Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/404

396 was doled out in small instalments which were entered on the back of the shop-notes.

By this time, however, Oldknow, besides accumulating heavy debts of a larger kind, had got into arrears with the small contractors of the neighbourhood, and now that his note system was at work, the time seemed opportune for meeting their demands. On 25 May 1793 the account for wages, &c., at Mellor rose to £341 10s. 5d., of which only about £120 was due to mill hands; deductions for rents and other supplies received amounted to £52; 'notes upon shop' to £233; and a bill of exchange for £30 was paid to one of the contractors, leaving about £26 to be accounted for by cash or other modes of payment. In addition to this, however, the holders of shop-notes received small sums in cash amounting to £16 10s. 11½d. It will be seen that Samuel Oldknow contrived during the crisis of 1793 to carry on his factory by cash payments to his workers amounting to no more than two shillings in the pound.

Letters from Arkwright in April 1795 and July 1796 show him acknowledging instalments of interest, and urging repayment of 'this vast debt'; and indicate that Oldknow had borrowed an additional £5,000 from his bankers. By this time Oldknow had given up his manufacture of muslins, had let his Stockport works, and had taken up his residence at Mellor, where—as the employer of three hundred mill hands, as a master responsible for the board, lodging, clothing, and upbringing of fifty to a hundred apprentices, as an improving landowner and colliery proprietor, as canal director and road-maker—he was becoming the founder of a new industrial community. But it was not till 1798 that he offered for sale his Stockport works and other estates which he had acquired for industrial purposes, and the letter from Arkwright on 2 February 1798, which probably led to this step, may perhaps be an indication that until then Oldknow had not abandoned hope of reviving the wider plans of 1792:

"No favourable circumstances have arisen in business to induce me to alter the sentiments I expressed when I last wrote to you, indeed everything seems to conspire to extinguish the little prospect there then was of my taking up the idea you have been suggesting. It would be downright madness in me to engage myself—I dread the consequences that seem likely to follow the present situation of trade. Many mills are giving over. In this neighbourhood Mr. Strutt's have shortened their time of working, and so has Mr. Nightingale—I have been so much undercut that I have made little sales for this long time. Nobody adhere to their lists and what steps to take I do not know … I am sorry it is not convenient to you to remit me the interest. … It seems to me trade cannot mend till there is a peace, or till one-half, two-thirds or perhaps three-fourths of the mills have given over working."