Talk:Heckling (flax)

In the autumn of 1827

"Of employees connected with flax-spinning, the " hecklers," or flax-dressers, once formed a class of very considerable importance, both from their numbers, and the faculty of combination, which enabled them at times almost to control the whole trade, and dictate the rate of wages. Their policy, and the almost total extinction of their class which resulted from it, points a moral which has been exemplified in other quarters, where unreasonable dictation on the one side has pro­voked antagonism between labour and capital That the " hecklers" had grievances it might be unjust to deny; but the frequent and obstinate strikes, by which they sought to right themselves, showed by their ultimate failure, and the extinction of their trade, that they grievously miscalculated their strength. In the autumn of 1827, dur­ing a depression of trade, the spinners proposed a reduction of 3d., out of 2s. 6d. per cwt., for dressing flax, which the flaxdressers an­swered by a strike of thirteen weeks' duration, involving much priva­tion to themselves, and other operatives dependent upon them. In the end, the diminished wages had to be accepted; but the struggle had the effect of stimulating mechanical ingenuity to produce a sub­stitute for manual labour; and hackling machines were gradually introduced, and perfected, so that in a few years they almost wholly supplanted hand-labour in the preparation of the fibre." https://web.archive.org/web/20240329151226/http://www.fdca.org.uk/The_Staple_Jute_Trade.html --Virtualiter (talk) 15:23, 29 March 2024 (UTC)