AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE MANUFACTURE OR PRODUCTION OF ORNAMENTAL FABRICS
Year: 1856

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Robert Bell, of 93, Glassford Street, Glasgow, for
the Invention of "AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE MANUFACTURE OR PRODUCTION
OF ORNAMENTAL FABRICS."
Sealed the 19th September 1856, and dated the 22nd May 1856.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Robert Bell at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 22nd May
1856.
I, ROBERT BELL, of 93, Glassford Street Glasgow, do hereby declare the
nature of the Invention for "AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE MANUFACTURE OR PRO-
DUCTION OF ORNAMENTAL FABRICS," to be as follows:-
This Invention consists of an improvement in the manufacture of printed
cotton fabrics, and the same has for its object the making a cloth, having two
printing surfaces and one or more filling wefts or warps between the said print-
ing or outside surfaces, all woven into one as one fabric, which may be printed
on one or both sides with different patterns or colors. This Invention is par
ticularly adapted for the production of double-sided shawls, zebra dresses, and
others. The filling warps or wefts inside between the outer plies or printing
surfaces, while they prevent the colors on one side passing to the other, and
thus procure beauty of coloring, give also thickness, softness, and the peculiar
spongy feel necessary for such goods. Goods made in this way will have all
the appearance and feel of a very much more expensive article, now made in
the jacquard, or other harness, and complicated loom, while the price will be
very much lower.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Robert Bell in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 22nd
November 1856.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ROBERT
BELL, of 93, Glassford Street, Glasgow, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria; by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-second day of May, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, in the nineteenth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself,,Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Robert Bell, Her special licence that I, the said Robert Bell, my executors,
administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Robert Bell,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time agree with
and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during the
term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use; exercise, and
vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel,
Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for. "AN IMPROVEMENT. IN. THE MANU-
FACTURE OR PRODUCTION OF ORNAMENTAL FABRICS," upon the condition (amongst
others) that 1, the said Robert Bell, my executors or administrators, by
an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands and seals,
should particularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention,
and in what manner the same was to be performed, and cause the same to be
filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months next and
immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Robert Bell, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed,
to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement
thereof, reference being had to the accompanying Diagrams or Figures (that is
to say):-
The said Invention consists of improvements in the manufacture of cotton
fabrics, such as zebras and shawls, and other fabrics which have patterns
printed on their plain or unflushed surfaces; and by these improvements I am
enabled to produce fabrics having two printing faces or surfaces; that is to say,
faces or surfaces upon both or either of which patterns may be printed; so that
each or either side of such a fabric may be. ornamented by printed patterns
instead of a fabric having one side printed and the other side unprinted and
flushed. Hitherto cotton fabrics of this class, ornamented with patterns on
both their sides or surfaces, have been chiefly produced by weaving 'them of
yarns or threads of several colors, in a jacquard, harness, or other complex

page_text: loom, and any imitation of such fabrics has never, I believe, béen made so as
to possess the soft spongy feel of my improved cloth.
.
The cotton fabrics which I manufacture according to my .Invention, consist
of two distinct cloths or plies of cloth, having each a face or surface suitable
for receiving a printed pattern placed outwards, and. with flushed or filling
threads in the interior between the two plies of cloth, which are tied together
into one fabric in the act of weaving, in the loom, and the two plies of cloth or
printing surfaces have flushed or filling threads 'laid or placed between them;
and woven into the fabric; for the purpose of preventing the colors of the
pattern printed upon either side or surface of the fabric.from passing through
to the other side or surface, and of giving the fabric thickness, and a soft or
spongy feel. I make this fabric in a common loom, and the two plies of cloth
may have their exterior or printing surfaces woven. plain, twilled, figured; or
in' any other manner which may be desired for fitting them to receive the
pattern or patterns to be printed upon them, and produce or assist.in producing
the intended ornamental appearances, and the two plies of cloth may be tied
together more or less loosely by weft threads or yarns, or by warp threads; or
in any other convenient manner. In weaving a fabric of this description I
employ a warp and a weft for each of the plies of cloth, and one or more
extra warps.or wefts, or both, to form the filling or flushed. threads between
the two plies; but I prefer to use weft for filling or..flushed threads. or yarns.
The kind of threads or yarns used to form filling threads may be varied,
according to the thickness, softness, or other quality of the fabric to be. pro-
duced; and they may be of the same description as the threads composing the
outer plies of cloth or different; and' by the use of such filling threads,
thickness, softness, and a peculiar spongy feel may be given to the fabrics pro-
duced, for the purpose of giving them the like appearance and feel as" much
more expensive articles made in the jacquard, harness, or other complicated
loom.
i
One side of the fabric may be woven with a plain, or other description of
surface when the opposite side-is woven with a twilled or some description of
surface: different to the other, or both of the sides may be woven with the same
description of surfaces, and the warp or weft, or both the warp and weft, on one
side may consist of threads different from or more or less numerous than those
on the other side; and the two sides of any such fabric, when printed on both
sides, may be printed with the same pattern or with different patterns, or;
if desired, only one side may be printed.
.1
A weaver of competent knowledge would be enabled by the description
which I have given to weave any of the above-mentioned varieties of fabric,

page_text: but by way of illustration I will describe the mode of weaving a fabric.which
I prefer for the purposes of my Invention.
In weaving this fabric I use two warps, one for each of the surfaces or plies
of cloth, and three wefts, one for each of the surfaces or plics of cloth, and
one for the filling threads or yarns to be laid or woven into the fabric and
between the two plies of cloth forming its two printing surfaces.
.
In weaving this fabric in the hand looni, I prefer to use ten leaves of heddles
and ten treddles, and to work them as shewn in Diagram or Figure 1 of the
accompanying Figures or Diagrams. In that Diagram, the spaces between
parallel lines marked with Figures or numbers.represent the treddles, which
are to have motion given to. them in the order of the numbers (beginning
with No. 1 and ending. with No. 10), for the purpose of working the warps.
The spaces between lines, at right angles with the first-mentioned lines, repre-
sent heddles or leaves of heddles; the crosses marked in the spaces where the
heddles or leaves of heddles are shewn to cross a. treddle, indicate that each of
those heddles is raised by a cord attached to that treddle; the other heddle
leaves at the same time sinking the heddle leaves, marked with the letter a;
work the warp threads of the upper side of the fabric, and the others the warp
threads of the underside of the fabric, as shewn in the Diagram.
The figures or numbers 1 to 32 on the spaces representing the leaves of
heddles shew how the warp is to be drawn into the leaves of heddles, each
Figure representing a thread. It will be seen by the Diagram that the warp
threads drawn into the leaves indicated by the Figures 9 and 10 are much
fewer than those drawn into the other eight leaves, formning one-sixteenth only
of the whole of the warps, and that the leaves indicated by the Figures 7 and
8 have this sixteenth part less than the leaves indicated by the numbers 1, 2,
3, 4, 5, and 6.
The fabric woven in a loom mounted or harnessed and worked in this
manner will have two twilled surfaces for receiving the pattern or patterns
which may be printed upon them.
In Diagram or Figure 2 I have shown how a loom may be mounted or
harnessed and worked for the purpose of weaving in the hand loom a fabric
consisting of three warps and three wefts, and having also two twilled surfaces,
each or either of which may be printed upon..
A fabric having been manufactured with filling threads placed and woven
in between the two plies of cloth forming its two surfaces, in manner herein-
before described, I proceed to print the intended pattern or patterns on both
or on either of the surfaces, in the ordinary or in any other convenient
manner.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my Inven-
tion, and the manner in which it is to be performed, I hereby declare that I
do not claim as of my Invention any fabric consisting of two plies of cloth
which has not flushed or filling threads laid or woven into the fabric between
such two plies of cloth, as herein-before mentioned; nor do I claim as of my
Invention any fabric printed on both sides thereof, unless it be a fabric
manufactured and printed as herein-before described; nor do I claim the
printing of cloths on both sides generally, or when not used or applied to the
printing of my improved fabric, as being any separate part of my Invention;
and that I claim as of my said Invention the manufacture of a cotton fabric
consisting of two plies of cloth or printing surfaces, with filling threads or
yarns laid and woven in between them, for the purpose of making the fabric
thick and soft or spongy, and preventing the colors which may afterwards be
printed upon either side of it passing through to the other side, as herein-
before described; and a cotton fabric consisting of two plies of cloth with
filling threads laid or woven in between them, and having both or either of the
sides or surfaces of such fabric printed as herein-before described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Robert Bell, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, this Twenty-first day of November, in the year of our Lord'
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six.
Witness,
JNO. ALCOCK.
ROBERT BELL. (L.S.)