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The Emergence of the Professional Manager in the Scottish Coal Industry, 1760–1815

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2012

Baron F. Duckham
Baron F. Duckham
Affiliation:
Editor, Transport History, University of Strathclyde
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Abstract

In the mid-eighteenth century, the Scottish coal industry was characterized by small pits, lagging technology, serf labor, and owner management. Thus, severe bottlenecks in the supply of responsible managerial personnel occurred when the market expanded as the result of the establishment of coke-using iron works and the growth of urban centers in the last four decades of the century. By 1815, however, the Scottish industry had seen the rise of large firms, an advance in technology, the abolition of serf labor, and the attainment of near self-sufficiency in the supply of essential professional managers.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 43 , Issue 1 , Spring 1969 , pp. 21 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1969

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References

1 I wish to thank the Keeper of the Records of Scotland, the staff of the Scottish Record Office, and the Librarian of the Signet Library, Edinburgh, for access to material and unfailing help. I am indebted to my colleague, Dr. John Butt, for several invaluable suggestions.

2 Nef, J. U., The Rise of the British Coal Industry (London, 1932)Google Scholar; Ashton, T.S. and Sykes, J., The Coal Industry of the Eighteenth Century (Manchester, 1929)Google Scholar; and Galloway, R.L., Annals of Coal Mining and the Coal Trade, 1st series (London, 1898)Google Scholar, 2nd series (London, 1904), and A History of Coal Mining in Great Britain (London, 1882). See also Sweezy, P.M., Monopoly and Competition in the English Coal Trade 1550–1850 (Cambridge, Mass., 1938)Google Scholar and Hughes, E., North Country Life in the Eighteenth Century: vol. I, The North East 1700–1750 (London, 1952)Google Scholar, and vol. II, Cumberland and Westmorland 1700–1830 (London, 1965).

3 A bibliography occurs in Payne, Peter L., ed., Studies in Scottish Business History (London, 1967), 81.Google Scholar I have compiled a select bibliography of British coal mining history for the forthcoming reprint of Galloway's History of Coal Mining, now in the press.

4 In eighteenth century coal mining, the borders between entrepreneurial and managerial functions are sometimes most indistinct. The division I wish to make in principle is that discussed by Pollard, S., The Genesis of Modern Management: A Study of the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain (London, 1965), 2–5.Google Scholar

5 Rather different subdivision is of course possible, but this at least underlines the wide nature of the purely technical problems involved.

6 References for the bond labor of the Scottish coal industry are included in my forthcoming article, “Serfdom in Eighteenth Century Scotland,” in History (London) which deals with some of the labor problems involved.

7 See my “Life and Labour in a Scottish Colliery 1698–1755,” Scottish Historical Review, XLVII (October, 1968), 109–28.

8 I hope to discuss the reasons for this in my book on the Scottish coal industry of the eighteenth century now in preparation.

9 Dundas of Dundas MSS, GD75/530/1, April 4, 1738 Scottish Record Office, Edinburgh. This was the 5th Duke of the second creation, James (1703–1743), 5th Duke of Hamilton and 2nd Duke of Brandon.

10 Ibid., GD75/S30/2, 5, 6. They also advised the Earl of Rothes in 1738.

11 See below. The Cunninghames had a long and distinguished connection with mining going back to the seventeenth century.

12 Scott and others v. Gibson, 1747, “Petition of Andrew Scot [sic],” February 27, 1747, Court of Session Papers, 62:68, Signet Library, Edinburgh.

13 “Grieve's Obligation,” GD18/955, and “Grieve's Duty,” GD18/955/1, Clerk of Penicuik MSS, Scottish Record Office. The date of these documents is c.1702, but the general outline of the duties remained the same throughout much of the century.

14 The “banksman” in Scotland was rarely, if ever, the important official he might be in the less developed English coalfields where he was sometimes the kingpin of colliery organization.

15 Old Statistical Account, IX (1793), 298–99.

16 Although George Sinclair included a section on Scottish coal mining in his Hydrostatics (Edinburgh, 1672) and did himself conduct experiments with chokedamp at Tranent, there seems to have been no published work devoted wholly to mining practice north of the Tweed until 1808.

17 Duckham, Baron F., “Some Eighteenth Century Scottish Coalmining Methods: The Dissertation of Sir John Clerk,” Industrial Archaeology, V (1968), 217–32.Google Scholar

18 Harris, J.R., “The Employment of Steam Power in the Eighteenth Century,” History, LII (1967), 133–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar, convincingly shows that historians have tended to underestimate the amount of steam power in existence in Britain before 1800, but the parish returns of the Old Statistical Account (1791–99) do not suggest many Newcomen engines were erected before the date stated. At least three of those erected in the 1760's were fitted by William Brown, the famous Tyneside viewer (Galloway, Annals of Coal Mining and the Coal Trade, I, 261–2). Investment in steam power is dealt with again below.

19 An assertion based on the examination of many mining records and other papers in the Scottish Record Office. Bo'ness was an exception with one shaft 420 feet deep.

20 In 1740, the Duke of Hamilton's Bo'ness colliery employed only 28 hewers and 40 bearers though this was accounted one of the larger concerns (Dundas of Dundas MSS, GD75/530).

21 Bald, R., A General View of the Coal Trade of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1808), 10–11Google Scholar. On the other hand Sir George Bruce's colliery at Culross was in the early seventeenth century undoubtedly very advanced, even by Newcastle standards. See Cunningham, A.S., Mining in the “Kingdom” of Fife (Dunfermline, 1913)Google Scholar. Nor was all Scottish “mining machinery” necessarily inferior to that employed near Newcastle even in the eighteenth century. The whim gin, a distinct improvement on the cog-and-rung gin for winding coal, seems to have become common in Scotland before Tyneside. See my article, “Some Eighteenth Century Scottish Coalmining Methods.”

22 Bald, , General View of the Coal Trade of Scotland, 10–11Google Scholar; Carvel, J.L., One Hundred Years in Coal: The History of the Alloa Coal Company (Edinburgh, 1944), 12.Google Scholar

23 References to these journeys and to the published accounts of them are given in my “Eighteenth Century Scottish Mining Methods.”

24 A discussion of the paternalism of the estate collieries occurs in my forthcoming article in History and that in the Scottish Historical Review, cited above.

25 A valuable general outline of the economic importance of Scottish landowners is given in Smout, T.C., “Scottish landowners and economic growth, 1650–1850,” Scottish Journal of Political Economy, XI (1964), 218–34.Google Scholar The younger sons of such families not infrequently occupied a managing role. Dundonald's brother Alexander was for a time a manager at Muirkirk. I owe this information to Dr. John Butt.

26 The classic account of Scottish industrialization remains Hamilton, H., The Industrial Revolution in Scotland (Oxford, 1932).Google Scholar For a stimulating modern reappraisal, see Campbell, R.H., Scotland Since 1707 (Oxford, 1965)Google Scholar and the same writer's, “The Industrial Revolution: A Revision Article,” Scottish Historical Review, XLVI (1967), 37–55.

27 For the interest of ironmasters in coal mining, see Campbell, R.H., Carron Company (Edinburgh, 1961)Google Scholar, passim, and Hume, J. R. and Butt, J., “Muirkirk, 1786–1802: The Creation of a Scottish Industrial Community,” Scottish Historical Review, XLV (1966), 160–83.Google Scholar

28 The attempt to attract free labor into the mines was the main reason for the Emancipation Act of 1775.

29 Such, anyhow, was the practice of the Clerks of Penicuik.

30 Thomas Cochrane (1748–1831), 9th Earl of Dundonald, Description of the Estate, particularly of the Mineral and Coal Property … at Culross (Edinburgh, 1793), 71.Google Scholar Dundonald was an active if not oversuccessful coalmaster who won fame but not fortune as a patentee of coal-tar distilling and as an inventor.

31 Information about the coal interests of Robert Reid Cunninghame is taken, except where otherwise stated, from the legal papers of the long case Warner v. Cunninghame, U.P. Currie Mack, B26/1, Miscellaneous, “Observations on Mr. Clerk's Report,” 1800, Scottish Record Office.

32 Very occasionally a coalmaster made a genuine attempt to see that the colliery community received the elements of education. The Erskines of Mar provided a schoolmaster specifically for colliers' children. Old Statistical Account, VIII (1793), 614.

33 The term grieve was, of course, widely used to describe a landowner's sub-official under a steward. The assumption of responsibility for the colliery records would follow naturally when a mine was sunk within such an official's territorial sphere.

34 Warner v. Cunninghame, B26/1 Miscellaneous, Defender's Proof (August, 1798), Evidence of Alexander McGregor. McGregor was obviously one of the comparatively small number of free laborers who had entered mining after the Emancipation Act of 1775.

35 Memorandum dated February 23, 1710, GD18/1035, Clerk of Penicuik MSS.

36 Warner v. Cunninghame, B26/1 Miscellaneous, Additional Pursuer's Proof (November, 1798), Evidence of Alexander Gardner, Superintendent of Loanhead Colliery, Midlothian.

37 James Bower, coalgrieve at Carden Colliery in Fife, for example, stated he had left because the lessee-manager had paid him irregularly and given him an indifferent house. Ferguson & Rutherford v. Shepherd (1766), Court of Session, 93:11, Signet Library.

38 Warner v. Cunninghame, Evidence of Alexander Gardener.

39 Even with expert guidance, it was reckoned a fortune could be lost in mining with scarcely less ease than at the card table.

40 William Symington, the famous marine engineer and inventor, was taken into partnership by James Miller, a distiller of Craigend, to be sole manager of Callander Colliery, Falkirk. He does not appear to have made a success of the mine. Miller v. Symington (1809–1810), Court of Session, 242:6, “Petition of James Miller,” January 18, 1810, Signet Library.

41 Petition to House of Lords by John Pettigrew Wilson, 1813, U.P.I., Curie Dal G7/1, Scottish Record Office.

42 Bill Chamber Process (1794), 73, 516, Scottish Record Office.

43 Cochrane, Description of the Estate at Culross, 35.

44 Ibid., 56.

45 The general state of industrial accountancy during this period is summarized in Pollard, Genesis of Modern Management, 209–49.

46 In some ways a vicious circle existed, for as long as grieves were poorly educated and untrustworthy the argument for retaining master and steward accounting appeared strong. In any case, so long as landowners dominated mining, such accounts were bound to persist.

47 Warner v. Cunninghame, “Report of John Clerk of Eldin … upon the Coal works of Ardeer,” 1798.

48 “Orders to be Renewed,” June 25, 1741, GD75/530/5, Dundas of Dundas MSS.

49 Warner v. Cunninghame, “Report of John Clerk of Eldin.”

50 “Lease of Eldin Coal,” 1815, GD247/Box 101, Bdle. 4, J. C. Brodie MSS, Scottish Record Office.

51 See below.

52 Old Statistical Account, VII (1793), 389; Butt, J., “The Scottish Iron and Steel Industry before the Hot-blast,” Scotland Iron and Steel Institute, LXXIII (1965–1966), 193–214Google Scholar, see especially page 197; Faulds v. Herriot (1803), Court of Session 454:42, “Answers for Andrew Faulds,” November 29, 1803, Signet Library.

53 Payne, P.L., “The Govan Collieries, 1804–1805,” Business History, III (1961), 75–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The collieries employed 137 men in 1805 if carters are included.

54 A very conservative estimate, based on the Old Statistical Account and Baxter, B., Stone Blocks and Iron Rails (Newton Abbot, England, 1966).Google Scholar

55 Old Statistical Account, V (1793), 540, VII (1793), 389; Cadell, H.M., The Rocks of West Lothian (Edinburgh, 1925), 332.Google Scholar The engine fitted at Stevenston in 1800–1801 was very probably the first Boulton & Watt rotary engine purchased by a Scottish colliery, Miscellaneous Engine Ledger, Boulton & Watt MSS, Birmingham (England) Reference Library. I owe this reference to my colleague, Mr. J. R. Hume.

56 The Old Statistical Account does not provide a suitable basis for a reliable estimate. Besides omissions and numerous ambiguities, the volumes date from 1791 to 1799 with the result that no uniform date can be applied to all parishes. It may be noted that the parish minister of Shettleston estimated there were at least twenty steam engines at work at collieries around Glasgow. Old Statistical Account, XII (1794), 111–112n.

57 A clear knowledge of long-wall working seems to have come north with the English who were employed by Carron Ironworks. I have corne across a definite example of such work for 1771, but it was introduced a few years earlier, possibly 1760. Beaumont v. Carron Company (1777), Court of Session 595:1, “Memorial for Carron Co.,” April 25, 1777, and Reply for Beaumont, Signet Library; Galloway, Annals of Coal Mining and The Coal Trade, I, 357–8. Altogether, from all sources, at least 58 engines can be identified by 1800.

58 The first two Clerk baronets had, for example, “viewed” for neighboring coalmasters.

59 James Landale is described in the case of Arnot v. Wilson as “Engineer of Coal Works and Tacksman [lessee] of the Coal of Kingsmoor,” Court of Session 138:21, “Depositions of William Robertson & James Landale,” June 16, 1758, Signet Library.

60 “Plan, etc. of J. Green of Leeds,” 1785, GD26/v/352, Leven & Melville MSS, Scottish Record Office.

61 Carvel, One Hundred Years in Coal, 14–24.

62 Bald contributed to the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal and also wrote the article on coal mining for the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia of 1820. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (Edinburgh) in 1817. I have included a longer assessment of Robert Bald in my introduction to the scheduled reprint of his book.

63 Bald, General View of the Coal Trade of Scotland, 129–41.

64 Carvell, One Hundred Years in Coal, 17–24.

65 Many important viewers, including John Buddle and Robert Bald, also became coal-masters. Bald became proprietor of the Woodlands Colliery, Alloa, and placed its management in the hands of his nephew. Dixon eventually became managing partner of the Calder Coal and Iron Works. Dixon v. Taylor (1816), Court of Session 304:1, “Petition of William Dixon,” April 11, 1816, Signet Library.

66 Muirkirk Iron Co. v. John London M'Adam, Court of Session 220:20, “Minute for the Muirkirk Iron Co,” March 3, 1802, Signet Library. This was, of course, the McAdam of road making fame.

67 For example, they were in the cases concerning Stevenston Collieries and Muirkirk Ironworks.

68 Galloway, Annals of Coal Mining and The Coal Trade, IIx, 288.

69 Old Statistical Account, VII (1793), 88.

70 Salmon, T.J., Borrowstounness and District (Edinburgh, 1913), 156–7.Google Scholar

71 Beaumont v. Carron Company, “Memorial for Carron Co.”

72 Court of Session Papers (1800), 413:30, “Petition of John Grieve,” February 14, 1800, Signet Library.

73 Dixon v. Taylor, “Petition of William Dixon,” April 11, 1816.

74 Lindsay, Jean, The Canals of Scotland (Newton Abbot, England, 1968 ), 66, 68.Google Scholar

75 Strawhorn, J., The New History of Cumnock (Cumnock, Scotland, 1966), 43–5.Google Scholar Taylor, who was educated at Edinburgh University, was originally a tutor and steward. He provides yet another example of the connection between the Scottish universities and industrialization, though a fairly tenuous one.

76 See, for example, Reports of Inspectors of Mines: Report of July 15, 1851 (London), 5–7, for comments on Scottish practice at mid-century.

77 A small handful of Scottish coal mines had good ventilation before 1815, but many were still fairly primitive in this respect even in 1851. Ibid., 9.