an aggregate nominal horse power of 637, and these give employment to 3924 men and 78 boys, making a total of 4002. There is only one foundry in Oldham at present unoccupied - the Werneth Iron Works which was built by Mr. Samuel Barnes.

During the year 1851 and for some time previous many important improvements were introduced into the iron trade, machines having been invented for the performance of work hitherto executed by mechanics and engineers. "Unskilled" labourers, as they were termed, were employed to superintend these machines, which necessarily displaced a large number of workmen, and considerable anxiety arose in the minds of the operatives generally as to what would be the ultimate effects of these proceedings upon their body. The subject having been maturely considered by the society of operative engineers, they resolved upon trying their power with the employers by a strike for the redress of their grievances. These were the employment of "unskilled" labour; the adoption by the masters of contracts with a sort of "middlemen," who got their part of the contract done by employing the workmen by piece or task work; and they further objected to working overtime. A good deal of fruitless negotiation took place between the contending parties, and the operatives refusing to abate any of their demands, the employers also entered into a combination, and, at the expiry of a certain time, several of them locked up their workshops, and refused to open them to any workman who would not sign a declaration to the effect that they would not become a member, or contribute in any way to the support of any trades' union. This somewhat harsh proceeding further exasperated the operatives, and a long and disastrous struggle ensued - injurious to the masters, but inconceivably more so to the operatives, who, after having endured many privations and sufferings with a heroic self sacrifice and with a devotedness to their sense of right which,

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