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Mr Charles Gott gave us an interesting illustrated overview of the development of blanket making in Witney.
He began with a review of the production methods for producing woollen cloth, explaining the earliest methods of carding, spinning, fulling and finally weaving. The earliest spinning wheel in Britain was in the 14th Century and blankets were usually made from yarn produced from low quality fleece, mainly from butchered sheep. Fulling, a method of reducing the natural oils from the raw wool, was originally done by treading the material in a tub with a mixture including a type of clay called "Fuller's Earth". In time this primitive method was gradually mechanised.
Weaving on loom at first limited the with of a piece of cloth to the arm span of the operator because the shuttle had to be returned from side to side. "Broadcloth", wider, was made when an apprentice or second worker was employed to return the shuttle.
During the Middle Ages most of the woollen cloth was produced in the Low Countries by Flemish workers. Wool was exported and the finished cloth was reimported. The wool industry made many people very rich and many village and town today has church or attached chapel as a memorial to the wool merchants.
Why did Witney prosper and survive when other wool processing centres such as Burford went into decline? Our speaker suggested that one possible reason was the lack of guilds within the town. This allowed greater freedom in setting up and engaging in the industry. Another reason was that the weavers produced a good value for money cloth, not of the best quality but at a price people could afford. It was a general purpose cloth suitable for a range of uses. In the late 17th and early 18th Centuries the Hudson Bay company was in the market for a steady and reliable supply of blankets for trading for furs in Canada, The weavers of Witney were more industrialised than other areas, using factory setups with multiple machines and a degree of co-operation which enabled them to capture the contracts.
Eventually the trade ended up with a small group of families who became related through marriage. Best known were the Early family. As the new inventions became available with flying shuttles, steam engines and gas lamps the factories gradually became consolidated into fewer buildings.
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