Presupuesto de los Gobiernos Autónomos Descentralizados

The next two sections outline the statistical case for the argument that Londoners enjoyed different levels of access to commodities depending on their location. In this context, the selection of silk and iron for these studies invites elaboration.

! Silk was the choicest textile in early modern Britain due to its exotic origin and consequent expense. Importing silks, other than raw bails, was subject to a high degree of mercantilist interference, as cloths processed by aliens were seen as robbing British weavers of work. London’s Legal Quays were the focus for these imports, not only because it was the largest single market for silks but also because it was the seat of the Customs Commission, who worked with the Weavers

Company and City merchant houses to police the trade.173 _{Domestic silk weaving} centered on Spitalfields, though many processes, especially dying and throwing, were completed outside of London, where labour was less fractious and water was more accessible. Coventry ribbons and Macclesfield handkerchiefs were amongst the standardised products sent back to London from the provinces, though Norwich and Essex also produced broad cloths of mixed fibres, crepes and gauzes.174

! Rioting weavers caused the 1765 prohibition of foreign silk imports into Britain, protecting Spitalfields weavers from French competitors. The latter produced cheaper goods as the fibres used in the production of French silk were acquired domestically.175 _{More legislation arrived in the Spitalfields Act of 1773 that}

empowered City Aldermen to fix the wages of weavers in order to dampen industrial

173 _{See N.K.A Rothstein, The Silk Industry in London, 1702-1766 (Unpublished PhD,}

University of London, 1961); Schwarz, London, 33-8; D.C. Coleman, The Courtaulds, An Economic and Social History (Oxford: Clarednon Press, 1969), I, pp. 13-23.

174 _{Rothstein, Silk, passim and M.D. George, London Life in the Eighteenth Century}

(Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985), pp. 182-3; S.H.R. Jones, ‘Technology, Transaction Costs, and the Transition to Factory Production in the British Silk Industry, 1700-1870’, Journal of Economic History, 47, 1 (1987), pp. 75-80.

unrest.176 _{Silk production in London was increasingly uncompetitive, and wares} produced in the provinces were cheaper, although in 1822 provincial manufacturers were said to ‘have had not the taste’ of Londoners.177 _{Catering for the fashionable} London market, however, Spitalfields could capitalise on the industrial atmosphere and circuits of knowledge generated by London’s retailing mercers. Vaunted

designers of seasonal ‘flowered’ silks, such as Anne Maria Garthwaite, emerged as professional taste-makers. Geographical fixity in combination with an abundance of existing secondary studies makes processing the policies generated by Spitalfields weaving a somewhat fruitless enterprise. Instead, this study will focus on those policies associated with the more mobile throwsters to represent the productive part of the trade, alongside those of mercantile silkmen and retailing mercers, which are less well known.

! Richard Cambell’s London Tradesman provides a concise description of what these terms meant, though he understates the complexity of the interaction between them and their customers. Silkmen bought raw silk, which they acquired through City merchants importing from the Levant and Italy, like John and Thomas March whose letterbooks survive, the East India Company or on their own account. Campbell saw them as straddling overseas and inland distribution, though his description speaks of the exalted status overseas merchants enjoyed despite the fact they probably shared plenty of skills: ‘If we consider him as a warehouse- keeper and retailer, he requires no great genius...if as a merchant, we refer him to that chapter where his qualifications are comprehended under the description of a general merchant’.178 _{Silkmen sold raw silk to throwsters who converted the ‘skein’} into yarn in sheds, employing both drawing mills and a large number of hands in the winding stage, ‘mostly women’.179 _{In turn, the throwsters sold to dyers and weavers} both in London and elsewhere. Mercers retailed finished silk cloths bought from them, though, as we shall see, this was not straightforward.

! Iron was subjected to far less formal regulation than silk, despite the fact that domestic production was substantially supplemented by higher quality imports from

176 _{J.H. Clapham, ‘The Spitalfields Acts, 1773-1824’, Economic Journal, 26, 104 (1916), pp.}

459-471.

177 _{House of Lords Sessional Papers, 1823, 13, p. 113.}

178 _{Richard Campbell, London Tradesman (London, 1747), p. 261.} 179 _{Campbell, London, p. 261.}

the Baltic.180 _{By the end of the seventeenth century, London’s Ironmongers} Company was a dining club that administered charitable bequests not the trade.181 Finished iron goods came to London from the Midlands overland or by river via Oxford, while the Sussex Weald supplied ordnance to the Navy Board and London Merchants until the 1770s.182 _{After 1770, large-scale ironworks in Wales, the north} and Scotland began to dominate the process of casting goods, although outworking remained the dominant mode of organisation in the Midland trades.183 _However, large volumes of Baltic bar-iron were landed in London and even if most was shipped to regional centres of production, the policies sampled in this study reveal some founding was carried on in London, as well as detailed working and finishing. Fashionable ironwork ranged alongside staple products, especially hand-tools, locks and nails, meaning the imperatives of ironmongers and iron-founders differed materially from fashionable mercers in scope.

! Insuring as an ironmonger or mercer did not necessarily mean that the policyholder was confined to selling iron or silk. At the retail end of both trades, the necessity of offering customers a large range of products doubtless meant that goods other than silk and iron would be stocked.184 _{Mercer Richard Perkin insured} the King’s Arms, Henrietta Street, and Covent Garden in 1720. On his death in April 1722, his shop was inventoried: in addition to silks it included cottons, woolens, and shagreens.185 _{Similarly Campbell asserted that ‘the brazier and ironmongers shops} are generally united, and in them you find Grates, and Stoves of all fashions,

180 _{K-G. Hildebrand, ‘Foreign Markets for Swedish Iron in the Eighteenth Century’,}

Scandinavian Economic History Review, 6, 1 (1958), p. 3 and J.R. Harris, The British Iron Industry, 1700-1850. Studies in Economic and Social History (Basingstoke: MacMillan, 1988), p. 50.

181 _{Elizabeth Glover, A History of the Ironmongers’ Company (London: Ironmongers’}

Company, 1991), p. 94. Cf. Robert Plumsted, Letterbook, 1756-58, In the University Library, Cambridge, Ralph Davis intro. (Wakefield: Micro Methods), to the ‘Ironmongers Clubb’, ff. 436-7.

182 _{Marie B. Rowlands, Masters and Men in the West Midland Metalware Trades Before the}

Industrial Revolution (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1975), pp. 99-106 and Henry Cleere and David Crossley, The Iron Industry of the Weald (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1985), pp. 205-11.

183 _{William G. Staples and Clifford L. Staples, Power, Profits and Patriarchy: The Social}

Organisation of Work at a British Metal Trade Firm, 1791-1922 (Oxford and New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001), pp. 17-19.

184 _{Mathew Craske, ‘Plan and Control: Design and the Competitive Spirit in Early- and Mid-}

Eighteenth Century Britain’, Journal of Design History, 12, 3 (1999), p. 193.

Pokers, Fire Shovels, [etc.]’.186 _{Likewise, a trade card for the Ironmongers Edward} and William Martinof Foster Lane from 1776 advertised a dizzying range of products, including

! all sorts of files and tools for goldsmiths, jewelers, engravers, clock and

! watchmakers; also for blacksmiths, gunmakers, braziers, tin-men, upholsterers, ! carpenters, joyners, carvers [etc.], Curriers knives and implements for gardening, all ! sorts of nails, locks, hinges, brass works for cabinets &c., furniture for coffins; all ! sorts of brass and iron wire, spinnet and harpsichord ditto, watch keys, glasses ! springs [etc.]. Melting pots of all sorts, Houghs [hoes], bills, axes and other iron work ! for ye plantations.187

Given the diversity of materials and the forms they were worked into, it is likely several suppliers would be engaged, although it is impossible to be sure which goods constituted the primary source of income for an individual trader. A good number of policy-holders insured with dual occupations, usually in cognate sectors: for example ironmonger-braziers, or, mercer-drapers. The wide range of contacts fostered in amassing these inventories still helps explain the lateral movement of, say, mercers to woolen drapers. !

! The aggregated insurance policies reflect the buoyancy of the silk and iron trades across the eighteenth century. Outlining the key movements briefly serves to provide a basis for a more detailed discussion of the trends and strategies

considered later in the chapter.! !

! For the silk trades, the chronology delineated by table 2.1 is relatively straightforward and conforms to the narrative drawn by earlier historians of the industry.188 _{The early eighteenth century was a golden period, the mid-century saw} a dip in activity, which was arrested in the 1770s, before declining again towards the end of the century. Before the early-1710s most of the policies state that £300 had been covered by the policyholder, reflecting the cap that applied in these early years for the Sun Office, hence their omission from this table and others. However, in terms of numbers of policies taken out, the 1710s and 1720s were positively hectic for the mercers, with a quarter of total policies falling in these years for all

occupations. After that, sums covered were variable, and on the whole tended to rise in real terms until the 1760s, though the volume of policies declined after 1724.

186 _{Campbell, Tradesman, p. 177.} 187 _{GL, Trade Cards.}

As Natalie Rothstein has suggested, the capture of French overseas colonies in the Seven Years War led to an unsustainable boom in British silk production for the export market, followed by a spectacular collapse immediately after the Peace of Paris, and the statutory intervention to protect the industry after the Parliamentary Inquiry of 1764-5.189

Table 2.1: London Sun Policies, Silk trades

Mercers Silkmen Throwsters

Number of Policies Average deflated Policy (£) Number of Policies Average deflated Policy (£) Number of Policies Average deflated Policy (£) 1710-14 79 10 8 1720-24 88 637 4 546 9 603 1730-34 44 1405 5 1916 10 720 1740-44 31 1519 1 309 8 1037 1750-54 22 1638 3 1804 2 722 1760-64 37 2077 6 598 18 1712 1770-74 52 2161 15 823 19 859 1780-84 38 2243 11 1899 4 712 1790-94 59 1564 4 1842 3 1624 1800-1804 20 1630 2 1862 1810-14 29 1438 5 5257 2 286 Total 499 66 83

Sources: V&A Sun Index (V&A Sun). Values deflated using the Schumpeter-Gilboy price index, industrial products (B).

! These strains were felt unevenly in the industry: the period 1760-3 saw a high number of policies taken out by mercers and throwsters, who exploited favourable conditions before a near complete cessation in 1764. By comparison, although few silkmen insured before the war, and silkmen completely ceased insuring between 1756 and 1759, activity in this sector also rose after 1760. By the 1770s, the number of policies had risen, though it must be noted that inflation also decreased the real values of the capitals insured by throwsters and mercers. Silkmen insured slightly more in real terms when compared with the 1760s. However, they were also most affected by the dangers wartime posed to shipping and cargos; the early 1760s meant both unforeseen risks and a buoyant demand for

their product at home. Overseas conflicts raged during all the sample periods after 1774 and made themselves felt across all the silk-related occupations assessed here, as did inflation. By this point, the industry was in terminal decline measured by both the volume of policies and real values. The rate of decline was not the same across the industry, happening comparatively slowly for mercers and much more dramatically for throwsters and silkmen, as silk processing increasingly moved away from London.

Table 2.2: London Sun Policies, Iron trades

Ironmongers Iron founders

Number of Policies Average deflated Policy (£) Number of Policies Average deflated Policy (£) 1710-14 28 1720-24 30 460 1730-34 22 953 1740-44 28 710 1750-54 19 942 2 941 1760-64 53 894 2 821 1770-74 58 1176 3 1100 1780-84 28 975 4 1856 1790-94 84 1046 ! !4 992 1800-1804 41 867 1 268 1810-14 67 1149 5 1054 Total 458 21

Sources: Museum of London Library Sun Index (ML Sun). Values deflated using the Schumpeter-Gilboy price index, industrial products (B).

! The historical narrative for London’s iron trade is not so clearly defined. And yet, proper attention to insurance records reveals that its trajectory stands in stark contrast to that of silk. Illustrated in table 2.2, its story was one of slow, hard-fought growth. For ironmongers, the real values covered by policies rose on average from £460 in 1720-24 to £1,149 in 1810-14, with twice as many policies being taken out at the end of the period. Given the domestic origin of iron and its use in ordnance and shot production, it comes as no surprise that wars did not have the same adverse effect on the trade as they did for silk, though locating a pattern for the growth of the trade is tricky. Seemingly, war did check growth in the 1740s when there was a fall in average real-coverage, although this was without a

corresponding decline in the numbers of policies filed. In the latter periods, this changed: a notable period of regression occurred in the 1780s, when policy numbers and real-coverage dropped during the American Revolutionary Wars. Colonial exports represented a major component of British hardware, and problems in this sector filtered through to the London trade, indicating the extent to which global, in addition to local markets, were significant.190 _{Nevertheless, the London} trade had rebounded by the 1790s, before a similar cycle occurred between 1800 and 1815. By this time, ironmongers had overtaken mercers in terms of coverage by volume and average policy value. The resilience of the industry in straitened

circumstances was, perhaps, sustained by advances in forging, puddling and casting in the Midlands and Wales, which resulted in lowered production costs. Equally, the increasing number of policies also suggests ironmongers adapted to increasingly variegated markets in London.

Section 4: Location

Insurance policies were assiduous in noting the addresses and locations of the goods they concerned. However, there was no generic form of street address in the eighteenth century, which complicates any attempt to map this information. The addresses given in the policy documents testify to the layered nature of place, usually combining one or more of the following signifiers: a shop-sign or, after 1767, house number; a street name; a parish or district (Wapping); or a local landmark (Monument). Contemporary maps allow street names to be traced with reasonable accuracy, but rarely do they allow, say, the precise location of the King’s Head, Paternoster Street, as insured by Charles South, mercer, in 1742, which on long shopping streets could make a considerable difference to the character of the area.191 _{Moreover, major thoroughfares like Cheapside crossed several knots of} parish boundaries, making the omission of the nearest parish by the Sun clerks especially irksome. Addresses outside central London were noted with little attention to detail, with Joseph Cook, mercer, insuring a business at ‘Uxbridge’ in 1743.192 _{Presumably this indifference to detail reflects the scarcity of mercers there,} and therefore the relative ease with which he could be located at the time.

Consequently, the following attempt to locate these trades is at best a splicing of

190 _{Chris Evans, ‘Plantation Hoe’, p. 78 and n. 12.} 191 _{V&A Sun, Mercer, Charles South, 1743.} 192 _{V&A Sun, Mercer, Joseph Cook, 1743.}

often-imperfect information taken from the policies with cartographic sources that are inevitably silent on some points.

! With this caveat in mind, this section proceeds by utilising an anachronistic analysis concerned with broad geographical trends. To outline general trends, the policies were assigned a geographical district within London, shown in Figure 2.1. From west to east these are Westminster, Covent Garden, Western City Suburbs, West City, East City, Eastern City Suburbs, South London and Other Suburbs. The district boundaries are consonant with that of the modern day post-coding of central London (WC1, EC1, etc.), though these have been modified in order to retain a sense of the City of London’s integrity relative to the rest of the capital. The City has been broken into two large sectors, west and east on a line running from London Bridge to Bishopsgate Street. The Eastern City includes the Legal Quays and primary overseas mercantile district. Each of these City sectors has been assigned a suburban component, roughly equating with areas ‘without’ the traditional City walls and radiating outward. The West Suburbs include Holborn, Clerkenwell and Hoxton; the East Suburbs include Spitalfields, Whitechapel and Shadwell. The Covent Garden district stretches down to the Thames, bounded by Clare Market on the East and Leicester Square in the West. Anything further west is assumed to be Westminster. Urban south London is counted as one district, though areas like Greenwich are included in a zone designated Other, made up of outlying villages including Chelsea and Uxbridge.

Figure 2.1: Districts used for the study: Source: Motco.co.uk

! In terms of the geographical distribution of policyholders, Table 2.3 shows a clear distinction can be made between the iron and silk trades. Divisions of labour

were reiterated by location in the silk trades. For the throwsters, the Eastern

Suburbs of Spitalfield and Whitechapel were the focus of most policies. Considering the concentration of the weavers here, this is hardly surprising. Despite a more varied distribution in the 1720s, most silkmen operated from the West City with some activity appearing in neighbouring districts in the East City and Western Suburbs from the 1730s. Given the silkmen’s mercantile function, their City location also seems sensible. The mercers generated the largest volume of policies, at 499. In combination, these suggest a trade that was similarly concentrated

geographically, while also presenting a picture that was more complex than either the silkmen or throwsters. Two districts, Covent Garden and the West City around Cheapside, generated 157 and 109 policies respectively, comprising over half the sample. Westminster and the East City generated a quarter more, meaning the remaining four districts in the East, South and Suburbs supported under a fifth of the mercers between them. Such a disparity between north-west and south-east suggests wealth and fashionability were decisive factors in the location of mercers’ shops. Reiterating this relationship, ironmongers were far more evenly distributed around London. Despite a tilt towards Westminster and the West City, no single district dominated as lopsidedly as did Covent Garden’s mercers. The aggregate figures suggest two patterns: one shaped by occupational networks and the fairly static concentrations of silkmen and throwsters in particular areas of London; the other, prominent in the retailing trades, points to a relationship between markets, fashionability and goods, to which the mercers were particularly sensitive.

Table 2.3: Sun policy activity by district Throwsters Throwsters Throwsters Westminst er Covent Garden West suburbs West City East City East Suburbs East Suburbs South Other 1710-14 1710-14 1710-14 88 1720-24 1720-24 1720-24 77 1730-34 1730-34 1730-34 66 1740-44 1740-44 1740-44 1 77 1750-54 1750-54 1750-54 1 11 1760-64 1760-64 1760-64 1616 1770-74 1770-74 1770-74 1 1 55 1780-84 1780-84 1780-84 22 1790-94 1790-94 1790-94 1 1800-1804 1800-1804 1800-1804 1810-14 1810-14 1810-14 22 Total Total Total 1 1 2 1 5454

Silkmen WestminsterWestminsterWestminster Covent Garden West suburbs West City East City East Suburb South South Other 1710-14 222 1 2 4 1720-24 1 1 1 1730-34 3 1 1740-44 1 1750-54 3 1760-64 5 1 1770-74 8 4 1 1780-84 2 7 1 1790-94 3 1