270 Percy Wells Bidwell 



important to deserve especial consideration. The manufacture of 

 fur and woolen hats, which in many inland towns was carried on 

 in small shops for a purely local market, had in Fairfield County, 

 Connecticut, been developed into an export industry. In 1810 the 

 census credited this county with a product of 350,000 hats. Most 

 of these were made in the town of Danbury, where there were 56 

 hat shops employing from three to five men each.^ As a result of 

 the growth of this industry the population of the town had increased 

 from 3,180 to 3,600 in the decade 1800-1810. Hats were also manu- 

 factured in smaller quantities in New London.^ 



The Iron Industry. 



Iron furnaces, forges and trip-hammers, as well as rolling and 

 slitting mills, were in operation all through the inland region of 

 southern New England in 1810. For the furnaces the three requi- 

 sites to profitable operation were a supply of iron ore, a plentiful 

 supply of wood to produce the char coal used as fuel, and a stream 

 of water to furnish power for the bellows. These requisites seem 

 to have been met best in two localities; in Litchfield County, Conn., 

 and in a small area in south-eastern Massachusetts, including towns 

 in Plymouth and Bristol Counties. In Litchfield there were in 1810 

 four furnaces, 32 forges, 8 trip-hammers, and 2 rolling and slitting 

 mills. These works were rather evenly distributed among 16 towns, 

 those most interested being Salisbury, Canaan and Kent.^ In the 

 first of these there was a famous mine from which 4,000 to 5,000 tons 

 of ore of excellent quality were annually taken. Iron was also mined 

 in Kent and limestone was procured in Canaan. 



The principal articles produced from iron in this county were 

 anchors and other forms of ship-hardware, bells, cart and wagon- 

 tires, sleigh-shoes, scythes, gun-barrels, bar and sheet-iron, and nail- 

 rods. Up to 1810 this industry seems to have had little if any appre- 

 ciable effect in creating a non-agricultural population in the county. 



' Bailey, James M. History of Danbury, Conn. New York. 1896. p. 217. 



^ Coxe, Tench. View of the United States, pp. 158-159. In this place there 

 were 17 hatters' shops, producing 10,000 hats annually. 



' Pease and Niles' Gazetteer gives us facts concerning the extent of the iron 

 manufacture in these towns at a somewhat later date, 1819. There were then 

 in Canaan 8 forges, 7 anchor shops and 2 furnaces; in Kent there were several 

 mines in operation and 7 forges, with an estimated total output of 100 tons annually. 

 Salisbury had 3 forges, 2 blast furnaces, 1 shop making anchors and screws, an- 

 other making scythes, and 2 shops fitted with trip-hammers operated by water 

 power which produced gun-barrels, sleigh-shoes and hoes. 



