The Industrial Revolution & Slavery

Eli Whitney’s Cotton Gin invented in 1793 (photo by Tom Murphy VII, authorized for public use)

Historian Margaret Washington of Cornell University talks about the impact of industry on African Americans:

 Q: What did the progress created by technological innovations such as the cotton gin and the steam engine mean for black people?

A: Progress has different meanings for different people. And for people of African descent, the cotton gin was not progress. It was a further entrenchment of enslavement. And for African Americans, the Industrial Revolution, those technological advances in the textile industry, did not mean progress. It meant slavery. So we have to understand that during this period, what was progress for white people was enslavement and further degradation for African Americans.

The cotton gin represented for African Americans the antithesis of progress, because it created a massive domestic slave trade. Virginia, for example, which was a state that no longer had a one-crop economy (tobacco) but had a massive slave population — more slaves in Virginia than any other state — and yet they didn’t have the economy to support this population. So they became the place that supplied the Territories with slaves. And this was a situation of despair for African Americans, because they usually took men and left the women and children behind. So one aspect of the cotton gin was that African American families were separated as the cotton kingdom spread, and as, say, the sons of younger planters took men out into places like Alabama and set up new cotton estates.

Officially, the Atlantic slave trade ends in 1808. From 1801 to 1808, in anticipation of the closing of the Atlantic trade, 39,000 Africans are brought into the United States, most of them through South Carolina, legally. After 1808, because the cotton gin has revolutionized cotton production, the illegal slave trade is still very much a factor. The domestic slave trade is creating a situation where Africans are being pushed into the frontier, and there are not enough. Americans wink at the international trade, and Africans continue to come in. They do come in, in South Carolina, in Florida. They come in through the Spanish areas. So even though the trade is abolished, there’s still this constant trickle of Africans. And this continues all the way up to the Civil War.

Retrieved from: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part3/3i3126.html

Unknown author (n.d.) [image of slaves on a cotton plantation]. [Stereo Card]. Retrieved from https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/cotton-gin-and-the-expansion-of-slavery/sources/1885

Questions:

1. What was the connection between new technology and slavery after the Cotton Gin was invented in 1793?

2. What do you think life was like on a cotton plantation based on what you see in the picture?

The Industrial Revolution and Child Labor

Many industries employed young children due to their small size. In coal mines, small boys worked as “breakers.”

Detroit Publishing Co. (c. 1900) Breaker boys, Woodward Coal Mines, Kingston, Pa. [photograph]. Retrieved from Library of Congress.

Hine, L.W. (c. 1911). A Clipping. [photograph]. Retrieved from Library of Congress.

Child labor here in Illinois!

“The Industrial Revolution brought an increased need for coal to keep steam machinery running. Illinois helped to meet this need with coal mines, mostly in northern Illinois. Young boys were employed by coal companies because of their small size and low wages. Boys as young as eight could be found working the mines. Poverty drove parents to lie about their children’s age so they could work in the mines. Mining companies were oblivious to the children who were legally too young to work in the dangerous mines. Companies profited from child labor since wages for children were so low. Children had a variety of jobs in the mines. Trapper boys opened and closed the huge doors allowing mining cars to travel from one area of the mine to another. The doors needed to open and shut quickly to control ventilation in the mines. These children worked in almost complete darkness.

Breaker boys separated coal from rocks or other debris. This work was done above ground but still posed hazards to young workers. They sat in a room dark from the thick coal dust for hours. Just like the children working underground, breaker boys inhaled great amounts of coal dust damaging their lungs and causing illness. Breaker boys handled thousands of pieces of coal each day and the sulfur on the coal would cause their fingers to swell and bleed. The sounds of the machines used were deafening and able to crush small hands quickly…

By 1900, roughly 1.7 million children under the age of 16 worked in factories. Young boys and girls worked long hours for little pay near dangerous equipment that could dismember small hands, fingers and legs. To reach a high lever on the running equipment, very young children would stand on the machine which was extremely dangerous. The conditions in factories were harsh and treatment of the children by adult supervisors was abusive. The death toll in the factories was high, yet there was little concern for children who were injured or even killed because there was always another child to take their place.

Economics was a driving force behind child labor during the Industrial Revolution. Companies depended on the cheap wages they could pay children and would threaten to close or leave the state if any serious child labor legislation stood in their way.”

(Excerpted from “Child Labor” at https://www.eiu.edu/eiutps/newsletter_childlabor.php )

Questions:

1. Describe what you notice in the images of “breaker boys” that worked in the coal mines in Kingston, PA, and other pictures here.

2. What struck you as you read the newspaper story?

3. What role did child labor play in industries right here in Illinois?

The Industrial Revolution and Workplace Culture

Factory Rules from the Handbook to Lowell, 1848

REGULATIONS TO BE OBSERVED by all persons employed in the factories of the Hamilton Manufacturing Company.

The overseers are to be always in their rooms at the starting of the mill, and not absent unnecessarily during working hours. They are to see that all those employed in their rooms, are in their places in due season, and keep a correct account of their time and work. They may grant leave of absence to those employed under them, when they have spare hands to supply their places, and not otherwise, except in cases of absolute necessity. All persons in the employ of the Hamilton Manufacturing Company, are to observe the regulations of the room where they are employed. They are not to be absent from their work without the consent of the over-seer, except in cases of sickness, and then they are to send him word of the cause of their absence. They are to board in one of the houses of the company and give information at the counting room, where they board, when they begin, or, whenever they change their boarding place; and are to observe the regulations of their boarding-house. Those intending to leave the employment of the company, are to give at least two weeks’ notice thereof to their overseer. All persons entering into the employment of the company, are considered as engaged for twelve months, and those who leave sooner, or do not comply with all these regulations, will not be entitled to a regular discharge. The company will not employ anyone who is habitually absent from public worship on the Sabbath, or known to be guilty of immorality. A physician will attend once in every month at the counting-room, to vaccinate all who may need it, free of expense.

A time table scheduling out the days at Lowell Mills, 1868

Questions:

1. What rules were the factory workers subjected to? Give some examples.

2. Would you like to work and live with this set of rules? Why or why not?

3. What do you notice on the time table? What do you think each day was like?

4. Based on what you learned about “pre-industrial” work culture, what are some big contrasts between pre-industrial work and work in Lowell Factory?

The Industrial Revolution and the Environment

Photograph of a painting of St.Rollox Chemical Works at the opening of the Garnkirk and Glasgow railway in 1831 painted by D.O.Hill

In the 1840s, Charles Cist wrote an account of visiting Cincinnati:

“A dense cloud of darkness and smoke, visible for some distance before [a traveler] reaches it, hides the city from his eyes until he is in its midst; and yet half the volume is furnished by household fires, coal being the only fuel of the place. As he enters the manufacturing region, the hissing of steam, the clanking of chains, the jarring and grinding of wheels and other machinery, and the glow of melted glass and iron, and burning coal beneath, burst upon his eyes and ears in concentrated force. If he visits the warehouses he finds glass, cotton yarns, iron, nails, castings, and machinery, occupying a prominent place. He discovers the whole city under the influence of steam and smoke. The surface of the houses and streets are so discolored as to defy the cleansing power of water, and the dwellings are preserved in any degree of neatness, only by the unremitting labors of their tenants, in morning and evening ablutions. The very soot partakes of the bituminous character of the coal, and falling—color excepted—like snowflakes, fastens on the face and neck, with a tenacity which nothing but the united agency of soap, hot water, and the towel can overcome. Coal and the steam-engine are the pervading influence of the place. . . . It is, in industry, a perfect hive—and without drones.”

Cist, Charles. Cincinnati in 1841: Its Early Annals and Future Progress . Cincinnati: 1841.

Questions:

1. What do you notice in the image? What sorts of sounds or smells do you think the people in the painting are experiencing?

2. What did Charles Cist notice about the effect of industry on Cincinnati?