The Tideswell Local History Club was treated to a very knowledgeable tour around Belper by Joan Ward on their May evening excursion. Belper is an interesting little town which has known at least two major industries in itâs time.
The un-missable North Mill, dated 1912, is evidence of the cotton industry which was promoted here by Derbyshire man Jedediah Strutt. He and his family had a huge weir built across the Derwent, powerful enough to drive eight different mills and which at one time employed 3000 people!
This was at a time of great industrial unrest with machine wreckers troubling many factories and so it is still possible to see gun emplacements built into an old gangway across the road. However, the Strutts were much more enlightened and paternalistic than the mill owners in the Tideswell area. Being Unitarians they believed in helping others to help themselves. They owned three farms, whose produce went towards feeding the workers. They started a school and Belper could even boast of a factory with a 40 piece orchestra! But they did insist on good behaviour â you could be fined for having a dirty machine etc. or even for misbehaving in the town at night.
One of their major contributions was in the design of the mills themselves. Older wooden mills were always going up in flames. The Strutts designed iron framed buildings which had composition floors. These iron (later, steel) frames were later adopted all over the World for high-rise construction.
Before cotton, Belper was famous for the production of iron nails. Joan took us past a tiny workshop where at one time a self-employed nailer would beat out 1000 nails per week. It must have been a very noisy town with around 500 nailers working here before their trade was ruined by the new Birmingham manufactories.
Many thanks Joan, it was an excellent evening and we learned lots.
B. Woodall