“Grinding Its Help:” Baltic Mills, Sprague, Connecticut

The American Industrial Revolution began in New England, and the textile industry led the way. The first successful mill built in Pawtucket, Rhode Island adopted family labor where a division of labor based on the age and gender of the individual emerged: children worked in the mill, men worked on farms or at other traditional jobs, and most women remained in the home. By the mid nineteenth century, this labor system could be found throughout southeastern New England. Initially local rural families moved to the mill towns, and they were followed first by the Irish and then by French Canadian families. Quebec families came to dominate the labor force. They sought work in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island, but initially avoided moving to Connecticut. That state had some of the largest textile mills in the country, but their factory owners had a reputation for mistreating workers, for “grinding its help.” The term was applied to the Baltic Mills in Sprague, Connecticut.