List of mills in Wigan

The textile industry in the Wigan and Leigh areas grew out of a domestic putting-out system particularly fustians.

In the 19th century, textile mills on the Lancashire Coalfield were powered by cheap easily accessible coal.

In 1818 Wigan had eight mills in the Wallgate area and it developed as a cotton town in Victorian times.

From 1889 until the First World War the largest ring spinning company in Britain was Farington, Eckersley & Co of Western and Swan Meadow Mills.

At its peak in 1830 about 10,000 people, mostly domestic, were employed in silk weaving in the parish, after which the numbers declined to 8,000 in 1841 and 2,301 in 1871.

[4] In 1911 in Leigh, 6,146 people were employed in the cotton industry and from 1913, measured by the number of spindles, it was the fifth-largest spinning centre in Greater Manchester.

[5][6] The design of the surviving late-19th and early 20th-century factories along the Bridgewater Canal in Bedford is an example of the peak of the Lancashire mill-building tradition.

The four-storey spinning block is built of common brick with sandstone dressings and has a concealed roof.

The four-storey mill is built of common brick with sandstone dressings and has a concealed roof.