The secret to fashionable clothing for former slaves and the poor was shoddy, an affordable new textile made from recycled material. In the Second World War it proved its worth once again, and this mill in 1942 is ‘facing’ (brushing a light pile onto) new cloth made from 75-year-old rags.
THE African slaves in the West Indies were usually dressed in a shirt and trousers of striped mattress sacking. As soon as they were emancipated, they wished to dress like their late masters, and Jewish entrepreneurs in London heard of it from their colleagues in the Caribbean. So they hastily washed, mended and exported second-hand clothes to the States, allowing ex-slaves to rival their former owner’s wardrobe for an eighth of the price.
Demand soon far exceeded supply. To meet it, Yorkshire mill-owners manufactured a new cloth made from cotton warp and woollen weft, the wool being shoddy, a mix of new and recycled wool.* Indeed, the new business stimulated them to higher flights of invention, learning to comb scraps of wool previously thought too small. This not only reduced waste but enabled the poorer classes all over the world to dress much better for much less.
Chief among those Yorkshire mill owners in Dickens’s time was Sir Titus Salt, who paid generous wages, kept workers on in slack times, and provided excellent working conditions.
Précis
Early in the 19th century, the abolition of the slave trade in British-ruled colonies led to a surge in demand among former slaves for high-quality clothing. At first, the demand was met with send-hand clothing, but soon manufacturers developed cheaper cloth for stylish but affordable new garments, benefiting not just former slaves but ordinary people worldwide. (56 / 60 words)
