Jedediah Strutt (1726–97)

During the British Industrial Revolution Jedediah Strutt was among the fathers of the factory system. After making innovations in knitting stockings he worked with Richard Arkwright to build the first water-powered cotton-spinning factories. Industrial settlements associated with him are inscribed in the Derwent Valley Mills World Heritage site.

He grew up in Derbyshire in central England, where his family were farmers. He was apprenticed to a wheelwright at the age of 14 and later began his own business as a wheelwright. After he married and inherited a farm from his uncle at the age of around 28 he began stocking knitting and experimenting with mechanics. With his wife’s brother, William Woollat, and a local businessman, Samuel Need, among others he developed an invention for knitting ribbed stockings and patented it as the Darby Rib Machine in 1758-9. He opened a silk mill in Darby to produce thread and set up workshops to knit silk stockings. The profit from this business enabled him to invest in cotton as a cheaper material.

In 1769, he met Richard Arkwright and funded him to develop his invention of water-powered spinning. Strutt and Need both became partners with Arkwright to build the revolutionary multi-story cotton-spinning factory at Cromford in 1771. Soon afterwards, they opened further cotton-spinning factories with Samuel Need nearby at Belper and Milford in 1778 and 1779. He continued to expand these factories after dissolving the partnership in 1782. At both Belper and Milford he built rows of good-quality houses for his workers, a chapel and a Sunday school. His sons and daughters joined the firm and continued to run it after his death. His eldest son William (1756-1830) made many improvements in the design of the firm’s buildings and his North Mill at Belper, completed in 1804, was one of the first iron-framed buildings in the world.