AN IMPROVEMENT IN STIFFENING, SIZING, FILLING, OR WEIGHTING TEXTILE FABRICS
Year: 1859

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William and Samuel Pickstone, of Radcliff Bridge,
near Manchester, Cotton Spinners, Manufacturers, and Dyers, for the
Invention of "AN IMPROVEMENT IN STIFFENING, SIZING, FILLING, OR
WEIGHTING TEXTILE FABRICS."
Scaled the 12th August 1859, and dated the 19th March 1859.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William and Samuel
Pickstone at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their
Petition, on the 19th March 1859.
We, WILLIAM and SAMUEL PICKSTONE, of Radcliff Bridge, near Manchester,
Cotton Spinners, Manufacturers, and Dyers, do hereby declare the nature of
the Invention for "AN IMPROVEMENT IN STIPPENING, SIZING, FILLING, OR
WEIGHTING TEXTILE FABRICS," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object an improvement in stiffening, sizing, filling,
or weighting textile fabrics, and consists in the application of a peculiar clay
or shale found in Lancashire and other coal fields generally covering the
scams of coal, in substitution of or in combination with flour or other matters
or substances now used for like purposes. This "black shale" or "crunch" or
"cover" may be prepared in various ways. Our manner of rendering it
suitable for use in the manufactures above mentioned is to reduce it to a pulp
by grinding it with water in a mill, then to boil the pulp, keeping it agitated
when boiling; other means may be resorted to for preparing this substance,.
and when necessary it may be bleached and also colored or dyed.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said William and Samuel Pickstone in the Great Seal Patent
Office on the 19th September 1859.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, wc, WILLIAM
and SAMUEL PICKSTONE, of Radcliffe Bridge, near Manchester, Cotton
Spinners, Manufacturers, and Dyers, send greeting.
.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Nineteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine, in the twenty-second year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto
us, the said William and Samuel Pickstone, Her special licence that we,
the said William and Samuel Pickstone, our executors, administrators,
and assigns, or such others as we, the said William and Samuel Pick-
stone, our executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time agreo
with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during the
term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, excrcise, and
vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel
Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "AN IMPROVEMENT IN STIFFENING,
SIZING, FILLING, OR WEIGHTING TEXTILE FABRICS," upon the condition (amongst
others) that we, the said William and Samuel Pickstone, our executors or
administrators, by an instrument in writing under our or their hands and
seals, or under the hand and seal of one of us or them, 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 we, the said William and Samuel Pickstone, 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, that is to say:-
This Invention has for its object an improvement in stiffening, sizing, filling,
or weighting textile fabrics, and consists in the application of a peculiar clay
or shale found in Lancashire and other coal fields generally covering the seams
of coal, in substitution of or in combination with flour or other matters or
substances now used for like purposes. This "black shale" or "crunch
"cover" may be prepared in various ways.
"
or
Our manner of rendering it suitable for use in the manufactures above
mentioned is to reduce it to a pulp by grinding it with water in a mill, then

page_text: to boil the pulp, keeping it agitated when boiling. The clay having been
ground with water and brought to the consistency of thick cream, is to be
boiled for four or five hours, keeping the same stirred; flour mixed with a
small quantity of water is then stirred in, and the whole mixture is boiled and
stirred to convert the flour into paste and to keep the compound intimately
blended. The quantity of flour used may be varied according to the degree of
stiffness of paste it is desired to produce.
Other means may be resorted to for preparing this substance, and, when
necessary, it may be bleached, and also colored or dyed; but we would remark,
that in practice we have not found it necessary to have recourse to any process
for bleaching. Any color, however, which may be removed by water may,
when desired, be washed off before subjecting the clay and water to heat for
boiling the sanic.
In witness whereof, we, the said William and Samuel Pickstone, havo
hereunto set our hands and seals, this Seventeenth day of September,
in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine.
WILLIAM PICKSTONE. (L.S.)
SAMUEL PICKSTONE. (L.S.)