Birthplace of the factory system: Cromford
Cromford Mill was the world's first successful cotton spinning mill. Built by Richard Arkwright , it was begun in 1771 and was the blueprint for hundreds of factories and mills all over the world. Cromford was chosen as it had a reliable water supply. It was remote from the traditional, largely home-based cotton industry based in Lancashire. where newly-invented cotton machinery was under attack (the high, castle-like walls of the mill were designed to protect it).
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Workers' housing, a church, shops, the Greyhound Hotel, lock up, market place and a new house for Sir Richard (Willersley Castle) were built by Arkwright over the next 20 years. Masson Mill was built in 1783 and was dependent for power on the River Derwent. Echoing Arkwright's work, mills at Belper, Milford and Darley Abbey soon followed.
Later, the Merebrook Sough captured the water supply to Cromford Mill and after a long legal battle, Arkwright gave up cotton spinning there in 1846. Since then, the site has been used as a brewery, a laundry, hosiery warehouse, a colour (pigment) mill and a fish farm.
Starting in 1979, the area has gradually been restored and renovated by the Arkwright Society. Cromford with the other mills noted, was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2002. |
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