Flax mills : their machinery, accidents occurring therein, with suggestions for their prevention / by Thomas H. Babington.

  • Babington, Thomas H.
Date:
1866
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Flax mills : their machinery, accidents occurring therein, with suggestions for their prevention / by Thomas H. Babington. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    3/8
    J FLAX MILLS —THEIR MACHINERY; ACCIDENTS OCCURRING THEREIN, WITH ‘SUGGESTIONS FOR THEIR PREVENTION. The above may be considered an extraordinary text on which to ground a communication to a medical and surgical journal. The subject is one of importance. It, in my opinion, demands the attention of the public at large, as ratepayers, and of the Legislature; and I trust my brethren in the profession will concur with me in thinking that I am not out of place in asking them to consider the subject for a short space. I have lived, during my professional life (commenced in 1835), in the flax-growing province of Ulster; first, in County Donegal, medical officer of a large dispensary district; afterwards at Port- stewart. County Derry; then, for thirteen years, medical officer of Coleraine Union Workhouse; and for twelve years surgeon to the County Londonderry Infirmary. In each year I have had under my care many cases of accidents from flax mills, of greater or less magnitude. In some cases one or two fingers have been lost; in others a whole hand, often a whole limb, sacrificed; and, occasionally, life lost by the frightful injuries inflicted. Flax, when pulled from the earth, is steeped for a certain time, then spread on grass lands and dried in the sun; afterwards dried in kilns constructed for the purpose; then bruised, and carried to the mills (“ scutch mills, as they were formerly called), there to be scutched or cleaned. And here begins the danger to lives and limbs. In order to have the flax properly scutched or cleaned that is, to have all extraneous substances removed, nothing to be left but