INDUSTRIES 



typical. Even in such mills, however, steam- 

 power has of late largely superseded hand-labour, 

 and the introduction of ' cheap and perishable ' 

 foreign doors, &c., which the large importers 

 admit to be a notable recent feature of the 

 trade, is a serious rival to their own production. 



Allusion has been made to the county in- 

 dustries directly or indirectly connected with 

 the timber trade. These are too numerous for 

 detailed description, but a very brief account of 

 them may be given. There is a large pro- 

 duction of carriages, wagons, &c., both in 

 Gloucester, where the well-known ' Railway 

 Carriage and Wagon Co.* now employs from 

 1,100 to 1,400 hands, and has in the forty-six 

 years since its establishment grown to be the 

 largest manufacturing firm in the city, and one 

 of the largest of its kind in the kingdom ; and 

 in Bristol, where a great trade is carried on by 

 the Bristol Carriage and Wagon Works, the 

 Stapleton Carriage and Wheel Works, &c. 

 Joinery and cabinet-making are done on a 

 large scale in both the large cities. There 

 are the Whitehall Cabinet Works, among many 

 in Bristol ; while at or near Gloucester are the 

 'Gloucester Joinery Co.,' Mr. William Wibby, 

 and Messrs. James Constance & Sons (founded 

 in 1788) who do steam-turning and joining. 

 A very large manufacture of furniture has 

 since 1863 been carried on at Gloucester by J. 

 Matthews & Co. ; Mr. C. Jones, at Hather- 

 ley, has since 1885 managed what is said to 

 be the largest step-works in existence ; Messrs. 

 Roberts, of Gloucester, employ about 150 ope- 

 ratives in the manufacture of different games 

 and toys ; the firm of Vowles & Sons, with ten 

 other firms, &c., produces brushes at Bristol, and 

 has recently started a branch in a disused cloth- 

 mill at Stonehouse ; while at Gloucester Messrs. 

 Ireland & Co., brushmakers, have carried on 

 their business since as far back as 1767, and 

 Messrs. Morland have for more than fifty years 

 made safety and other matches on a scale which 

 is indicated by the fact that they can turn a ton 

 of wood into matches in a day. 



The manufacture of walking-sticks and um- 

 brella handles, which is a speciality of the Stroud 

 district, is carried on by so few firms in the 

 country as to merit a rather more detailed 

 account. With so much cheap local beech- 

 wood as material, and with water-power and 

 vacant cloth-mills available, the manufacture 

 had a natural origin in the Golden Valley. It is 

 not known, so far as I can ascertain, at what 

 exact date it started ; but sixty years ago it was 

 prospering. For some time only common sorts 

 were made the black handles, carved according 

 to traditional local patterns, representing the 

 highest type. But the trade has progressed and 

 enlarged, foreign woods are employed, and the 

 five or six firms now producing umbrella-handles, 

 while driving a keen competition among them- 

 selves, supply a large part of the demand of the 



country. Some of the materials are procured 

 ready-made, i.e. the firms receive the celluloid, 

 bone, or metal handles now so much in fashion, 

 and fit them into specially prepared sticks, gene- 

 rally of beech-wood. Wooden handles of every 

 grade are, however, manufactured on the spot, 

 from olive, gorse, cherry, orange, American birch 

 and maple, Congo-wood, and canes of different 

 sorts, and pass through every stage of seasoning, 

 stripping, bending, and varnishing within the 

 factory. The present makers are Messrs. Hooper 

 of Griffin Mill, Thrupp, whose firm claims to 

 be the oldest, and employs about fifty hands ; 

 the Chalford Stick Co., with about one hundred 

 hands ; Messrs. A. J. Harrison & Co., founded 

 in 1840 by Mr. Dangerfield, also at Chalford ; 

 Messrs. Nicks & Co. (now Walker) at Nails- 

 worth ; Messrs. Beard & Co., Horsley Mill, and 

 Messrs. Workman at Woodchester. 



It is principally for the very large English 

 market that these firms produce. Complaints 

 are raised of the ' excessive tariffs ' which have 

 nearly killed the former trade with France, Ger- 

 many, Spain, and Italy, and of the dumping of 

 foreign manufactured sticks by France, Austria- 

 Hungary, and Germany. On the whole, how- 

 ever, this interesting special industry, like others 

 in Gloucestershire Jong surviving the special 

 advantages which caused its rise, may be said to 

 be flourishing, and competition has at least led 

 to 'economies in production' as regards utiliza- 

 tion of ' waste ' wood, and cane, to a degree 

 which is really remarkable. 1 



There were, according to the census returns 

 of 1901, 442 males and 264 females within 

 the county engaged in the umbrella and stick 

 manufacture. 



The history of Gloucestershire shipbuilding 

 is almost inevitably a part of the civic history 

 of Bristol. It is true that the Severn towns have 

 spasmodically attempted shipbuilding. At Glou- 

 cester a shipsmith is mentioned in 1230,* while 

 Newnham in the l8th century produced a few 

 ships ' of large burthen.' * But the Severn was 

 too dangerous a river for shipbuilding to prosper 

 on its banks, and it was Bristol, described as far 

 back as 1141 by the Gesta Stephani as 'a port 

 fit and safe for 1,000 vessels,' which up to 

 the beginning of the 191(1 century was the 

 chief source of vessels for the west of England. 

 For the siege of Calais in 1347, Bristol supplied 

 Edward III with 24 ships and 608 men, 4 and a 

 little later in the reign gave him twenty-six 

 vessels, while London gave but twenty-five, and 

 only Fowey, Yarmouth, and Dartmouth supplied 

 more. In the I5th century began its foreign 

 shipping trade in organized form, when Canynges 

 started a line of vessels for that purpose. In 



1 Thousands of ' pea-shooters,' for instance, are 

 made out of odd ends of cane. 

 1 W. H. Stevenson, Glatu. Cat. 

 1 Rudder, op. cit, 572. 

 4 Arrowimith's Diet, of Bristol, 363. 



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