mellie o. jAMES
eMBROIDERY dESIGNS OF A MILL GIRL

This wonderful collection of over 100 drawings was rendered by Mrs. Mellie O. James during the years 1857 - 1858.  The collection features patterns for silk, flannel, and wool.
 
Most of the patterns are rendered in a type of iron gall ink. 
Several patterns were done by pokerwork, what was once known as "fire writing". 
​More commonly known today as pyrography. 
Mellie likely used a fine pointed metal tool ​heated by candle flame
​to gently burn her designs into paper.  

Fortunately, Mellie signed most of her work. 
​She included dates, location, and the purpose of her patterns.  
​

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​In 1857, Mellie and her husband, Erastus, were  living in Willimantic, CT. 
​The young couple had not yet started a family, but their first child would be born  in 1858.

Willimantic, CT, is historically known as "The Thread City".​
"Wilmentuck" was the original Algonguian name for "place of the swift running waters".

"In 1825, the three Jillson brothers built a cotton mill there, which later became the spool-making
shop of the Willimantic Linen Company. Prior to this time, thread wound on spools only came in
black or white; colored thread was available in bulk skeins only. But from the beginning,
the Willimantic company offered spooled thread in a wide variety of colors."

"By 1828, there were six cotton mills. Willimantic became known as “Thread City", and American Thread
was at one time one of the largest producers of thread in the world. Its factory was the first in the world
to use electric lighting. Most of the red thread used in manufacturing baseballs
was produced at the American Thread Company."

Meltiah Orsina "Mellie" Church

Mellie w/daughter Emma, granddaughter Helen, and great grand daughter, Florence.

Meltiah "Mellie" Orsina Church
 
Birth:  15 Jan 1836, Mansfield, Tolland, CT
Father:  Martin Rose Church (28 Jan 1810 - 2 Apr 1842) #157192192  
Mother:  Betsey B. Armstead (10 Jun 1814 - 24 Mar 1906) m. 26 Jun 1834, New Haven, CT,  #147370766
Spouse:  Erastus P. James (1826 - 1883) s. of Perry James,  #42021557
Marriage:  29 Nov 1855, Windham, CT
Death:  18 Mar 1922
Burial:  Old Branford Center Cemetery
Memorial ID:  42021614

Siblings:
​Elizabeth O. Church:  Jun 1834 - 10 Mar 1915
Martin Luther Church:  25 May 1840 - 10 Mar 1918
James A. Church:  6 Mar 1842 - 16 Mar 1923
 
Children:
Ellen D. James: 1858 - 1867
Emma Elizabeth James Augur:  28 Apr 1860 - 1923, b. Fiskdale, MA
Ida L. James:  1862 - 1867
Anna L. James:  1864 - 1867
John Erastus James:  1867 - 1921
Edward Perry James:  1876 - 1954

​
​1842 - Martin Rose Church dies at the young age of 32.  Mellie is 6 years old.  Her mother, Betsey, is 28, with three young children and a 3-week old baby.  Betsey never remarries and remains in New Haven the rest of her life.
1855 - Mellie, age 19, marries Erastus P.  James, age 31, in Willimantic, CT
1857 - Mellie and Erastus living in Willimantic, CT
1858 - Mellie and Erastus living in Fiskdale, Sturbridge, MA
1867 - Mellie and Erastus lose 3 of their 5 children.  The 3 young daughters succumb to dysentery.
1876 - Living in New Haven, CT, on Division St.
1883 - Erastus P. James dies.  Mellie moves to "Branford on Laurel St. with her daughter Emma and her son-in-law Frederick Minot Augur and their children". 
She settles there for the next 29 years.  As her eyesight begins to decline, Emma tends to her, and miraculously, Mellie regains her sight before her death in 1922.

Mellie's paternal great grandfather,  Abner Church (8 Jun 1738 - 1834) married Sarah Linsey Coy on 16 Mar 1769, and settled in Mansfield, Tolland, CT.

 By 1858, Mellie and Erastus had moved to Fiskdale, in part of the township of Sturbridge, MA. 
Several of her pokerwork drawings are marked Fiskdale.

19th c., textile mills made every effort to increase productivity, by all means necessary.

"In Dover, NH, owners of the textile mills made stricter regulations of the working-day, imposing fines
and punishments on workers who did not arrive to work on time or wasted time on the job. 
This is not a prolongation of the working-day, but an enforcement of its limits."

"In Exeter, New Hampshire in 1834, there was another method where the capitalists attempted
to lengthen the working-day without a pay rise by setting the clocks backward throughout the day.
This was simpler to do when fewer workers had timepieces of their own."
​
From: The Struggle of the 'Mill Girls': Class Consciousness in Early 19th c. New England - Ian Schlom