HISTORY

Smash the Machines

The biggest city in the United States in 1813 was New York City, population 123,000. It was followed by Philadelphia at 100,000 and Baltimore at 50,000. In all the US still only 1 in 12 citizens lived in an urban area in a country that was largely agrarian, yet the industrial revolution was beginning to boom. Ammunition, made by hand in the Revolution, was manufactured and delivered to US troops by supply deliveries.

In the United States this change was being embraced by most of the population (especially in the north) but in Europe the feedback was quite different. Workers in Yorkshire, calling themselves Luddites (possibly named after Ned Ludd . . . an early machine thrasher), smashed textile machines in factories. In January 1813, 17 convicted Luddites were hanged at York for destroying textile machines.