these holes were not desirable, and so saggars were made without holes, enclosing the ware in an atmosphere tight box.

The introduction of dipping ware in a fluid glaze meant that two firings were necessary. It also meant that the first, or biscuit firing, could be to a higher temperature than for once fired lead glazed ware. The temperature at which the biscuit earthenware was fired would be between 1150 C and 1250 C (and at this temperature lead volatizes).

The later glost firing would be at a temperature about 100 C lower. The Glost fired ware had to be separated from each other by a variety of sharp pointed refractory items such as cockspurs, thimbles and strips. The technique of placing ware for the glost firing was very skilled and also dangerous to health because of the contamination of the lead.

Decorating 
Colours were made from oxides and carbonites of metals. The common metals gave black, brown, green red and yellow. Cobalt which was very expensive gave blue. Factories sent their glazed wares to specialist decorating workshops for hand painting.

It was in Liverpool that the printing of earthenware from engraved copper plates was first introduced by John Sadler in about 1750.  Staffordshire Potteries especially Wedgwood sent their creamwares to him. Most of these prints were either black, brown or red. At the same time there was a growth in the use of cobalt blue for painting decorations imitating the imported Chinese porcelain. As this style became more popular the use of printing from copper plates became more widespread and were used in Staffordshire from the 1780s.

Factory organisation 
The demand for earthenwares meant much better organisation of labour and processes in a factory were needed. The potting skills had been separated into specialised departments in the workshops by the 1740s in a movement led by the Elers brothers.

So when Wedgwood designed his model factory at Etruria, (completed by 1769) he was able to layout the factory according to a very logical plan. Other pottery factories would have been developed along similar lines. Although they did not have the advantage of sufficient wealth to lay out a brand new factory on a new site, many manufacturers could install steam engines and develop buildings continuing in design the old scheme of squares by which maximum light was made available to craftsmen and craftswomen.

The majority of factories were laid out so that the goods would travel in a logical direction. From the intake of raw materials to the sliphouse, clay making workshops, biscuit kilns and warehouse, dipping room, glost placing and firing, sorting and selection warehouse and then to the decorating departments and kiln.

During the nineteenth century as business expanded, this layout scheme was altered and the sequence was often muddled. The aim was to have the lighter work on the first floor levels and the heavier on the ground floor.

Casting, dish pressing, plate making and decorating were mostly first floor, while throwing and turning were on the ground floor so that they could have access to a damp cellar. Saggar making with its heavy materials was usually ground floor.

After the construction of the Trent and Mersey Canal, factory plans were arranged so that raw materials, the milling of them and the steam engine would be close to the canal to reduce carrying. Similarly the despatch department would be near to the canal for loading boats with casks and crates of finished goods. Away from the canal the same points apply to roads.

Transport

Roads
The condition of roads in the eighteenth century were terrible all over England, but the roads in Staffordshire were so bad that even seasoned travellers like Arthur Young commented in 1768 "Let me persuade all travellers to avoid this terrible country".

Horse drawn wagons taking ware to market caused ruts in the roads which in winter were generally impassable, and some potters still used packhorses. It was obviously in the interests of the potters to press for better highways. Josiah Wedgwood had both prestige and business skill and he used these qualities to persuade people that better roads could only bring about increased trade and prosperity for the whole district.

The Turnpike Act had originally been passed in 1714 and renewed in 1734, but the Potteries had not been affected apart from an eight mile stretch between Tittensor and Talk o' the Hill (now the A34), and the Derby to Newcastle road (A50) which passes through Longton.  An Act of Parliament was passed in March 1763 supporting road improvements and over 300 local trustees including Wedgwood, were appointed to value sites and give contracts for constructing new roads. Certain concessions were made to the potters for instance no toll gate was to be erected nearer than Meir. By 1800 a network of turnpiked road served north Staffordshire and the surrounding country.

Canals
Turnpiking was of great benefit to the potters, but Wedgwood had even greater ambitions for the development of local transport.

The nearest navigable river was the Weaver in Cheshire, too far from the Potteries to be viable. Rivers were subject to weather changes, and do not follow a logical network so journeys still needed to be supplemented by packhorse. By 1765 Wedgwood was busy getting support for a canal scheme for the Potteries. He subscribed £1,000 towards the initial cost, and was instrumental in presenting the canal bill to parliament.

The Grand Trunk Canal or the Trent and Mersey as it became known, was designed by James Brindley, a local engineer and completed in 1777. It rapidly cut the cost of transport from 10d to 1 1/2 d per ton per mile, because a canal boat could carry a weight of over 20 tons as opposed to a packhorse weight of two cwts.

Several smaller canals eventually fed into the Grand Trunk (Trent and Mersey) including the Cauldon canal (Shelton to Endon) bringing lime and coal, and the Stoke to Newcastle, bringing coal.

Bibliography

E McArthur, Outlines of English Industrial History.

John Thomas, The Rise of the Staffordshire Potteries.

Ivy Pinchbeck, Women Workers and the Industrial Revolution

The Potteries: A study in the Evolution of a Cultural Landscape; Transactions of the Institute of British Geography No34, 1964.

Diane Baker, Potworks.

C Hawke-Smith, The Making of the Potteries Landscape.