September 1856: Forging ahead in Manchester

In our July 2022 edition we recalled the adventures of a reporter sent to Manchester in 1856 to appraise the city’s manufacturing capabilities, a task executed thoroughly and with great enthusiasm.

By 1856 Manchester was well on its way to becoming the world’s first industrial city and our reporter was still there in September the same year to record the day-to-day activities in all manner of manufactories and the ebb-and-flow of daily life.

“I have now been nearly three months in Manchester; have perambulated most of her principal thoroughfares and byways and watched the living stream of faces which surges along them,” our reporter enthused. “I have…listened to the converse of her citizens in all their various moods and phases, visited most of the large manufactories; and, seeing Manchester both at work and at play, I have derived both pleasure and instruction from contact with perhaps the most active and intelligent community in England.”