Maggie Shackleton -
A Family of Cotton Weavers

Margaret Shackleton was born on the 2^nd of November 1887 in Burnley, Lancashire.

One of eight children born to James and Harriet Shackleton, Maggie as she was called, would not stray too far from her roots.

We first find Maggie and her family living in Nelson in the 1891 English Census. Nelson had started off as two small villages' Little Marsden and Great Marsden. It was the coming of the Leeds and Liverpool canal in 1796 followed by the East Lancashire railway in 1849 that spurred the development of Nelson. The Industrial Revolution brought an economy based mainly upon cotton weaving.

Maggie was 4 years old in the census. James Shackleton her father was 34 and Harriet her mother 35.James is listed as a cotton weaver overlooker. The family of seven are living at 13 Craven Street, in four rooms.

Maggie would find herself thrust into the millwork force when she was 11 years old and spend all her working life in the mill.

We find the family again in the 1901 English census. They had moved house to 48 Westmoreland street. Maggie was now 14 and listed as a cotton weaver along with two of her sisters and her 12 year old brother Elias. James was now 44 and still working in the mill as a cotton loom overlooker. The family had increased in size, there were now eight children.

Time moved on and in 1908 Maggie married a local boy from Nelson. Firth Dole was also from a big family. They had one daughter Edna, born around the same time in the world as' Hollywood movie stars' Carol Lombard and Joan Crawford' Edna would only know her father for a short time.

The 1st world war would take many of Nelson's son's away from home. Maggie's younger brother Elias joined the Royal Welsh Fusiliers. He gained the Victory Cross but lost his life on the 26^th of September 1917.He was 28 years old. He is mentioned in the Commonwealth Grave records as the son of James and Harriet Ann Shackleton of 66 Brunswick Street Nelson.

The following month October would bring more bad news, Firth Dole, Maggie's husband had been killed in an explosion in the munitions factory where he had been a fireman. Maggie was left a Widow at 30 years old.

Maggie was left to bring up their daughter Edna by herself. She remained in Nelson and worked at' Jimmy Nelson's' cotton mill until she retired. Edna married and had three daughters. The 2^nd world war would come at the end of the 1930's.Edna would join the women workforce that was needed to support the war. She would travel to Bolton every day to work in an Munitions factory. Maggie would have been a big help looking after her granddaughters. She lived in the same street as Edna, Bradshaw street in Nelson.

The Mills of Nelson played a key role in the Second World War. They produced cloth for uniforms, parachutes and canvas for aircraft.

In 1945 one of Maggie's granddaughters would follow family tradition and become a cotton weaver.

The British textile industry went into decline after the 2^ndWorld War. It was unable to compete with the growing Indian textile industry. Most of the mills around Nelson would close. Another factor that would change the face of Nelson after WW2 was the thousands of migrants from the Indian subcontinent. They settled in the mill towns to fill the labour shortage in the industry. They often moved to the traditional working class areas. The white working class moved out to the newly built estates after the war.