COMMERCIAL POLITICS--THE ALBION MILLS--RIOTS IN CORNWALL--PROSPERITY OF
BOULTON AND WATT.
When Boulton returned to Birmingham, he was urgently called upon to take
part in a movement altogether foreign to his habits. He had heretofore
been too much engrossed by business to admit of his taking any active
part in political affairs. Being, however, of an active temperament,
and mixing with men of all classes, he could not but feel an interest in
the public movements of his time. Early in 1784, we find him taking the
lead in getting up a loyal address to the King on the resignation of the
Portland Administration and the appointment of Mr. Pitt as Prime Minister.
It appears, however, that Pitt disappointed his expectations. One of his
first projects was a scheme of taxation, which he introduced for the
purpose of remedying the disordered state of the finances, but which,
in Boulton’s opinion, would, if carried, have the effect of seriously
damaging the national industry. The Minister proposed to tax coal, iron,
copper, and other raw materials of manufacture, to the amount of about
a million a year. Boulton immediately bestirred himself to oppose the
adoption of the scheme. He held that for a manufacturing nation to tax the
raw materials of wealth was a suicidal measure, calculated, if persevered
in, to involve the producers of wealth in ruin. “Let taxes,” he said, “be
laid upon luxuries, upon vices, and if you like upon property; tax riches
when got, and the expenditure of them, but not the means of getting them;
of all things, don’t cut open the hen that lays the golden eggs.”[267]
[267] Boulton to Wilson, 16th December, 1784. Boulton MSS.
Petitions and memorials were forthwith got up in the midland counties,
and presented against the measure; and Boulton being recognised as the
leader of the movement in his district, was summoned by Mr. Pitt to London
to an interview with him on the subject. He then took the opportunity
of pressing upon the Minister the necessity of taking measures to secure
reciprocity of trade with foreign nations, as being of vital importance
to the trade of England. Writing to his partner Scale, he said, “Surely
our Ministers must be bad politicians, to suffer the gates of nearly
every commercial city in the world to be shut against us.” “There is no
doubt,” he wrote to his friend Garbett, “but the edicts, prohibitions,
and high duties laid upon our manufacturers by foreign powers will be
severely felt, unless some new commercial treaties are entered into with
such powers. I fear our young Minister is not sufficiently aware of the
importance of the subject, and I likewise fear he will pledge himself
before Parliament meets to carry other measures in the next session that
will be as odious to the country as his late attempts.”
As Boulton had anticipated, the Ministry introduced several important
measures, calculated to have a highly injurious effect upon English
industry, and he immediately bestirred himself, in conjunction with Josiah
Wedgwood, of Etruria, to organise a movement in opposition to them.
Wedgwood and Boulton met at Birmingham in February, 1785, and arranged
to assemble a meeting of delegates from the manufacturing districts,
who were to meet and sit in London “all the time the Irish commercial
affairs were pending.” A printed statement of the objects of the movement
was circulated, and Boulton and Wedgwood wrote to their friends in
all quarters to meet and appoint delegates to the central committee in
London. Boulton was unanimously appointed the delegate for Birmingham,
and he proceeded to London furnished with a bundle of petitions from his
neighbourhood. The delegates proceeded to form themselves into a Chamber
of Manufacturers, over the deliberations of which Wedgwood, Boulton, or
John Wilkinson usually presided.
The principal object of these meetings and petitionings was to prevent,
if possible, the imposition of the proposed taxes on coal, iron, and raw
materials generally, as well as the proposed export duties on manufactured
articles. At a time when foreign governments were seeking to exclude
English manufactures from their dominions by heavy import duties, it was
felt that this double burden was more than English industry could bear.
The Irish Parliament were at the same time legislating in a hostile spirit
towards English commerce; imposing taxes upon all manufactures imported
into Ireland from England, while Irish manufactures were not only sent
into England duty free, but their own parliament encouraged them by a
bounty on exportation. The committee strongly expostulated against the
partial and unjust spirit of this legislation, and petitioned for free
interchange on equal terms. So long as such a state of things continued,
the petitioners urged that “every idea of reciprocity in the interchange
of manufactures between Britain and Ireland was a mere mockery of words.”
Although Watt was naturally averse to taking any public part in politics,
his services were enlisted in the cause, and he drew up for circulation
“An answer to the Treasury Paper on the Iron Trade of England and
Ireland.” The object of his statement was to show that the true way
of encouraging manufactures in Ireland was, not by bounties, not by
prohibitions, but by entire freedom of industry. It was asserted by the
supporters of the propositions, that the natives of Ireland were ignorant,
indolent, and poor. “If they be so,” said Watt, “the best method of giving
them vigour is to have recourse to British manufacturers, possessed of
capital, industry, and knowledge of trade.” The old covenanting spirit of
his race fairly breaks out in the following passage:--
“It is contemptible nonsense to argue that because Ireland has
never had iron manufactories she cannot soon have them.... One
hundred years ago the Irish had no linen manufacture; they
imported linen; and now they sell to us to the amount of a
million annually. How came this about? The civil wars under
Charles I., and the tyranny of the Scotch Privy Council under
Charles II., chased the people out of Scotland, because they
were Presbyterians. Ireland received and protected them; they
peopled the northern provinces; many of them were weavers; they
followed their business in Ireland, and taught others. Philip II.
chased the inhabitants out of Flanders, on account of religion;
Queen Elizabeth received and protected them; and England learnt
to manufacture woollen cloth. The persecutions of Lewis XIV.
occasioned the establishment of a colony in Spitalfields. And the
Parliament of Britain, under the auspices of ---- and ----, and
others, imposed oppressive duties on glass; and ----’s Act gave
the Irish liberty to export it to our Colonies; the glass-makers
fled from the tyranny of the Excise; Ireland has now nine
glass-houses. Britain has lost the export trade of that article!
More examples of the migrations of manufactures could be adduced,
but it seems unnecessary; for it cannot be denied that men will
fly from tyranny to liberty, whether Philip’s Priests, Charles’s
Dragoons, or our Excisemen be the instruments of the tyranny.
And it must also be allowed that even the Inquisition itself is
not more formidable than our Excise Laws (as far as property is
concerned) to those who unhappily are subjected to them.”
Towards the end of the statement he asks, “Would it not be more manly
and proper at once to invite the Irish to come into a perfect union with
Britain, and to pay the same duties and excises that we do? Then every
distinction of country might with justice be done away with, and they
would have a fair claim to all the advantages which we enjoy.”
The result of the agitation was that most of the proposals to impose new
taxes on the raw materials of manufacture were withdrawn by the Ministry,
and the Irish resolutions were considerably modified. But the relations
of British and Irish industry were by no means settled. The Irish
Parliament might refuse to affirm the resolutions adopted by the British
Parliament, in which case it might be necessary again to oppose the
Ministerial measures; and to provide for this contingency, the delegates
separated, with the resolution to maintain and extend their organisation
in the manufacturing districts. Watt did not, however, like the idea of
his partner becoming engrossed in political agitation, even in matters
relating to commerce. He accordingly wrote to Boulton in London, “I find
myself quite unequal to the various business now lying behind, and wish
much you were at home, and that you would direct your attention solely to
your own and to Boulton and Watt’s business until affairs can be brought
into reasonable compass.”[268] Later he wrote,--“At Manchester they are
busy making a collection for the Chamber of Manufacturers, which I fancy
will be in vogue again next winter. But I hope that neither you nor I will
be mad enough to be demagogues then. Let us leave that to those who can
defy Ministers, and get our property secured, which may be done in the
confusion.”
[268] Watt to Boulton, 31st March, 1785.
Watt was at this time distressed by an adverse decision against the firm
in one of the Scotch courts. “I have generally observed,” he wrote, “that
there is a tide in our affairs. We have had peace for some time, but now
cross accidents have begun, and more are to be feared.” His anxieties were
increased by the rumour which reached his ears from several quarters of a
grand combination of opulent manufacturers to make use of every beneficial
patent that had been taken out, and cut them down by _scire facias_, as
they had already cut down Arkwright’s. It was said that subscriptions
had been obtained by the association amounting to 50,000_l._ Watt was
requested to join a counter combination of patentees to resist the
threatened proceedings. To this, however, he objected, on the ground that
the association of men to support one another in lawsuits was illegal, and
would preclude the members from giving evidence in support of each other’s
rights. “Besides,” said he, “the greater number of patentees are such as
we could not associate with, and if we did it would do us more harm than
good.”[269]
[269] Watt to Boulton, 21st July, 1785. Writing to Boulton on a
later occasion on the subject of these threatened attacks on
all patents, he said, “A pursuance of such decisions as have
been given lately in several cases must at length drive men of
invention to take shelter in countries where their ingenuity
will be protected; and the other states of Europe know their
interest too well to neglect any opportunity of curbing the
insolence and humbling the pride of Britain. If the minister
should not think it right to amend and confirm the patent laws,
the next best thing would be to make a law totally taking
away the king’s power of granting them. I mean, this would
be the _honest_ part.”--Watt to Boulton, 19th March, 1786.
Boulton himself had equally strong views on the subject of
patents, believing that they tended to encourage industrious
and ingenious men to labour for the common good. Referring to
the decision against Argand’s lamp patent, he wrote De Luc in
1787,--“It was hard, unjust, and impolitic, as it hath (to my
knowledge) discouraged a very ingenious French chemist from
coming over and establishing in this country an invention of
the highest importance to one of our greatest manufactures.
Moreover, it tends to destroy the greatest of all stimulants to
invention, viz. the idea of enjoying the fruits of one’s own
labour. Some late decisions against the validity of certain
patents have raised the spirits of the illiberal, sordid,
unjust, ungenerous, and inventionless misers, who prey upon
the vitals of the ingenious, and make haste to seize upon what
their laborious and often costly application has produced. The
decisions to which I refer have encouraged a combination in
Cornwall to erect engines on Boulton and Watt’s principles,
contrary to the Law of Patents and the express provisions of an
Act of Parliament; and this they are setting about in order to
drive us into a court of law, flattering themselves that it is
the present disposition of the judges to set their faces against
all patents. Should such a disposition (so contrary to Lord
Mansfield’s decisions) continue to prevail, it will produce far
greater evils to the manufacturing industry of the kingdom than
the gentlemen of the law can have any idea of.”
Towards the end of 1785 the engines which had been in hand were nearly
finished, and work was getting slacker than usual at Soho. Though new
orders gave Watt trouble, and occasioned him anxiety, still he would
rather not be without them. “It will be well,” he wrote to his partner,
“if we can get some orders now for engines worth while. What we have
been doing lately has been very trifling, and if we don’t get orders
soon, our men will be idle. As it happens at present, we have at least
three engineers too few here, there being eight engines to be done in
two or three months, and only three engineers.”[270] It was matter of
gratification to Watt to be able to report that the engines last delivered
had given great satisfaction. The mechanics were improving in skill,
and their workmanship was becoming of a superior character. “Strood and
Curtis’s engine,” said he, “has been at work some time, and does very
well. Whitbread’s has also been tried, and performs exceedingly well.” The
success of Whitbread’s engine was such that it had the honour of a visit
from the King, who was greatly pleased with its performances. Not to be
outdone, “Felix Calvert,” wrote Watt, “has bespoken one, which is to outdo
Whitbread’s in magnificence.”
[270] Watt to Boulton, 27th August, 1785.
The slackness of work at Soho was not of long continuance. Orders for
rotative engines came in gradually; one from Harris, of Nottingham;
another from Macclesfield, to drive a silk-mill; a third from Edinburgh,
for the purposes of a distillery; and others from different quarters.
The influx of orders had the effect at the same time of filling Soho
with work, and plunging Watt into his usual labyrinth of perplexity and
distress. In September we find him writing to Boulton,--
“My health, is so bad that I do not think I can hold out much
longer, at least as a man of business, and I wish to consolidate
something before I give over.” ... Again, “I cannot help being
dispirited, because I find my head fail me much, business an
excessive burden to me, and little prospect of my speedy release
from it. Were we both young and healthy, I should see no reason
to despair, but very much the contrary. However, we must do the
best we can, and hope for quiet in heaven when our weary bones
are laid to rest.”[271]
[271] Watt to Boulton, 24th September, 1785.
A few months later, so many more orders had come in, that Watt described
Soho as “fast for the next four months,” but the additional work only had
the effect of increasing his headaches. “In the anguish of my mind,” he
wrote, “amid the vexations occasioned by new and unsuccessful schemes,
like Lovelace I ‘curse my inventions,’ and almost wish, if we could gather
our money together, that somebody else should succeed in getting our trade
from us. However, all may yet be well. Nature can be conquered if we can
but find out her weak side.”
We return to the affairs of the Cornish copper-miners, which were now in a
very disheartening condition. The mines were badly and wastefully worked;
and the competition of many small companies of poor adventurers kept the
copper trade in a state of permanent depression. In this crisis of their
affairs it was determined that a Copper Company should be formed, backed
by ample capital, with the view of regulating this important branch of
industry, and rescuing the mines and miners from ruin. Boulton took an
active part in its formation, and induced many of his intimate friends
in the north to subscribe largely for shares. An arrangement was entered
into by the Company with the adventurers in the principal mines, to buy
of them the whole of the ore raised, at remunerative prices, for a period
of eleven years. At the first meeting, held in September, 1785, for the
election of Governor, Deputy-Governor, and Directors, Boulton held in his
hands the power of determining the appointments, representing, as he did
by proxy, shares held by his northern friends to the amount of 86,000_l._
The meeting took place in the Town-hall at Truro, and the proceedings
passed off satisfactorily; Boulton using his power with due discretion.
“We met again on Friday,” he wrote to Matthews, “and chose the assayers
and other subordinate officers, after which we paid our subscriptions, and
dined together, all in good humour; and thus this important revolution in
the copper trade was finally settled for eleven years.”
Matters were not yet, however, finally settled, as many arrangements
had to be made for setting the Company to work, in which Boulton took
the leading part; the Governor and Directors pressing him not to leave
Cornwall until they were definitely settled. It happened to suit his
convenience to remain until the Wheal Fortune engine was finished--one of
the most formidable engines the firm had yet erected in Cornwall. In the
mean time he entered into correspondence with various consumers of copper
at home and abroad, with the object of finding a vend for the metal. He
succeeded in obtaining a contract through Mr. Hope, of Amsterdam, for
supplying the copper required for the new Dutch coinage; and he opened
out new markets for the produce in other quarters. Being a large holder of
mining shares, Boulton also tried to introduce new and economical methods
of working the mines; but with comparatively little result. To Wilkinson
he wrote,--“Poldice is in a desponding way, and must give up unless better
managed. North Downs is managed as badly by incapable, ignorant, drunken
captains, who hold their posts not by merit, but by their cousinship to
some of the adventurers.... I should spend a great part of next year in
Cornwall, and make myself master of the minutiæ. I think I could then
accomplish many necessary regulations.”[272]
[272] Boulton to Wilkinson, 21st November, 1785.
Though actively bestirring himself for the good of the mining interest,
Boulton had but small thanks for his pains. The prominence of his position
had this disadvantage, that if the price of the ore went down, or profits
declined, or the yield fell off, or the mines were closed, or anything
went wrong, the miners were but too ready to identify him in some way
with the evil; and the services which he had rendered to the mining
interest[273] were in a moment forgotten. On one occasion the discontent
of the miners broke out into open revolt, and Boulton was even threatened
with personal violence. The United Mines having proved unprofitable in
the working, notice was given by the manager of an intended reduction
of wages, this being the only condition on which the mines could be
carried on. If this could not be arranged, the works must be closed,
as the adventurers declined to go on at a loss. On the announcement of
the intended lowering of wages being made, there was great excitement
and discontent among the workpeople. Several hundreds of them hastily
assembled at Redruth, and took the road for Truro, to pull down the
offices of the Copper Mining Company, and burn the house of the manager.
They were especially furious with Boulton, vowing vengeance on him, and
declaring that they would pull down every pumping-engine he had set up
in Cornwall. When the rioters reached Truro, they found a body of men,
hastily armed with muskets taken from the arsenal, stationed in front of
the Copper Mining Company’s premises, supported by six pieces of cannon.
At sight of this formidable demonstration the miners drew back, and,
muttering threats that they would repeat their visit, returned to Redruth
as they had come. Two companies of soldiers and two of local militia were
brought into the town immediately after; and the intended assault was not
made. When Watt was informed of the violence with which his partner had
been threatened, he wrote,--“In my opinion nothing can be more ungrateful
than the behaviour of those people who endeavour to make you the object of
the resentment of the mob, at a time when (setting aside former services)
you are doing all that lies in your power to serve them.... If you still
find the same spirit continue, for God’s sake leave them immediately. The
law can reach the adventurers, if it cannot the miners.”
[273] Writing to M. De Luc, the Queen’s Librarian, of what he and
his partner had done for Cornwall, Boulton said,--“The copper
and tin mines of Cornwall are now sunk to so great a depth that
had not Mr. Watt and myself nearly expended our fortunes and
hazarded our ruin by neglecting our regular business, and by a
long series of expensive experiments in bringing our engine to
its present degree of perfection, those mines must inevitably
have stopped working, and Cornwall at this time would not have
existed as a mining county. The very article of extra coals
for common engines would have amounted to more than the entire
profits of their working.”--Boulton to De Luc, 31st March, 1787.
This was, however, but the wild and unreasoning clamour of misguided and
ignorant men. Boulton was personally much esteemed by all who were able
to appreciate his character, and to understand the position of himself
and his partner with reference to the engine patent. The larger mining
owners invited him to their houses, and regarded him as their friend. The
more intelligent of the managers were his strenuous supporters. First
and foremost among these was Mr. Phillips, manager of the Chacewater
mines, of whom he always spoke with the highest respect, as a man of the
most scrupulous integrity and honour. Mr. Phillips was a member of the
Society of Friends, and his wife Catherine was one of the most celebrated
preachers of the body. Boulton and Watt occasionally resided with them
before the house at Cosgarne was taken, and conceived for both the warmest
friendship. If Watt was attracted by the Cornish Anabaptists, Boulton was
equally so by the Cornish Quakers. We find him, in one of his letters to
Mrs. Boulton, describing to her a great meeting of Friends at Truro which
he had attended, “when,” he said, “I heard our friend Catherine Phillips
preach with great energy and good sense for an hour and a half, although
so weak in body that she was obliged to lie abed for several days before.”
Boulton afterwards dined with the whole body of Friends at the principal
inn, being the only person present who was not of the Society; and he
confessed to have spent in their company a very pleasant evening.[274]
[274] Two days after this event, when about to set out for
Polgooth, a messenger arrived at Boulton’s lodgings, bringing
him the sad news of Mr. Phillips’s sudden death. He describes
the scene at the funeral, at which Catherine Phillips, though
strongly urged by him to stay away, insisted on being present.
“She was attended by a widow lady who had lost a good husband
last year, and though she had not been accustomed to speak in
the congregation of the righteous, yet on this occasion she
stood with her hand upon her husband’s coffin and spoke above
an hour, delivering one of the most pathetic discourses I ever
heard.” A large concourse of people attended the interment,
which took place in a garden near Redruth. Boulton, in writing
to Mrs. Boulton, said, “I wish I had time to give you the
history and character of my departed friend, as you know but
little of his excellences. I cannot say but that I feel a gloomy
pleasure in dwelling upon the life and death of a good man: it
incites to piety and elevates the mind above terrestrial things.
Now, let me ask you to hold a silent meeting in your heart for
half an hour and then return to your work.”
We return to the progress of the engine business at Soho. The most
important work in hand about this time was the double-acting engine
intended for the Albion Mill, in Southwark.[275] This was the first
rotative with a parallel motion erected in London; and as the more
extended use of the engine would in a great measure depend upon its
success, the firm naturally looked forward with very great interest to
its performances. The Albion Mill scheme was started by Boulton as early
as 1783. Orders for rotatives were then coming in very slowly, and it
occurred to him that if he had but the opportunity of exhibiting the
powers of the new engine in its best form, and in connexion with the
best machinery, the results would be so satisfactory and conclusive as
to induce manufacturers generally to follow the example. On applying to
the London capitalists, Boulton found them averse to the undertaking; and
at length Boulton and Watt became persuaded that if the concern was to
be launched at all, they must themselves find the principal part of the
capital. A sufficient number of shareholders was got together to make a
start, and application was made for a charter of incorporation in 1784;
but it was so strongly opposed by the millers and mealmen, on the ground
that the application of steam-power to flour-grinding would throw wind and
water mills out of work, take away employment from the labouring classes,
and reduce the price of bread,[276] that the charter was refused; and the
Albion Mill Company was accordingly constituted on the ordinary principles
of partnership.
[275] The Albion Mill engine was set to work in 1786. The first
rotative with a parallel motion in Scotland, was erected for
Mr. Stein, of Kennet Pans near Alloa, in the following year.
[276] In a letter to Mr. Matthews (30th April, 1784) Boulton
wrote,--“It seems the millers are determined to be masters of
us and the public. Putting a stop to fire-engine mills because
they come into competition with water-mills, is as absurd as
stopping navigable canals would be because they interfere with
farmers and waggoners. The argument also applies to wind and
tide mills or any other means whereby corn can be ground. So
all machines should be stopped whereby men’s labour is saved,
because it might be argued that men were thereby deprived of
a livelihood. Carry out the argument, and we must annihilate
water-mills themselves, and thus go back again to the grinding
of corn by hand labour!”
By the end of the year the Albion Mill engines, carefully designed by
Watt, were put in hand at Soho; the building was in course of erection,
after the designs of Mr. Wyatt, the architect; while John Rennie, the
young Scotch engineer, was engaged to design and fit up the flour-grinding
and dressing machinery. “I am glad,” wrote Boulton to Watt, “you have
agreed with Rennie. Mills are a great field. Think of the crank--of
Wolf, Trumpeter, Wasp, and all the ghosts we are haunted by.” The whole
of the following year was occupied in the erection of the buildings and
machinery; and it was not until the spring of 1786 that the mill was ready
to start. Being the first enterprise of the kind, on an unprecedented
scale, and comprising many novel combinations of machinery, there were
many “hitches” before it could be got to work satisfactorily. After the
first trial, at which Boulton was present, he wrote his partner expressing
his dissatisfaction with the working of the double-acting engine,
expressing the opinion that it would have been better if they had held
by the single-acting one.[277] Watt was urged to run up to town himself
and set matters to rights; but he was up to the ears in work at Soho, and
could not leave for a day.
[277] Watt, however, continued to adhere to his own views as to
the superiority of the plan adopted:--“I am sorry to find,” he
observed in his reply to Boulton, “so many things are amiss at
Albion Mill, and that you have lost your good opinion of double
engines, while my opinion of them is mended. The smoothness
of their going depends on the steam regulators being opened
a little before the vacuum regulators, and not opened too
suddenly, as indeed the others ought not to be. Otherwise the
shock comes so violently in the opposite direction that no pins
or brasses will stand it. Malcolm has no notion how to make gear
work quietly, nor do I think he properly understands it. You
must therefore attend to it yourself, and not leave it until it
is more perfect.”--Watt to Boulton, 3rd March, 1786.
[Illustration: DOUBLE-ACTING ENGINE, ALBION MILL.]
“I can by no means leave home at present,” he wrote, “otherwise we
shall suffer much greater losses than _can_ come from the Albion
Mill. The work for Cornwall which must be planned and put in train
is immense, and there will more come from that quarter. Besides,
I am pulled to pieces by demands for forwardness from every side.
I have lost ten days by William Murdock, Wilson, Wilkinson, and
headaches, and I have neither health nor spirits to make the
necessary exertions. If I went to London I should be in torment
all the while with the thoughts of what was lying behind here.”
After pointing out what course should be taken to discover and remedy the
faults of the engine, he proceeded:--
“Above all, patience must be exercised and things coolly examined
and put to rights, and care be taken not to blame innocent parts.
Everything must, as much as possible, be tried separately. Remind
those who begin to growl, that in new, complicated, and difficult
things, human foresight falls short--that time and money must be
given to perfect things and find out their defects, otherwise they
cannot be remedied.”[278]
[278] Watt to Boulton, 10th March, 1786.--Boulton MSS.
Not being able to persuade Watt to come to his help, Boulton sent to
Cornwall for Murdock, always ready to lend a hand on an emergency, and in
the course of a few weeks he was in town at work upon the engines. The
result is best told in Wyatt’s letter to Boulton, who had by this time
returned to Birmingham:--
“Mr. Murdock has just set the engine to work. All the rods are
altered. I think he has done more good than all the doctors
we have had before; and his manner of doing it has been very
satisfactory--so different from what we have been used to. He
has been through all the flues himself, and really takes uncommon
pains. Pray write to him; thank him for his attention. He will not
have left town before he gets your letter, and press him to stay
as long as he can be essentially serviceable.”
There was, however, so great a demand for Murdock’s presence in Cornwall,
that he could not be spared for another day, and he hurried back again to
his multifarious duties at the mines.
The cost of erecting the mill proved to be considerably in excess of the
original estimate, and Watt early feared that it would turn out a losing
concern. He had no doubt about the engines or the machinery being able to
do all that had been promised; but he feared that the absence of business
capacity on the part of the managers would be fatal to its commercial
success.[279] He was especially annoyed at finding the mill made a public
show of, and that it was constantly crowded with curious and frivolous
people, whose presence seriously interfered with the operations of the
workmen. It reached his ears that the managers of the mill even intended
to hold a masquerade in it, with the professed object of starting the
concern with eclat! Watt denounced this as sheer humbug. “What have Dukes,
Lords, and Ladies,” said he, “to do with masquerading in a flour-mill? You
must take steps to curb the vanity of ----, else it will ruin him. As for
ourselves, considering that we are much envied at any rate, everything
which contributes to render us conspicuous ought to be avoided. Let us
content ourselves with _doing_.”[280] It was also found that the mill
was becoming a nest for schemers and speculators occupied in devising
all manner of new projects. Boulton bestirred himself to put matters in
a more business-like train. Steps were taken to close the mill against
the crowd of idle visitors; and Boulton shortly after reported that “the
manufacturing of Bubbles and new schemes is removed from the Mill to a
private Lodging.”
[279] “The Albion Mill,” wrote Watt to Boulton, “requires your
close attention and exertions. I look upon it as a weight about
our necks that will sink us to the bottom, unless people of
real activity and knowledge of business are found to manage it.
I would willingly forfeit a considerable sum to be clear of
the concern. If anybody will take my share I will cheerfully
give him 500_l._ and reckon myself well quit. My reasons are
that none of the parties concerned are men of business, that no
attention has been hitherto paid to it by anybody except Mr. W.
and ourselves, and that if we go on as expensively in carrying
on the business as in the erection, it is impossible but that
we should be immense losers, and thus probably our least loss
will be to stop where we are. As to our reputation as engineers,
I have no doubt but the mill will perform its business, but
whether with the quantity of coals and labour is what I cannot
say.”--Watt to Boulton, 19th March, 1786.
[280] Watt to Boulton, 17th April, 1786.
When the mill was at length set to work, it performed to the entire
satisfaction of its projectors. The engine, on one occasion, ground as
much as 3000 bushels of wheat in twenty-four hours. The usual rate of work
per week of six days was 16,000 bushels of wheat, cleaned, ground, and
dressed into fine flour (some of it being ground two or three times over);
or sufficient, according to Boulton’s estimate, for the weekly consumption
of 150,000 people. The important uses of the double rotative engine were
thus exhibited in the most striking manner; and the fame of the Albion
Mill extended far and wide. It so far answered the main purpose which
Boulton and Watt had in view in originally embarking in the enterprise;
but it must be added that the success was accomplished at a very serious
sacrifice. The mill never succeeded commercially. It was too costly in its
construction and its management, and though it did an immense business it
was at a loss. The concern was, doubtless, capable of great improvement,
and, had time been allowed, it would probably have come round. When its
prospects seemed to be brightening,[281] it was set on fire in several
places by incendiaries on the night of the 3rd of March, 1791. The
villains had made their arrangements with deliberation and skill. They
fastened the main cock of the water-cistern, and chose the hour of low
tide for firing the building, so that water could not be got to play upon
the flames, and the mill was burnt to the ground in a few hours. A reward
was offered for the apprehension of the criminals, but they were never
discovered. The loss sustained by the Company was about 10,000_l._ Boulton
and Watt were the principal sufferers; the former holding 6000_l._, and
the latter 3000_l._ interest in the undertaking.[282]
[281] Watt wrote Boulton from London, 1st October, 1789,--“I
called on Wyatt (the architect) last night. He says the mill
sold above 4000_l._ worth of flour last week and is doing well.”
[282] For further particulars as to the Albion Mill, see Life of
Rennie in ‘Lives of the Engineers,’ ii. 137.
Meanwhile orders for rotative engines were coming in apace at
Soho,--engines for paper-mills and cotton-mills, for flour-mills and
iron-mills, and for sugar-mills in America and the West Indies. At the
same time pumping-engines were in hand for France, Spain, and Italy.
The steam-engine was becoming an established power, and its advantages
were every day more clearly recognised. It was alike docile, regular,
economical, and effective, at all times and seasons, by night as by day,
in summer and in winter. While the wind-mills were stopped by calms and
the water-mills by frosts, the steam-mill worked on with untiring power.
“There is not a single water-mill now at work in Staffordshire,” wrote
Boulton to Wyatt in December; “they are all frozen up, and were it not for
Wilkinson’s steam-mill, the poor nailers must have perished; but his mill
goes on rolling and slitting ten tons of iron a day, which is carried away
as fast as it can be bundled up; and thus the employment and subsistence
of these poor people are secured.”
As the demand for rotative engines set in, Watt became more hopeful as
to the prospects of this branch of manufacture. He even began to fear
lest the firm should be unable to execute the orders, so fast did they
follow each other. “I have no doubt,” he wrote to Boulton, “that we
shall soon so methodize the rotative engines as to get on with them at
a great pace. Indeed, that is already in some degree the case. But we
must have more men, and these we can only have by the slow process of
breeding them.”[283] A fortnight later he wrote, “Orders for rotative
engines are coming in daily; but, if we part with any more men here, we
must stop taking them in.” Want of skilled workmen continued to be one
of Watt’s greatest difficulties. When the amount of work to be executed
was comparatively small, and sufficient time was given to execute it,
he was able to turn out very satisfactory workmanship;[284] but when the
orders came pouring in, new hands were necessarily taken on, who proved
a constant source of anxiety and trouble. Even the “old hands,” when
sent to a distance to fit up engines, being left, in a great measure, to
themselves, were apt to become careless and ill-conditioned. With some,
self-conceit was the stumbling-block, with others temper, but with the
greater number, drink. “I am very sorry to hear,” wrote Watt to Boulton,
“that Malcolm Logan’s disease increases. I think you should talk to him
roundly upon it, and endeavour to procure him to make a solemn resolution
or oath against drinking for some given term.” Another foreman sent to
erect an engine in Craven was afflicted with a distemper of a different
sort. He was found to have put the engine very badly together, and,
instead of attending to his work, had gone a-hunting in a pig-tail wig!
“If the half of this be true,” wrote Watt, “as I fear it is, he will not
do to be sent to New River Head [where an engine was about to be erected],
and I have at present nobody else here.... I suppose I shall be obliged
to send Joseph over, for we must not have a bad engine if it can be
helped.... We seem to be getting into our old troubles again.”[285]
[283] Watt to Boulton, 23rd September, 1786.
[284] He spoke of Goodwyn’s Brewery engine, finished in 1784, as
the best that Soho had up to that time turned out--it “performed
wonderful well--not the smallest leak and scarce any noise....
The working gear and joints are the best I ever saw.”
[285] Watt to Boulton, 24th February, 1786.
William Murdock continued, as before, an admirable exception. He was
as indefatigable as ever, always ready with an expedient to remedy a
defect, and willing to work at all hours. A great clamour had been raised
in Cornwall during his stay in London while setting the Albion Mill to
rights, as there was no other person there capable of supplying his place,
and fulfilling his numerous and responsible duties. Boulton deplored that
more men such as Murdock were not to be had;--“He is now flying from mine
to mine,” he wrote, “and hath so many calls upon him that he is inclined
to grow peevish; and if we take him from North Downs, Chacewater, and
Towan (all of which engines he has the care of), they will run into
disorder and ruin; they have not a man at North Downs that is better than
a stoker.”
Towards the end of 1786 the press of orders increased at Soho. A rotative
engine of forty-horse power was ordered by the Plate Glass Company to
grind glass. A powerful pumping-engine was in hand for the Oxford Canal
Company. Two engines, one of twenty and the other of ten horse power, were
ordered for Scotch distilleries, and another order was shortly expected
from the same quarter. The engine supplied for the Hull paper-mill having
been found to answer admirably, more orders for engines for the same
purpose were promised. At the same time pumping-engines were in hand for
the great French waterworks at Marli. “In short,” said Watt, “I foresee
I shall be driven almost mad in finding men for the engines ordered
here and coming in.” Watt was necessarily kept very full of work by
these orders, and we gather from his letters that he was equally full of
headaches. He continued to give his personal attention to the preparation
of the drawings of the engines, even to the minutest detail. On an engine
being ordered by Mr. Morris, of Bristol, for the purpose of driving a
tilt-hammer, Boulton wrote to him,--“Mr. Watt can never be prevailed upon
to begin any piece of machinery until the plan of the whole is settled,
as it often happens that a change in one thing puts many others wrong.
However, he has now settled the whole of yours, but waits answers to
certain questions before the drawings for the founder can be issued.”[286]
[286] Boulton to Morris, 2nd November, 1786.
At an early period his friend Wedgwood had strongly urged upon Watt
that he should work less with his own head and hands, and more through
the heads and hands of others.[287] Watt’s brain was too active for
his body, and needed rest; but rest he would not take, and persisted in
executing all the plans of the new engines himself. Thus in his fragile,
nervous, dyspeptic state, every increase of business was to him increase
of brain-work and increase of pain; until it seemed as if not only his
health, but the very foundations of his reason must give way. At the very
time when Soho was beginning to bask in the sunshine of prosperity, and
the financial troubles of the firm seemed coming to an end, Watt wrote
the following profoundly melancholy letter to a friend:--
“I have been effete and listless, neither daring to face business,
nor capable of it, my head and memory failing me much; my stable
of hobby-horses pulled down, and the horses given to the dogs for
carrion.... I have had serious thoughts of laying down the burden
I find myself unable to carry, and perhaps, if other sentiments
had not been stronger, should have thought of throwing off the
mortal coil; but, if matters do not grow worse, I may perhaps
stagger on. Solomon said that in the increase of knowledge there
is increase of sorrow; if he had substituted _business_ for
knowledge, it would have been perfectly true.”[288]
[287] “Your mind, my friend, is too active, too powerful for your
body, and harasses it beyond its bearing. If this was the case
with any other machine under your direction, except that in
whose regulation your friends take so much interest, you would
soon find out a remedy. For the present permit me to advise a
more ample use of _the oil of delegation_ through your whole
machinery, and I am persuaded you will soon find some salutary
effects from this application. Seriously, I shall conclude
in saying to you what Dr. Fothergill desired me to say to
Brindley--‘Spare your machine a little, or like others under
your direction, it will wear out the sooner by hard and constant
usage.’”--Josiah Wedgwood to Watt, December 10, 1782.
[288] Watt to his brother-in-law, Gilbert Hamilton, Glasgow, June
18, 1786.
As might be expected, from the large number of engines sold by the firm
to this time, and the increasing amounts yearly payable as dues, their
income from the business was becoming considerable, and promised, before
many years had passed, to be very large. Down to the year 1785, however,
the outlay upon new foundries, workshops, and machinery had been so great,
and the large increase of business had so completely absorbed the capital
of the firm, that Watt continued to be paid his household expenses, at
the rate of so much a year, out of the hardware business, and no division
of profits upon the engines sold and at work had as yet been made,
because none had accrued. After the lapse of two more years, matters had
completely changed; and after long waiting, and indescribable distress of
mind and body, Watt’s invention at length began to be productive to him.
During the early part of his career, though his income had been small,
his wants were few, and easily satisfied. Though Boulton had liberally
provided for these from the time of his settling at Birmingham, Watt
continued to feel oppressed by the thought of the debt to the bankers for
which he and his partner were jointly liable. In his own little business
he had been accustomed to deal with such small sums, that the idea of
being responsible for the repayment of thousands of pounds appalled and
unnerved him; and he had no peace of mind until the debt was discharged.
Now at last he was free, and in the happy position of having a balance at
his bankers. On the 7th of December, 1787, Boulton wrote to Matthews, the
London agent,--“As Mr. Watt is now at Mr. Macgregor’s, in Glasgow, I wish
you would write him a line to say that you have transferred 4000_l._ to
his own account, that you have paid for him another 1000_l._ to the Albion
Mill, and that about Christmas you suppose you shall transfer 2007_l._
more to him, to balance.”
But while Watt’s argosies were coming into port richly laden, Boulton’s
were still at sea. Though the latter had risked, and often lost, capital
in his various undertakings, he continued as venturesome, as enterprising
as ever. When any project was started calculated to bring the steam-engine
into notice, he was immediately ready with his subscription. Thus he
embarked 6000_l._ in the Albion Mill, a luckless adventure in itself,
though productive in other respects. But he sadly missed the money, and as
late as 1789, feelingly said to Matthews, “Oh that I had my Albion Mill
capital back again!” When any mining adventure was started in Cornwall
for which a new engine was wanted, Boulton would write, “If you want a
stopgap, put me down as an adventurer;” and too often the adventure proved
a failure. Then, to encourage the Cornish Copper Mining Company, he bought
large quantities of copper, and had it sent down to Birmingham, where it
lay long on his hands without a purchaser. At the same time we find him
expending 5000_l._ in building and rebuilding two mills and a warehouse
at Soho, and an equal amount in “preparing for the coinage.” These large
investments had the effect of crippling his resources for years to come;
and when the commercial convulsion of 1788 occurred, he felt himself in
a state of the most distressing embarrassment. The circumstances of the
partners being thus in a measure reversed, Boulton fell back upon Watt
for temporary help; but, more cautious than his partner, Watt had already
invested his profits elsewhere, and could not help him.[289] He had got
together his store of gains with too much difficulty to part with them
easily; and he was unwilling to let them float away in what he regarded
as an unknown sea of speculation.
[289] “Mr. Watt hath lately remitted _all_ his money to Scotland,
and I have lately purchased a considerable quantity of copper
at the request of Mr. Williams.... Besides which I have more
than 45 tons of copper by me, 20 of which was bought of the
Cornish Metal Company, and 20 of the Duke’s at 70_l._, and not
an ounce of either yet used. In short, I shall be in a very
few weeks in great want of money, and it is now impossible to
borrow in London or this neighbourhood as all confidence is
fled.”--Boulton to Wilson, 4th May, 1788.
To add to his distresses, Boulton’s health began to fail him. To have
seen the two men, no one would have thought that Boulton would have
been the first to break down; but so it was. Though Watt’s sufferings
from headaches, and afterwards from asthma, seem to have been almost
continuous, he struggled on, and even grew in strength and spirits. His
fragile frame bent before disease, as the reed bends to the storm, and
rose erect again; but it was different with Boulton. He had toiled too
unsparingly, and was now feeling the effects. The strain upon him had
throughout been greater than upon Watt, whose headache had acted as a
sort of safety-valve by disabling him from pursuing further study until
it had gone off. Boulton, on the other hand, was kept in a state of
constant anxiety by business that could not possibly be postponed. He
had to provide the means for carrying on his many businesses, to sustain
his partner against despondency, and to keep the whole organisation of
the firm in working order. While engaged in bearing his gigantic burden,
disease came upon him. In 1784 we find him writing to his wine-merchant,
with a cheque in payment of his account,--“We have had a visit from a new
acquaintance--the gout.” The visitor returned, and four years later we
find him complaining of violent pain from gravel and stone, to which he
continued a martyr to the close of his life. “I am very unwell indeed,”
he wrote to Matthews in London; “I can get no sleep; and yet I have been
obliged to wear a cheerful face, and attend all this week on M. l’Abbé de
Callone and his friend Brunelle.”[290] He felt as if life was drawing to
an end with him: he asked his friend for a continuance of his sympathy,
and promised to exert himself, “otherwise,” said he, “I will lay me down
and die.” He was distressed, above all things, at the prospect of leaving
his family unprovided for, notwithstanding all the labours, anxieties,
and risks he had undergone. “When I reflect,” he said, “that I have given
up my extra advantage of one-third on all the engines we are now making
and are likely to make,[291]--when I think of my children, now upon the
verge of that time of life when they are naturally entitled to expect a
portion of their patrimony,--when I feel the consciousness of being unable
to restore to them the property which their mother intrusted to me,--when
I see all whom I am connected with growing rich, whilst I am groaning
under a load of debt and annuities that would sink me into the grave if
my anxieties for my children did not sustain me,--I say, when I consider
all these things, it behoves me to struggle through the small remaining
fragment of my life (being now in my 60th year), and do my children all
the justice in my power by wiping away as many of my incumbrances as
possible.”
It was seldom that Boulton wrote in so desponding a strain as this; but it
was his “darkest hour,” and happily it proved the one “nearest the dawn.”
Yet, we shortly after find him applying his energies, apparently unabated,
in an entirely new direction--that of coining money--which, next to the
introduction of the steam-engine, was the greatest enterprise of his life.
[290] Boulton to Matthews, 22nd December, 1788.
[291] Boulton acted with his usual open-handed generosity in
his partnership arrangements with Watt. Although the original
bargain between them provided that Boulton was to take
two-thirds, and Watt one-third profits, Boulton providing the
requisite capital and being at the risk and expense of all
experiments, he subsequently, at Watt’s request, agreed to the
profits being equally divided between them.