Dundee Mills

[Anne Wilson]

Hello everyone....I hope you all had a very happy & merry Xmas.
I have a question on the mills in Dundee in the mid 1800's please.
My gggrandparents were living in Rose Lane in 1841 and Ann Street in 1861 and were Irish handloom weavers. Presumably they worked in a mill nearby and I'm wondering if anyone can tell me what would be the most likely one?
I'm not sure if there were multiple mills around at that time?
Cheers
Annie

[Christopher]

Hello Annie,

I don't know much about Dundee but know a Belfast guy who works there and has lived there for many years. I've sent him a message asking if he can assist in replying to your query.

After I posted a message to him I googled to see if there was an online source where you could get more assistance ... the Verdant Works is the very place ... send a message. 

The Verdant Works is so called because when it was built for merchant and flax spinner David Lindsay in 1833 the area was surrounded by green fields. The ready availability of water (the Scouring Burn) made it a perfect location for a mill.

Have a Peaceful and Prosperous New Year.

Christopher

[atom12]

Hi Annie

Handloom weaving tended to be a cottage industry and therefore would be carried out in the home.  It was mainly spinning and cop winding that was carried out in the mills, though your family may well have worked in weaving sheds/factories or they might even have originally been handloom weavers that ended up working in the mill.

There were a number of mills in the area, one that was near hand was Maxwelltown.  Baltic Works opened in 1852 for power loom weaving and there were others.  Bowbridge Works would not be too far away from the area either.  

[Anne Wilson]

Thank you Christopher...it looks like a great site to start.
I appreciate your time and you have a great New Year too.
Thank you also atom12. Their daughters were listed as mill workers/winders and have found my gggrand father also listed as a carpet weaver......I thought the Maxwelltown mill might have been the go.
Time to do some googling!
Annie

[Christopher]

Hi Annie,

My friend in Dundee sent the following message.

Ann Street and Rose Lane.....there were dozens of jute mills in Juteopolis as Dundee was known....Ann Street is off Hilltown and the nearest big works to there was The Bowbridge and another smaller one the name of which escapes me...situation was similar to Derry and the mills there....husbands were paid less and stayed at home and walked the dog and fed the kids....they were known as potboilers......it was common for people to work around the various mills to the point of clocking on in one in the morning to the extreme point of getting sacked , walking out, or hearing of another with a couple of pence more per week, and moving on to another the same or next day. Many of the mills have been turned into apartment blocks....a lot of the jute barons lived in West Fery and in a square mile there were thirty three millionaires...the wealth of the jute Barons was obscene compared to the 10/9d paid to the workers..

If you contact the City Archivist at Dundee (google search will reveal the contact address) there will be more answers.
         
Mills were everywhere and your relatives may have worked in Blaikies, Verdant Works, The Coffin Mill, Halleys, or the huge Cox Brothers Mill at Lochee which is Dundee's Irish quarter.

Better info would come from The City Archivist, Dundee or by e-mailing the Verdant Works which is the Jute Mill museum. Hope this is of some help. BTW weavers were
the better paid mill workers and were looked up to by the spinners and other workers.

There's further information on the University of Dundee website  which includes images of an Employee list from the Camperdown Linen Works, Lochee. The Lochee area of Dundee is still feeling the effects of a large nineteenth century migration from across the Irish Sea. The area is known as "Little Tipperary".

Christopher

[atom12]

Thank you also atom12. Their daughters were listed as mill workers/winders and have found my gggrand father also listed as a carpet weaver.....

Hi Annie

As you will have discerned by now there were many mills in Dundee at the time.  A good number that Christopher mentioned were situated  more to the West End of the city.  Manhattan Works, Caldrum Works, Dens Works, Eagle Mill, Ogilvie Mill, Stobswell Works, Taybank Works, Welfield Works, Wallace Craigie Mill, Malcolms, etc, as well as those previously mentioned were nearer the area your relatives resided.

Thomson Shepherd was one well-known carpet weaving company in the town.

Thankfully, Christopher has provided you with a number of leads to be getting on with for now. 

[Christopher]

Hi Annie,

I've received another message from Dundee. 

I knew a gent who was a butcher's boy in Dundee and he delivered to the mansions of some of the jute Barons : He told me of a spinster daughter of jute wealth who had travelled to Egypt....she had an Italian painter come to her house and spend 3 months painting a frieze above the picture rail  of Egypt....cost in early 1900's...£3,500. Such was thw wealth of the jute owners.

A strike was threatened by jute workers , so an owner reacted by importing Irish to work at an  even lower rate. Allegedly a child fell asleep on a lengthy shift and was held by the ankles from a top floor mill window to wake the child up and set an example.

Leading families owning Mills were Baxters, Cairds, Cox, and the Grimmond family of Joe Grimmond the politician.... they bequeathed parks and halls to the City. There were many mills now that I think of it in the Ann Street area and I cannot think of Rose Lane although the Ann Street area has Rosebank names and Rose House which is now a Care home. Eagle Jute Mills, Buist, Don Brothers, and many mills on Victoria Road area close to Ann Street.

Dundee jute has close connections to Belfast as much of the machinery was made at Mackies

Christopher

[Rowana]

Hi Annie,

Here is a couple of links for you -

http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=340293&y=731032&z=1&sv=ann+street&st=6&tl=Ann+Street,+Dundee,+DD3&searchp=newsearch.srf&mapp=newmap.srf

Ann St originally went right through from the Hilltown to Cotton St.  I went to, what was then, the Dundee Trades College in 1962-63. The workshops were in the old Ann St works, which was at the corner of Ann St & William St. I don't know what it was used for previously.

As others have said, there were loads of jute works in this area. The Eagle works were on Arbroath road (B959 on the map). Forebank works on Forebank St, works on Dura St, Caldrum work in Caldrum St, in fact loads of works round that area.

I served my apprenticeship as an electrician in Rockwell works, which was in Lorrimer St, just off the top left of the map. It was flattened and houses built on it when I was last down there about 4 or 5 years ago.


http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/towns/moretpix399.html

Scroll down to the 10th picture. The 4 multi-storey flats in the front are build on the north side of Ann St.


http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/towns/moretpix399.html

This one gives you some quick time movies of the jute mills.


I left Dundee in 1969 to go to sea, and I'm sure I would get lost if I went back again now.


Hope this helps.

Cheers
Jim

[Christopher]

YouTube - Victorian Dundee part 1

YouTube - Victorian Dundee part 2