Queen Victoria Jute Mill
Before the spinners finally stopped in 1990, Queen Victoria Jute Mill was the oldest operating jute mill in the world. Built initially as a flax mill in 1828, the mill gradually expanded, focusing more and more on jute processing as the century progressed.
Jute was a rough material. Indeed, the process by which raw jute was transformed into hessian sacks and rope was only discovered thanks to another Dundee industry — whaling. The whale oil, a by product of the industry, could be applied to jute to facilitate its spinning and thus, an industry was born.
Jute was shipped in raw from British India, processed in Dundee and sold across Europe and the colonies. This highly profitable industry burgeoned in a few short decades and and by the turn of the century Dundee had at least one hundred individual jute mills. In 1911 a total of 31,500 were employed in the jute industry in Dundee, over 40% of Dundee’s working population. This included several thousand at the Camperdown Works in Lochee.
The highly volatile jute market attracted many would be industrialists to try their hand in the industry. The mechanised powerloom, introduced in 1864 offered the irresistible chance to get rich quick. However, the potential for high profits also brought risk. Price fluctuations massively benefited the larger mills who were able to store up large quantities of jute and effectively sit out any downturn in the global price. So although there were consistently many jute mills operational in Dundee there was also significant churn — with smaller producers going bust and being replaced all the time.
Although operational until 1990, Queen Victoria Jute Mill (latterly Victoria Spinning Ltd) is in very poor condition. Many of the outbuildings have been levelled and all that remains is the original (B- listed) brick structure, a spinning hall and the workshop.
In the spinning hall the wooden roof has rotted away, exposing the skeletal wrought-iron girders beneath. The light fracturing through these gaps gives a light airy feel to a space which would have once been sweaty and claustrophobic. Some modern ventilation equipment lies entangled in the Victorian carcass of the building, a clue to just how hot these spaces would have got when filled with machinery. That combination of heat, grease and dust from the jute led many of the workers to contract respiratory diseases, locally referred to as ‘mill fever’.
A feature which distinguished the jute industry from many others across the United Kingdom was the high proportion of female workers. During the first decade of the 20th century it is estimated that 70% of jute workers were women. Indeed it was this female dominated workforce that led some to refer to Dundee as ‘she town’.
Perhaps the best preserved part of the mill is the old workshop. The sturdy cast-iron columns must be one hundred and fifty years old but show few signs of buckling – maybe because there is less and less roof to support. The workshop is still filled with work benches and chairs, there is even a caged section which may have housed heavy duty machinery.
The centre piece of the site — the original 2-story mill — is in poor condition. Both floors have completely collapsed leaving just the outer stone walls standing. These walls are supported on either side by huge steel columns. When constructed the ground floor would have been flooded with water to allow the jute and flax to be lubricated prior to processing.
After the boon of WW1, where sand bags were required in dizzying quantities, the jute trade in Dundee slowly declined. The Dundee jute barons gradually began moving operations overseas, particularly to Calcutta where the jute was grown. This relocation required the expertise of many Dundonian jute traders, who moved to Calcutta in huge numbers to help set up jute processing mils. Indeed, Scots immigrants were in Calcutta in such numbers they even merited their own cemetery which still stands today.
The collapse in a trade so integral to the city must have led many Dundonians the Empire and who it was meant to benefit.
The decline of jute in Dundee did not spell the end for some mills. Some managed to diversify into synthetic fibres and linoleum whilst others like, the Queen Victoria Mill, continued to process jute well into the 1980s.
2018
A preliminary planning application has been registered by Dundee City Council for the Queen Victoria Jute Mill site. The application is for the demolition of all buildings on site and the construction of student accommodation. The application has been lying dormant for months. It can be presumed that nothing will move forward until the listed building is irredeemably ruined, at which point the developer will be able to pull it down completely. To demolish a listed building you must, of course, show that there is no viable alternative. Every day that passes Queen Victoria Jute Mill edges closer to this fate.
