Editing Stalybridge (section)

===Industrial Revolution===
[[File:Stalybridge Weavers' Cottages.jpg|thumb|left|Bohemia Cottages: weavers' cottages in Stalybridge dating from 1721]]
As Stayley expanded in the 18th century, it reached the banks of the [[River Tame, Greater Manchester|River Tame]]. After the construction of a bridge in 1707, the settlement was commonly referred to as Stalybridge, meaning the bridge at Stayley.<ref name="Dodgson 316-317"/> By the mid-18th century Stalybridge had a population of just 140. Farming and woolen spinning were the main means of subsistence at this time.

In 1776, the town's first water-powered mill for carding and spinning cotton was built at Rassbottom. In 1789, the town's first spinning mill using the principle of [[Richard Arkwright|Arkwright]]'s [[Water Frame]] was built. By 1793, steam power had been introduced to the Stalybridge cotton industry; by 1803 there were eight cotton mills in the growing town containing 76,000 spindles. The [[Huddersfield Narrow Canal]] was completed in 1811 and still runs through the town.

The rapid growth of industry in Stalybridge was due to the introduction of machinery. This was, however, met with violent opposition. After the arrival of the [[Luddites]] in the area the doors of mills were kept locked day and night. Military aid was requested by the mill owners and a Scottish [[regiment]] under the [[James Graham, 3rd Duke of Montrose|Duke of Montrose]] was sent to the town. It was led by Captain Raines who made his headquarters at the Roe Cross Inn. Gangs of armed men destroyed [[power loom]]s and fired mills. The disturbances in Stalybridge culminated with a night of violent rioting on 20 April 1812.<ref name="Middleton">{{cite book|last=Middleton|first= Thomas|title=Annals of Hyde and district: containing historical reminiscences of Denton, Haughton, Dukinfield, Mottram, Longdendale, Bredbury, Marple and the neighbouring townships (1899)|publisher=Cartwright & Rattray|location=Manchester|year=1899|url=https://archive.org/details/annalsofhydedist00middiala|access-date=28 March 2010}}</ref>

The social unrest did not curb the growth of Stalybridge. By 1814, there were twelve factories and, by 1818, the number had increased to sixteen. The [[Industrial Revolution]] led to a rapid increase in the town's population in the early part of the 19th century. The population of the town by 1823 was 5,500. In the following two years, partly because of an influx of Irish families seeking better wages, the population rose to 9,000. Stalybridge was among the first wave of towns to establish a [[Mechanics' Institute]] with a view to educating the growing number of workers. Only a year after the establishment of [[UMIST|Manchester Mechanics' Institute]], Stalybridge founded an Institute of its own. Its doors opened on 7 September 1825 on Shepley Street with a reading room on Queen Street.

On 9 May 1828, the Stalybridge Police and Market Act received [[Royal Assent]], establishing Stalybridge as an independent town with a board of 21 Commissioners. Every male over the age of 21 who was the occupier of a rateable property under the act was entitled to vote at the election of the Commissioners. On 30 December 1831, [[Stalybridge Town Hall]] was officially opened. In 1833, the Commissioners set up the Stalybridge Police Force, the first of its kind in the country. By this year, the population of the town had reached 14,216 with 2.357 inhabited houses.<ref name="Stalybridge Org">{{cite web|url=http://www.stalybridge.org.uk/history.htm |title=History of Stalybridge |author=Anon |work=stalybridge.org.uk |access-date=30 January 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080127131005/http://www.stalybridge.org.uk/history.htm |archive-date=27 January 2008 }}</ref>

In 1834, a second bridge was built over the Tame. It was downstream of Staley Bridge and constructed of iron.<ref name="Stalybridge Org"/>

The second [[Chartism|Chartist]] petition was presented to Parliament in April 1842. Stalybridge contributed 10,000 signatures. After the rejection of the petition the first [[general strike]] began in the [[coal mine]]s of [[Staffordshire]]. The second phase of the strike originated in Stalybridge.<ref name="Plug Plot">{{cite journal |url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003186892-3/general-strike-1842-mather |title=The General Strike of 1842: A Study in Leadership, Organisation and the Threat of Revolution during the Plug Plot Disturbance|author=F.C.Mather|publisher=George Allen & Unwin Ltd London|journal=Web.bham.ac.uk/1848|year=1974|doi=10.4324/9781003186892-3 |isbn=978-1-003-18689-2 |s2cid=242636272 |access-date=30 January 2008}}</ref> A movement of resistance to the imposition of wage cuts in the mills, also known as the [[1842 General Strike|Plug Riots]], it spread to involve nearly half a million workers throughout Britain and represented the biggest single exercise of [[working class]] strength in 19th century Britain. On 13 August 1842, there was a strike at Bayley's Cotton Mill in Stalybridge and roving cohorts of operatives carried the stoppage first to the whole area of Stalybridge and [[Ashton-under-Lyne|Ashton]], then to [[Manchester]], and subsequently to towns adjacent to Manchester, using as much force as was necessary to bring mills to a standstill. The movement remained, to outward appearances, largely non-political. Although the [[Chartism|People's Charter]] was praised at public meetings, the resolutions that were passed at these were in almost all cases merely for a restoration of the wages of 1820, a ten-hour working day, or reduced rents.

In writing [[The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844|''The Condition of The Working Class in England'']] (1844), [[Friedrich Engels]] used Stalybridge as an example:

<blockquote>...&nbsp;multitudes of courts, back lanes, and remote nooks arise out of [the] confused way of building&nbsp;... Add to this the shocking filth, and the repulsive effect of Stalybridge, in spite of its pretty surroundings, may be readily imagined.<ref name="Ref_i">Engels (2007), p.&nbsp;63.</ref></blockquote>

John Summers first established an iron forge in Stalybridge in the 1840s. Later, he and his sons developed this into a major business and employed over 1,000 local men in their factory, the largest in the town.<ref name="Manchester 2002">{{cite web | url=http://www.manchester2002-uk.com/towns/tameside3.html | title=The Borough of Tameside | author=Anon | publisher=Papillon Graphics | work=manchester2002-uk.com | access-date=30 January 2008 | archive-date=30 April 2008 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080430211455/http://www.manchester2002-uk.com/towns/tameside3.html | url-status=usurped }}</ref>

The [[Ashton, Stalybridge and Liverpool Junction Railway]] Company was formed on 19 July 1844 and the railway was connected to Stalybridge on 5 October 1846. On 9 July 1847, the company was acquired by the [[Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway]]. On 1 August 1849, the Manchester, Stockport and Leeds Railway connected Stalybridge to [[Huddersfield]] and later to [[Stockport]]. This line later became part of the [[London and North Western Railway]].

====The cotton famine====
On the outbreak of the [[American Civil War]] in 1861, the Stalybridge cotton mills rapidly ran short of cotton. Thousands of operatives were laid off. In October 1862, a meeting was held in Stalybridge Town Hall that passed a resolution blaming the [[Confederate States of America]] and their actions in the American Civil War, rather than U.S. blockades of seaports, for the [[cotton famine]] in [[Lancashire]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WMUXggOQ7ZsC&pg=PA225  |title= English public opinion and the American Civil War|first= Duncan Andrew |last=Campbell|year= 2003  |page=225|publisher=Royal Historical Society and Boydell Press|isbn= 978-0861932634}}</ref> By the winter of 1862–63, there were 7,000 unemployed operatives in the town. Only five of the town's 39 factories and 24 machine shops were employing people full-time. Contributions were sent from all over the world for the relief of the cotton operatives in Lancashire; and at one point three-quarters of Stalybridge workers were dependent on relief schemes. By 1863, there were 750 empty houses in the town. A thousand skilled men and women left the town, in what became known as "The Panic".

In 1863, the relief committee decided to substitute a system of relief by ticket instead of money. The tickets were to be presented at local grocery shops. An organised resistance was organised culminating on Friday 20 March 1863.

[[File:Stalybridge - Victoria Bridge.JPG|thumb|upright|Victoria Bridge]]
In 1867, Stalybridge was disturbed by the arrival of William Murphy. Records of this man indicate that his sole interest was to sow the seeds of dissent between Roman Catholics, who by this time had grown to significant proportions, and Protestants. He succeeded in this goal only too well for a full year. During 1868, there were a number of violent disturbances and rioting created by this man who described himself as a "renegade Roman Catholic". In his lectures to the public, "pretending to expose the religious practices of the Roman Catholic Church", he became a master at whipping up a crowd into a frenzy. Newspaper reports of the time told of his common practice of waving a revolver in the air in "a most threatening manner". On one occasion, he incited a riot of such proportions that Fr. Daley, the parish priest of St. Peter's, took to the roof of the church to defend it. A man was shot. The parish priest was tried but eventually acquitted at the [[Quarter Sessions]]. Following this incident, the community began to settle down and Murphy chose to extend his political activities elsewhere.

In 1867, the Victoria Bridge on Trinity Street was built. Victoria Market Hall was constructed in 1868 and the [[public baths]] were opened in May 1870. The baths were presented as a gift to the town by philanthropists and benefactors [[Robert Platt (philanthropist)|Robert Platt]] (1802–1882), born in Stalybridge, and his wife Margaret Platt (1819–1888), born in [[Salford, Greater Manchester|Salford]].

Stalybridge Borough Band was formed in March 1871, holding its first rehearsals and meetings at the Moulder's Arms, Grasscroft Street, Castle Hall. The band was known as the 4th Cheshire Rifleman Volunteers (Borough Band) until 1896. The founder and first conductor was Alexander Owen, who conducted the band until at least 1907.