BIRMINGHAM. 



305 



they displayed their usual fury. At ten o'clock in 

 the evening, three troops of cavalry had arrived at 

 Birmingham, and on this intelligence being com- 

 inunicated to the rioters they discontinued their 

 lawless operations. They did not, however, at 

 once disperse, but, forming themselves into small 

 bodies, levied contributions on hamlets and farm- 

 houses, until finally the country people collected 

 together in their own defence and dispersed the 

 ruffian*. During the riots, three of the persons 

 who sustained the greatest damage to their pro- 

 perty employed in their several concerns many 

 hundred persons, who would be thrown out of em- 

 ployment by the derangement which such events 

 occasion in manufacturing and commercial estab- 

 lishments. After a considerable interval all those 

 whose property had been injured by the rioters re- 

 covered damages from the county to the extent of 

 .26,961. Dr Priestley made his escape from his 

 house with his wife and family. Before quitting 

 his residence the fires were put out, in the hope 

 that the mob, not finding immediate facilities for 

 destroying the house, might be induced to relin- 

 quish the idea. This precaution, however, had not 

 the desired effect, and the laborious task of hewing 

 and tearing the house to pieces was quickly begun. 

 Dr Priestley first retreated to Worcester, and 

 afterwards to London, where he was appointed to 

 succeed Dr Price, as the pastor of a congregation 

 at Hackney. He finally quitted his native land in 

 1794, for America, where he purchased 200,000 

 acres of land on the banks of the Susquehannah, 

 about 120 miles from Philadelphia. Here he spent 

 the remainder of his days in retirement, and died 

 February 6th, 1804, in the seventy-first year of his 

 age. A tablet of white marble, with a suitable in- 

 scription, was erected to his memory at Birming- 

 ham, by the congregation over which he had pre- 

 sided. 



The history of Birmingham, as the midland me- 

 tropolis of art and manufacture, may be divided 

 into three periods. The first period may be sup- 

 posed to have terminated at about the restoration 

 of King Charles II. Down to this time (the Re- 

 storation) though Birmingham had been a manu- 

 facturing town from unknown antiquity, her arti- 

 sans, in general, kept themselves within the smoke 

 of their forges, to execute such orders for imple- 

 ments of war, and husbandry, carpenters' and other 

 tools, kitchen utensils, and such articles as might 

 be periodically ordered of them, by those who re- 

 quired them, or by merchants or their itinerant 

 agents. At the Restoration, therefore, may be 

 said to commence the second period of the manu- 

 facturing history of Birmingham, when a travelled 

 king and a luxurious court introduced a taste for 

 articles of a more elegant and costly description 

 than those that had been previously in demand, and 

 Birmingham naturally took the lead in the manu- 

 facture of them. Thus she proceeded in her pro- 

 sperous career of industry and skill to that import- 

 ant era the discovery of the steam-engine. Al- 

 though it was at Glasgow where Watt first made 

 his great improvements on the steam engine, it was 

 at Birmingham, or at least at Soho, in the vicinity 

 of Birmingham, where these were first carried into 

 successful practice. When Watt's partner, Dr 

 Roebuck, became unable to render him the stipu- 

 lated assistance in his undertakings in consequence 

 of the pecuniary embarrassments which followed 

 the failure of some mining speculations in which he 

 had engaged, Watt was so much discouraged, that 



VII. 



he was on the eve of abandoning the further pro- 

 secution of his plans. Mr Boulton had at this time 

 become well known as one of the most intelligent 

 and enterprising manufacturers in the kingdom ; 

 and, with the consent of Mr Watt, a negotiation 

 was opened with him and was brought to a conclu- 

 sion in 1773, when Dr Roebuck resigned his shaie 

 of the steam-engine patent to Mr Boulton on terms 

 very advantageous to himself. This was one of 

 the most happy events in the career of Watt, for 

 his new partner was a man of wealth and of great 

 personal influence : " to a most generous and ardent 

 mind," says Playfair, "he added an uncommon 

 spirit for undertaking what was great and difficult. 

 Mr Watt was studious and reserved, keeping aloof 

 from the world ; while Mr Boulton was a man of 

 address, delighting in society, active, and mixing 

 with people of all ranks with great freedom and 

 without ceremony. Had Mr Watt searched all 

 Europe he could not have found another person so 

 fitted to bring his invention before the public in a 

 manner worthy of its merit and importance ; and, 

 although of most opposite habits, it fortunately so 

 happened that no two men ever more cordially 

 agreed in their intercourse with each other." The 

 value to Watt of such a partner as this may be 

 best estimated by the fact, that the firm expended 

 no less a sum than 47,000 on the speculation in 

 Watt's steam-engines before they began to receive 

 any remuneration. When Watt went to Birming- 

 ham, part of the establishment at Soho was appro- 

 priated to his use, and with the advantages he 

 there enjoyed he soon produced some capital en- 

 gines. They came but slowly into use, but in time 

 found their way into the mines and manufactories 

 all over the kingdom. It was ultimately found 

 necessary to erect, at a convenient distance, an 

 iron-foundry, to which comes a branch of the Bir- 

 mingham canal, whereby coals, iron, sand, &c., 

 were brought to a wet dock within the walls, and 

 the engines and other heavy goods transported in 

 boats to every part of the kingdom. The firm, 

 however, did not confine its attention to the manu- 

 facture of engines, but devised means of applying 

 their powers to various operations in the manufac- 

 tures of Soho. Thus the extensive experience of 

 the proprietors enabled them to apply a steam- 

 power to the boring of cylinders, pumps, &c., to 

 drilling, to turning, to blowing their melting-fur- 

 naces, and to whatever tended to render their 

 manufactures more perfect and to abridge human 

 labour. But of all the different processes con- 

 ducted at Soho perhaps none have, first and last, 

 attracted more attention than the application of 

 steam to coining at the Soho Mint. The coinirig- 

 mill, or engine, which Mr Boulton first established 

 there in 1783, was afterwards much improved, and 

 ultimately not only produced coins with astonish- 

 ing expedition but with an accuracy which the 

 coinage of this country had not previously exhi- 

 bited. The engine in this mint, as thus improved, 

 worked at once eight machines, each capable of 

 striking from seventy to eighty-four pieces in a 

 minute, or between 4000 and 5000 in an hour, so 

 that the eight machines together would produce 

 between 30,000 and 40,000 coins in one hour. 

 The following are the processes executed by these 

 machines as operated upon by the steam-engine: 

 rolling the masses of copper into sheets; fine roll- 

 ing of the same cold through cylindrical steel-roll- 

 ers; clipping the blank pieces of copper for the 

 i die; shaking the coin in bags; striking both 



