Armley Mills on the history trip

This afternoon we visited Armley Mills in the heart of industrial Leeds. Here we saw locomotives, steam tractors, the woollen mill, the mill owners cottage, the canal where goods left the mill, one of the worlds first sweat shops, a Victorian silent movie in the cinema and much much more. It's been an enlightening afternoon- we've concluded that we are immensely grateful for reformers like Shaftsebury without whom children could still be working 16 hour days in appalling conditions!

We were shown how poor mill workers would make rag rugs:
















We understood why William Blake called this England's dark satanic mills:













Angus used his phone to find out that the Leeds coat if arms motto - pro rege pro lege- means 'for the King and for the law'.








































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