page_title: Silk industry of Cheshire
section_title: Throwing
hierarchical_section_title: Silk industry of Cheshire / History of silk working in Cheshire / Macclesfield / Throwing
caption_attribution_description: Macclesfield was a town of silk mills Chester Road Mill now known as the Regency Mill
context_page_description: Congleton, Macclesfield, Bollington and Stockport were traditionally silk-weaving towns. Silk was woven in Cheshire from the late 1600s. The handloom weavers worked in the attic workshops in their own homes. Macclesfield was famous for silk buttons manufacture. The supply of silk from Italy was precarious and some hand throwing was done, giving way after 1732 to water-driven mills, which were established in Stockport and Macclesfield.
context_section_description: Charles Roe built the Button Mill in 1743, where he installed two Italian filatoio (water-driven throwing machines of the type used in Derby), and a dye house. The mill expanded and by 1761 it was employing 350 persons. Other throwing mills followed, such as Frost's Mill on Park Green which was founded in 1775 by Daintry and Ryle. John Hadfield had a mill on the River Bollin, and around this time the first Chester Road Mill was built.
  Macclesfield prospered. Men in throwing earned 7s a week while men on the land earned 6s. Women earned 3s 6d, and children on a three-year contract started on 6d a week in the first year, then 9d in the second and a whole shilling in the third year. This was for twelve hours a day for a six-day week. Demand increased while Britain was at war with France, but peace caused years of depression. Charles Roe left the silk industry in 1760, selling his share in his business for £10,000, and when the Seven Years' War finished in 1763, there was great hardship. Macclesfield did not weave silk at this time but supplied the thread to Spitalfields. There, there was unrest and large demonstrations which were supported by smaller ones in Park Green and the Market Place. Workers formed combinations. An Act of Parliament in 1773 regulated the wage rates and the number or apprenticeship places in Spitalfields.
caption: Chester Road Mill, with the date 1790 above the door.
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