Born in Camphill on the south side of Glasgow, Thomson came from a family of cotton-goods manufacturers. The business fell into his hands when his brothers died, two in 1833 and the third in 1843.
He became known for the care of his workforce, introducing shorter hours before the law on this was passed. He also encouraged workers to open savings accounts, and established a bakery in Crossmyloof where good quality bread could be bought far more cheaply than was normally the case. This proved such a success that shops soon opened, with large crowds gathering to meet the delivery vans, and the experiment in philanthropy grew into a flourishing business.
Thomson acquired land adjacent to Camphill, and in 1857 gave this to the city for the construction of what became known as South Side, or Queen's, Park. He died at Camphill, after a long illness, on 26 June 1857.
ALTHOUGH birth and family associations must always exercise a preponderating influence in regulating the particular occupations of individuals, yet there are men whose lives almost unconsciously display a principle of energy and a facility of resource which would have gone far to ensure success in any sphere of activity or of usefulness to which fortune might have introduced them. It is not saying too much of many among the men whose lives are recorded in these volumes that the talent and the energy which they brought to bear upon the special duties of their everyday callings would have won them prominence in any profession or in any walk of life. Perhaps of few could this be said with greater truth than of the subject of this sketch.
Neale Thomson of Camphill (as he was familiarly known) was born in Glasgow in 1807. His family had come originally from the parish of Tullieallan in Perthshire, where we find them about A.D. 1680, but in the early part of the last century his great-grandfather, James Thomson, was settled in Anderston, Glasgow. His grandfather, Robert Thomson, born in 1742, survived to 1820, and was founder of the well-known firm of Robert Thomson & Son, of the Adelphi Cotton Works in Hutchesontown. He was a leading man in his day, and greatly respected and much beloved. He was the first person who attempted the manufacture of cotton goods in Scotland, and his adoption of it was due to the coincidence of a few trifling circumstances. Mr. Thomson was originally bred to the linen trade, which he carried on extensively till about the year 1778. At that time he was connected in business with his brother-in-law, James Monteith, father of the late Mr. Henry Monteith of Carstairs, who, being frequently at that time in London on business, happened accidentally to attend a public sale at the East India Warehouse. Among other goods offered were a few bales of East India cotton yarn, which he bought for a very trifling sum, the article being thought useless, and called from the manner in which it was bound up "bird-nest cotton," as it resembled birds' nests. These were sent by him to Glasgow for experiment. The texture was beautiful, but the difficulty was to find means of preparing it so as to render it fit for the weaver. A machine, however, was ultimately contrived that answered the purpose, and Mr. Thomson put it to use, applying it as weft for lawns, which produced an article then entitled "bastard muslin," for which he soon found a good demand, Indian muslin being then fashionable and very expensive. Encouraged by this demand, every search was made for supplies of the East India material, which was but partially to be procured, it being prohibited by law soon after. It then occurred to him that if cotton twist could be spun as fine as French lawn yarn it might be advantageously substituted for the latter. This was attempted and partially succeeded, and soon after this period Arkwright came forward with his spinning jennies, which were laid hold of by the manufacturers of Glasgow, and the result is well known.
Mr. Thomson had as partner in his business his only son Robert, born in 1771, and who in 1798 acquired the property of Camphill, then a secluded country district lying between the city and the small village of Langside, but now gradually being encroached on by the rows of terraces which are gathering round the South-Side Park.
Robert, who died in 1831, had a large family, of whom four sons survived him - Robert, John, Neale, and James. By them the business was continued, but both the elder brothers died in 1833, and the youngest in 1843, and the works thus fell into the hands of Neale, by whom, with a large measure of success, they were conducted till his death.
Mr. Thomson was a man of remarkable sagacity and ability. He had been educated at Glasgow University. His aptitude for business was exceptional. He was master of every detail, and the accuracy of his calculation and the minuteness of his scrutiny, combined with long practice and the carefully worked-out system on which he proceeded, obtained him a knowledge and a success which were equally remarkable. He had to struggle at first against serious difficulties from the position of the trade in which he was engaged, and from difficulties with his workmen, but he came towards the close of his life to be so closely identified with the latter in his care for their wellbeing, that the works assumed rather the appearance of a united society, presided over, in the interests of all, by the head, than of a manufactory where profits were wrung out of living machinery. While from the very necessities of the case his energy and genius were mainly devoted to the prosecution of a business among the foremost in the city, and to the development of every adaptation that the invention of the time placed at the disposal of what was then one of the staple industries of the country, he was not content to rest within the narrow bounds of a money-making profession. He was intensely alive to the interests of his fellows, and most of all to the interests of his workmen: and it is not too much to say that the greater part of his later life was spent in continued efforts to ameliorate their condition and minister to their comfort.
Thus when, after a long struggle, the Bill for the first restriction of the hours of work in manufactories was carried, the reduction was introduced into Mr. Thomson's works a considerable time before the statutory period fixed by the Act. On another occasion, desirous of forming saving habits among his workmen, he made them a proposition that he would place five or ten shillings to the account of any worker who would agree to open an account for a like amount in the savings bank. At the end of the year, naturally desirous to know to what extent the little stores had increased, he invited them to submit their passbooks to his inspection. Many demurred to what they perhaps considered undue inquisitiveness, but, on the other hand, many consented, and his delight was extreme when he found that in many cases considerable sums, reaching sometimes to as much as £5, had been accumulated during the course of the year. The end of it was that on the books being returned to them, each worker found that an amount exactly equivalent to their year's savings had been added to their credit by their kind-hearted master.
At a time when bread in the city was not only as a rule poor in quality, but high in price, the quarter loaf selling, we believe, as high as a shilling, he determined after great consideration to start himself an oven for his workers, and supply them with the purest material at the lowest possible cost. The instant the first oven was started the demand was enormous. The bread was so much cheaper and so much better that parties from all quarters sent out for it to Crossmyloof, where alone at first, and only for ready money, it was to be obtained.
A shop in Crown Street on the South Side was shortly after opened to meet the demand, and the scene on the first few days is still remembered. Large crowds awaited the arrival of the vans that brought the bread, the supply of which at first fell far short of the demand. The struggle was often extreme; shawls were torn off the shoulders of the women, and men emerged in a triumphant but disordered condition from the mass, waving in triumph the reward of their labours, and shouting, "This is the poor man's loaf, my boys!"
Ultimately one shop after another had to be established in the main thoroughfares of the city for what was known as "Crossmyloof Bread," and what thus began in an experiment of the purest philanthropy, ended in the establishment of a large and flourishing business.
There can be little doubt that the great improvement which has taken place in the quality of Glasgow bread, as well as in its cheapness, derived its first impulse from this action of Mr. Thomson; but he had at first a hard battle to fight with his competitors in the trade. In the "Herald" of 10th November, 1848, the following advertisement appeared:-
"LOAF FACTORY BREAD.
"All the loaves are stamped, and the weights also - the 2-lb. loaf 'C.F. 2 lbs.' - the 4-lb. 'C.F. 4 lbs' - the 8-lb. 'C.F. 8 lbs.'
"This notice is given simply as a warning to those who, whether willingly or in ignorance, are selling bread as the produce of the above factory. After Monday, the 13th inst., every shop professing to sell this bread shall be entered by persons employed to make detections, and the cases will be treated as the law directs."
This tells its own story, but the attempts to depreciate the purity and, above all, to call in question the weight of the loaves went on, and an interesting narrative might be framed from the police reports and correspondence that appeared on the subject in the "Glasgow Herald " and "Glasgow Courier" of May, 1849. We content ourselves by giving here a letter from Mr. Thomson himself which effectually ended the controversy, and which is interesting, not only in itself, and the details it furnishes of the process employed in the manufacture, but as giving a specimen of the clear, sharp, and incisive style which characterized the writer:-
"Loaf Factory, Crossmyloof, 16th May, 1849.
"To the Editor of the 'Courier.'
"Sir, - There appears to be a whole host of bakers, victuallers, and others most anxious that the produce of this factory should be condemned as being light weight, and as they cannot manage this by fair play, they have resorted to very underhand methods.
"The object of this is to let the public know the contents of our bread.
"Our 4-lb. loaf contains of flour 3.18, or as near as possible 3 lb. 3 oz.; the rest is composed of water, barm, and salt. This loaf when taken from the oven weighs on an average 4 lb. 3 oz. good. If I am wrong in stating the above to be the content of an honest 4-lb. loaf I will soon be put right; at all events I can tell those who are consuming, or have consumed our bread, that it is all they get for their money, and, if they can get a better bargain elsewhere, let them go.
"I have told the contents of our bread, which show that there are 13 oz. of flour short of 4-lb. weight, yet I assert our loaf to be a heavy, honest loaf. If there is any so ignorant as for a moment to suppose that there is 4 lb. of flour in a 4-lb. loaf, let him look to the comparative prices.
"The 4-lb. loaf is selling at 6d. The finest flour is 36s. per sack of 280 lbs; take this and you will find that 4 lbs. of flour costs about 6¼d., or, to state it correctly, 6.17. So much for any one who thinks when he buys a loaf that the whole weight of the loaf is flour.
"What I have to complain of is this, and this is the sole reason of this letter, that some parties are most anxious that we should be fined for light bread.
"They cannot manage this in a legal manner because the inspectors can find no light bread in our shop, for there is none there, and never was; the only thing, therefore, they can do is to get hold of some of our bread and make it light, and this is easily done. By what I have shown above, they have the 13 oz. of water and barm, and having them to cook at, it is a very simple matter. Put the loaf within three feet of a good fire and open all the windows, making a strong draught; continue this for a few hours, and you will have a Dutch account of your 13 oz.; it will then be in a nice state for giving information to the police. The baker is then summoned, his loaf weighed, the magistrate, with his wise face, declares that nothing has been taken off the loaf, and that it is just as it left the baker's shop. Honest man, little knowing of the comfortable seven or eight hours' seat the honest rumpie has had from his hospitable owner!
"Another very good way, it would seem, from a case that was tried yesterday, is to keep the bread for a fortnight, and then get information sent to an opposition baker to come and buy a loaf, who will at once send the inspector to your shop and seize your bread, and then you, when brought to defend yourself, can say, 'It's Thomson's bread; look at the stamp.'
"Now, honest bakers and victuallers, you had better just keep quiet, and let me alone. We can sell more bread than we can produce, and any step you can take to annoy us is just advertising our fame, a means which we hitherto have found unnecessary to adopt. - I am, sir, your most obedient servant,
"Neale Thomson."
Mr. Thomson took over Camphill from his brother Robert's eldest son (now Colonel White Thomson of Broomfield Manor, Devonshire), and in 1852 acquired the lands of Langside adjoining it on the south, and in 1854 the lands of Pathhead, which adjoined it on the east and north. In 1857 he disposed of the latter to the city for the formation of what is now known as the Queen's or South Side Park. The price he fixed was under what the land had cost him, with interest added; and those who were cognizant of the transaction are aware, what indeed from the great progress in value of the ground of late years is apparent, that the main object he had in view in fixing this rate was the benefit of his fellow-citizens.
His energy and independence were always readily backed up by a liberal and generous spirit. When, before the present post-office was built, complaints were general that Glasgow was not in this respect treated by the Government with the consideration to which its increasing importance entitled it, he endeavoured for a time to start a scheme for providing from the voluntary subscriptions of merchants and manufacturers a fund sufficient to provide a fitting building to be handed over by the city to a parsimonious Treasury, and offered to head the subscription himself; but either he failed to get sufficient support, or the scheme was ultimately rendered unnecessary by the steps taken by the Crown for the erection of the existing buildings.
Determined and energetic in all he undertook, he was yet the most warm-hearted of men. An instance of this, which originated an appellation that long stuck to his workmen, though in itself trifling, may be given here. Coming out one day from the gate of the Adelphi works he found a man on the street beating his wife. The man was in liquor and did not appreciate Mr. Thomson's interference, and, after some words between them, turned upon the latter, who immediately knocked him down, took the woman into the gatehouse, placing her under the care of the gatekeeper, and then calling out the workmen from the mechanic shop near the entrance, bade them take her husband to the police office. Nothing loth, they gathered round the offender, hoisted him on their shoulders, and carried him in a jubilant and boisterous procession to his proper haven. For long after the mechanics at the Adelphi works were dubbed "Thomson's police."
He was a keen sportsman, and to his beautiful country residence near the Trossachs brought the same energy and spirit which distinguished him in the city. He was intensely fond of a country life, and the affectionate memories which still gather round his name in a district to which he annually resorted for many years will not speedily fade away.
He died at Camphill, after a lengthened illness, on 26th June, 1857. He had been twice married - first to the daughter of the late Colonel Wright of Broom, by whom he had no issue, and second to the daughter of Mr. Malcolm Macfarlane of Achray, by whom he left four sons and two daughters, all under age at his death. After his decease the Adelphi works and the Crossmyloof bakery were carried on for many years by his Trustees, and ultimately, after the death of his two eldest surviving sons, by his widow and his third son, who, on his mother's death in 1874, assumed as partner in the mills Mr. James Struthers Hamilton, afterwards one of the Bailies of the city, whom his father had appointed manager a few months before his death. The destruction of the principal portion of the works by fire and the continued depression of the cotton trade led to the abandonment of the business in 1880, but the Crossmyloof bakery remains as a monument of the philanthropy and enterprise of its founder.
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