Samuel Touchet (ca. 1705 – 28 May 1773) was an English

cotton Cotton (), first recorded in ancient India, is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure ...

merchant, manufacturer and politician. Born in Manchester, he was himself the son of a cotton trader and manufacturer and he started his career representing his father's business in London. His career importing raw cotton from the

Levant The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use toda ...

and the

West Indies The West Indies is an island subregion of the Americas, surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, which comprises 13 independent island country, island countries and 19 dependent territory, dependencies in thr ...

was successful to the extent that manufacturers in Manchester began to suspect him of seeking a

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek and ) is a market in which one person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. A monopoly is characterized by a lack of economic Competition (economics), competition to produce ...

. In 1742 he became involved with the Birmingham inventors

Lewis Paul Lewis Paul (died 1759) was the original inventor of roller spinning, the basis of the water frame for spinning cotton in a cotton mill. Life and work Lewis Paul was of Huguenot descent. His father was physician to Lord Shaftesbury. He may have ...

and John Wyatt, who had designed the first machinery to successfully spin cotton mechanically, receiving a grant for 300 spindles off Wyatt. In 1744 Touchet and a partner called Bowker set the spindles up at Touchet's Mill in Birmingham in association with Paul and with assistance from Wyatt. Little is known of the fate of this mill, but it was sufficiently successful for Touchet later to secure the lease of

Marvel's Mill Marvel's Mill (or Marvell's Mill) on the River Nene in Northampton, England, was the world's second factory for spinning cotton, the first to be operated as a water mill, and the first to be driven by an inanimate power-source. Opened by Edward Ca ...

Northampton Northampton ( ) is a town and civil parish in Northamptonshire, England. It is the county town of Northamptonshire and the administrative centre of the Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority of West Northamptonshire. The town is sit ...

, another of the Paul-Wyatt cotton mills, from

Edward Cave Edward Cave (27 February 1691 – 10 January 1754) was an English printer, editor and publisher. He coined the term "magazine" for a periodical, founding ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' in 1731, and was the first publisher to successfully fashi ...

. As Touchet became very wealthy over the course of the 1750s his business interests diversified into

shipping Freight transport, also referred to as freight forwarding, is the physical process of transporting commodities and merchandise goods and cargo. The term shipping originally referred to transport by sea but in American English, it has been ...

, insurance broking and the

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose Glucose is a sugar with the Chemical formula#Molecular formula, molecul ...

and

slave Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

trades. He partnered up on two ships out of Liverpool, the ''Lydia'' and the ''Favourite'', 1757 and 1761, respectively. In just those two voyages over 1,000 slaves were taken.Voyages: The Transatlantic Slave Trade Database, http://slavevoyages.org/voyage/search?submit_val=restore_prev_query&prev_query_num=0 Touchet became the MP for

Shaftesbury Shaftesbury () is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is on the A30 road, west of Salisbury, Wiltshire, Salisbury and north-northeast of Dorchester, Dorset, Dorchester, near the border with Wiltshire. It is the only significant hi ...

in 1761 but his business foundered that year's financial crisis and was taken over by his creditors in 1763, with Touchet remaining an MP until 1768.

References

Bibliography

* * 1700s births 1773 deaths 18th-century English businesspeople People of the Industrial Revolution British textile industry businesspeople Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies British MPs 1761–1768 Businesspeople from Manchester 18th-century English slave traders 18th-century English merchants {{England-GreatBritain-MP-stub