TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 185 
The first essay in flax spinning in Leeds was made at a small mill driven by water, 
called Scotland Mill, about four miles from Leeds, by my late father, J ohn Marshall, 
in partnership with Samuel Fenton of Leeds, and Ralph Dearlove of Knaresborough. 
This was in 1788 and 1789. 
The wonderful success and large profits attending the introduction of Arkwright’s 
invention into cotton spinning had about this time attracted general attention to me- 
chanical improvements applied to manufacturing purposes. ‘The spinning of flax by 
machinery was a thing much wished for by linen manufacturers. It attracted the 
attention, amongst others, of Mr. Marshall, who was so strongly impressed with the 
advantageous field for invention and enterprise offered by flax spinning, that he de- 
voted himself entirely to the new enterprise. 
~ It appears that some attempts at flax spinning had already been made on a small 
scale at Darlington, and some other places, as the first spinning machines used at 
Scotland Mill were on a patent plan of Kendrew and Co. of Darlington. This did 
not answer; experiments were made, and a patent taken out for a plan of Matthew 
Murray’s, then foreman of mechanics with Mr. Marshall. 
In 1791 a mill was built in Holbeck, Leeds, and at first driven by one of Savery’s 
steam engines, in combination with a water-wheel, but in 1792 one of Boulton and 
Watt’s steam engines of twenty-eight horse power was put down. In 1793 there were 
900 spinning spindles at work. We may take this small item as our first statistical 
datum of flax spinning in Leeds. 
I may here describe an important difference between the state in which the raw 
material flax is presented to the spinner and that in which cotton, wool, or silk is 
found previous to being manufactured. The fibres of cotton, wool, and silk are sup- 
plied by nature already in their finest state of subdivision ; they require merely to be 
straightened and formed into a continuous thread. In raw flax, on the other hand, 
the ultimate fibres, which are very fine, are united by a gummy matter into broad strips 
or ribands, and a very operose process, called heckling, is required to subdivide the 
material into finer fibres before the spinning process can begin. 
In the earlier stages of flax spinning this preparatory process was performed entirely 
by adult men, called hecklers. 
As soon as the flax spinning by machinery began to increase considerably, the de- 
mand for the labour of the hecklers enabled them to obtain high wages (as much as 
two guineas a week, if they worked), and, as they were combined in Trades Unions, 
and enforced the old limitations on the number of apprentices, they became possessed 
of a species of monopoly, extremely troublesome and prejudicial to the progress of 
the trade. In fact no large extension or well-organized system was practicable so 
long as this barrier remained on the threshold. A patent for a heckling machine by 
which this process could be performed without the assistance of adult labour was taken 
out in the name of Matthew Murray, about 1805. Its introduction was resisted at 
first by the men with much violence and intimidation, but, being firmly persevered in, 
it became an established portion of the system. It was introduced gradually into 
general use in the trade, and had the effect of neutralizing the monopoly of the hand 
hecklers, without any sudden displacement of labour. 
The next step was the establishment, by Mr. Murray, of a good machine-making 
shop for flax machines, which became the parent or precursor of many others, until 
Leeds became the seat of a very important branch of business in machine-making, 
chiefly for flax spinning. 
The system of flax spinning had now become firmly established and well-organized, 
and made steady progress; but as yet was only applicable to the production of the 
coarser description of yarns, up to No. 16, or 16 lea yarn, which was manufactured at 
Barnsley into the coarser description of linens. The material employed was almost 
entirely Baltic flax. 
_ An improvement was next introduced into the processes, called preparing, prece- 
ding the actual twisting of the fibres into a thread in the spinning machine; this im- 
provement consisted in drawing the fibres through fine heckles or gills instead of roll- 
ers, thus giving the means of producing a much evener and finer thread, that is 
up to 40 or 50 leas, and for these yarns the finer flax of Flanders and Holland began 
to be used. ‘This was about the year 1820, when the finer description of yarn came 
into very extensive use in the manufacture of the finer and better sorts of drills—an 
important branch of the Barnsley linen trade. 
