Charles-François Richard

Charles-François Richard, also known as Richard-Chambovet, born August 9, 1772, in Bourg-Argental (Forez province) and died April 15, 1851, in Saint-Chamond (Loire department), was a French silk industrialist, and more notably the initiator of the lace industry.

After a brief military interlude - due to the revolutionary turmoil - his beginnings as a miller were modest. He then established himself as a passementier specializing in the manufacture of padous, the ribbons needed for culottes and catogans. But ruined for the first time by the general economic slump, fashion later abandoned them for good, putting an end to the business. Looking for a new direction, Richard went to the brand-new Musée des Arts et Métiers, where he met Joseph de Montgolfier. There, he found a rudimentary braiding loom that produced round-section elements - until then, weaving looms had only been able to produce flat elements - and from then on, he worked tirelessly to improve it.

Thus, this pioneer paved the way for the industrial manufacture of laces. On the one hand, he innovated by developing these looms, and on the other, he added a steam engine as a driving force. Later, he remained a pioneer, installing a central-heating boiler in his workshops, which increased profitability and enabled more meticulous work. Finally, he equipped his workshops with gas lighting to boost productivity.

As part of the nascent industrial revolution, Charles-François Richard was at the origin of an industry that dominated Europe and was recognized as far afield as America. The production of laces was of prime importance at this time: they were very widespread haberdashery items, used for a variety of fastenings. As a result, the town of Saint-Chamond, where Richard settled, became a major player in this field.

Biography
Baptized on August 9, 1772, the day of his birth in Bourg-Argental, Charles-François Richard was the second of six siblings. His parents were Jean-Louis Richard, a court clerk and future deputy to the Estates General of 1789, and Marie Chevalier. Involved in the silk industry, the household earned part of its income from the cultivation of mulberry trees on which silkworms were raised.

At the age of twenty-one, with the National Guards of Saint-Étienne and Montbrison, he went to Lyon to help with the city's uprising against the National Convention. On 11 fructidor year I (August 28, 1793), his detachment, posted to protect the arrival of a convoy of grain from Forez, successfully confronted a besieging formation. But, abandoned by his family, he became a "forgotten sentry [...] [who] tried in vain to return to Lyon, [who] obtained peasant's clothes and returned to Bourg-Argental [...]". Outlawed, he enlisted in Tournon in the 4th battalion of Ardèche volunteers. This unit, formed on the 4th Complementary Day of Year I (September 20, 1793) in Bourg-Saint-Andéol, was commanded by Louis-Gabriel Suchet, from a family of silk merchants. After the siege of Toulon, he joined his father Jean-Louis Richard, also a proscribe, in the same battalion in Marseille. This commitment was sometimes physically demanding, as his son Ennemond explains: "My father had been a soldier in the Army of Italy; for eight months, he had been deprived of his military bag and had slept with the snow, in the hedges that were half-open and then covered with his coat". His constitution proved robust, however, and the only health problems he encountered later on were limited to urinary stones, which required the intervention of a Parisian surgeon. In 1794, he attained the rank of lieutenant. Then, released from all obligations on 9 Floréal Year IV (April 28, 1796) by "the board of directors of the 69th demi-brigade of line infantry", he left the Army of Italy as a supernumerary officer.

On fructidor 23, year VI (September 9, 1798), he married a relative by marriage named Marie Chambovet in Saint-Chamond, from whom he had four children and from whom he took his customary name "Richard-Chambovet".

By 1817, working in the silk industry, he was an established industrialist. The six-member Chambre consultative des arts et manufactures de Saint-Étienne elected him miller. After its dissolution in 1792, the Société d'agriculture, arts et commerce de l'arrondissement de Saint-Étienne was recreated in 1820. His first Bulletin, from 1823, indicates that he is a member. In 1824, this Society published part of the notice princeps in which he described his early career. The commentary was laudatory, as Saint-Chamond, under his impetus, became the capital of shoelaces. In 1827, Richard-Chambovet had a hôtel particulier built as a testament to his success, with a garden that reached as far as the city limits. In 1829, probably because of his notability, he was the "temporal godfather" of the new Ursuline house in Saint-Chamond. In 1833, he was still listed as a full member of the Society.

Electoral mandates were added to his manufacturing activities. He was a member of the Saint-Chamond town council in 1808. This council favored the Restoration. Its vision of social peace was based on a balance between the divine monarchy, the church, and commercial prosperity. From 1829 to 1831, he was elected mayor of Izieux.

His work was honored with many distinctions. In 1814, he received the decoration of the Lily. On December 20, 1831, he was made a Knight of the Royal Order of the Legion of Honor. In 1839, French industrialists awarded his company a silver medal at the Exposition des Produits de l'Industrie Française in Paris. This was awarded not simply for the products exhibited, but for the work accomplished as a whole. It concluded: "Twenty-five to thirty years ago, Saint-Chamond delivered thirty thousand francs' worth of laces to the trade, now it delivers more than two million francs' worth".

In 1839, Richard-Chambovet relinquished his business to his three sons, who adopted "Richard Frères" as their corporate name. Finally, his death was declared on April 16, 1851, by his eldest son, who planned to have him buried in Lyon. The eldest son retired to Château de Montchat before his father's death, and on October 30, 1865, the youngest son retired to Château du Montellier in the Ain region. Eventually, only the second son, Ennemond Richard, took over the business.

In 1889, the industrialist was honored in Saint-Chamond by a road named "rue Richard-Chambovet". In 1890, when the municipality of Saint-Étienne handed over the entire Palais de la Bourse to the Chamber of Commerce, the latter undertook several decoration projects, including busts of Richard-Chambovet, which were donated by the families. Félix Thiollier produced heliogravures of these busts. Later, his brother made a presentation on the subject to the aforementioned Chamber. This presentation, printed in 1894, devoted a chapter to Richard-Chambovet.

Moulinier
In 1790 and 1791, Richard was an apprentice miller. In 1792 and 1793, he was employed by a ribbon manufacturer in Saint-Étienne. The French Revolution then took him on a three-year military tour. On his return, he found a position as a miller in Saint-Chamond, with a man named Coron.

Passmentier
In May 1797, he set up shop as a manufacturer of passementerie and padous, which were used to trim garments. They are also used to tie men's hair into catanogans, and to lace shoes. For optimum production, Richard bought many Zurich-style looms  capable of weaving twelve to twenty-four at a time, depending on the width required: he installed these machines in Saint-Chamond. He also manufactured sewing silks. In 1799, the Army of Italy began the Italian campaign against the Second Coalition, with setbacks that caused the already bloodless French state to lose the few territorial conquests that were barely holding it together. In the economic doldrums of the Directoire period, Richard-Chambovet was ruined for the first time.

However, he resumed his activities just as the coup d'état of 18 Brumaire brought economic recovery. It was then that he had to contend with Lyon's industry, which, out of protectionism, forbade dyers and chevilleurs from working for Saint-Chamond's sewing silk manufacturers, and with fashion, which definitively adopted short hair and abandoned culottes in favor of pants, rendering padous useless. In 1804, for the second time, he went bankrupt.

Conservatoire des arts et métiers
Against this backdrop, Richard-Chambovet seemed discouraged. As Thiollier states in his 1894 biographical note: "His family possesses letters written by him at this time, in which he declares that if he were not married, he would immediately return to service to seek glory or death".

He then investigated whether there was a way to increase the production of foil ganses from the low heddle looms at Saint-Martin-en-Coailleux. The idea was to use these looms to make flat laces, like those imported from Germany. But he gave up and thought of going to Germany. He recalled an article in the Journal des Débats - which on July 15, 1805, became the Journal de l'Empire - describing the lace industry in the Duchy of Berg. It states that "laces were made on certain looms operated by a single person, and that each loom produced around a hundred ells of laces each day".

Since May 1802, the Musée des Arts et Métiers has been open to the public. Demonstrators explain how the many machines on display work. In January 1807, Richard-Chambovet went to Paris and asked Joseph de Montgolfier, a native of Vidalon-lès-Annonay - only 10 km from his birthplace - and demonstrator, if there were any lace looms on deposit at the Conservatoire. His son led him into a room. Among the looms on display, he noticed one made of wood with thirteen spindles, one of whose characteristics was that it stopped as soon as a thread broke: it was most likely that of Jean-Éléonor Perrault. Upon inquiry, Joseph de Montgolfier indicated that, for Paris, three examples had been built from fir planks to occupy the children of a charity organization. Since they never made a profit, they were sold to a reseller, who can be contacted to purchase them. Richard-Chambovet tracked down this secondhand dealer, bought his three examples for 390 francs (ten francs a spindle), and acquired a hand-operated merry-go-round. Transport to Saint-Chamond and installation cost him 200 francs. Later, he recalled these 600 francs alone to launch the lace factory in Saint-Chamond.

Improving Perrault's craft
Richard-Chambovet studied and improved the mechanism of the Perrault loom, which he installed in the Terrasson mill (now rue du Béal in Saint-Chamond).

He orders the manufacture of other looms. A manufacturer from Paris, James Collier, whose prices were too high, was rejected in favor of Jean-Éléonor Perrault. According to Richard-Chambovet, before the business closed, this family was a shoelace manufacturer based in Lisieux (Calvados). These orders were probably filled by the inventor of the basic model.

In Saint-Chamond, "he [initially] experienced great difficulties in selling his products"; in 1808, seven other looms were added to the first ones, then ten more in 1809. He acquired the Granjon factory (place Saint-Jean in Saint-Chamond) to install thirty-nine new looms in 1810, then twenty-five more in 1811. These looms cost him a total of twenty-one thousand francs.

This was to create emulators and, in 1813, the first competing company arose: that of M. Hervier-Charrin et Cie. Then Mr. Motiron, an employee of Richard-Chambovet, set up a second factory, and Mr. Tamet, a bookkeeper with Mr. Hervier, created a third. According to an 1812 inventory by Philippe Hedde, there were one hundred and ten looms in Saint-Chamond, eighty-two of which belonged to Richard-Chambovet alone.

Steam engine
In 1813, Richard-Chambovet acquired the gardens of the former Dutreyve dye works in La Vignette, which included a waterfall, for twenty thousand francs. He installed seventy new trades there, but the fickle flow of water limited his expansion.

To remedy periods of frost and drought, Richard-Chambovet had Mr. Crépu build the first steam engine in the Loire department in Lyon that was not intended for a mine. The Almanach du commerce de Paris points out that, at the time, "it was the first steam engine in France without a condenser". This high-pressure steam engine, whose boiler was chosen by its sponsor from sheet metal rather than cast iron, developed twelve horsepower. Richard-Chambovet justifies it as follows: "This driving force is more expensive, it's true, than a waterfall; but the extra expense is well offset by the regularity of the movement, which is not interrupted by seasonal variations". According to one of his handwritten notes, the machine was set in motion in 1816, although the prefectoral authorization to establish it was formally obtained on March 3, 1817. This machine was able to drive "two hundred and forty lace looms, offering a resistance of one thousand two hundred kilograms, covering sixty meters per minute". Richard-Chambovet spent 150,000 francs at La Vignette to install 300 looms.

Then, in 1819, he bought the Izieux mills from his loom manufacturer Perrault. These mills, which benefited from all the waters of the Gier and a ten-meter waterfall, enabled him to set up a large factory. He spent 300,000 francs on the installation. In 1828, a new sixteen-horsepower steam engine, built by M. Imbert, a mechanic from Rive-de-Gier, was installed.

Richard-Chambovet's business had grown considerably: "all the looms are made in his workshops; the raw material undergoes all the preparations without leaving his premises. Cotton is spun, milled, bleached, dyed, laced, calendered and folded. The same applies to silks and foils.

This opened the way first to four competitors, then in 1822 to one of his employees setting up on his own, and in 1824 to eight entrepreneurs. Statistics covering the towns of Saint-Étienne and Saint-Chamond show that in 1824, there were 2,200 trades, 800 of which belonged to Richard-Chambovet. He alone employed 300 workers. Among the most notable technical features were the fact that the looms were independent of each other, and could be stopped individually if a thread broke, and that production could be increased by a third by working at night. The total value of raw materials consumed annually was 1,100,000 francs and doubled once all stages of production had been completed.

At the time, this expansion in shoelace manufacture was because, according to a technological dictionary of the time, "it is a haberdashery item of fairly wide consumption. Women used silk laces to fasten their corsets and other garments. Linen, hemp, and cotton thread laces are used for the same purpose, but they are also used, instead of string, for ligatures".

In 1830, Philippe Hedde noted that "the competition that has arisen between the various factories of Saint-Étienne and Saint-Chamond has reduced the sale of laces to the smallest profit, but this has resulted in a great advantage for export, to the detriment of factories in Germany, which can no longer compete on price. Saint-Chamond and Saint-Étienne supply Amsterdam, Brussels, Leipzig, Antwerp, Milan, a few cantons in Switzerland and the two Americas. After detailing the performance of the Richard-Chambovet factory, he continues: "No foreign competition is to be feared today for a factory that has succeeded in bringing order and economy in its workforce to such a degree of perfection".

Calorifier
Richard-Chambovet and his son Ennemond Richard joined forces after a year's stay in England. They operated under the name of MM. Richard-Chambovet et compagnie.

In 1830, they perfected cast-iron milling machines acquired in England. Output was further increased: spindles were increased from 1,000 to 3,000 revolutions per minute while requiring less motive power.

In 1831, the characteristics of innovative calorifiers installed at the Izieux plant were reported. A "six-beehive calorifier", fuelled by coal, replaced six stoves very economically. The even heat prevents the oil from freezing on the looms far from the stoves. The elimination of draughts puts an end to unpleasant odors from the stoves, oils, and gut ropes used to power the looms. The fumes that discolored the silks disappeared. The worker's hands, which no longer have to maintain the stoves, are no longer blackened or chapped by washing; they can handle the silk fabrics without loss. The general temperature is ten degrees Réaumur (or 12.5 degrees Celsius), but is modulated in each workshop to best preserve the silk. The rapporteur points out that this calorifier can also be installed in any building under construction: hospitals, collective or individual housing, etc. It's easy to downsize, as in the Izieux plant, which also has a two-fire calorifier.

Gas lighting
In 1833, gas lighting was installed at the Izieux factory, well before Saint-Étienne and Lyon were equipped. In 1836, "two hundred and sixteen nozzles were in operation, enabling workers to work day and night, with replacements at midday and midnight".

In 1833, along with the looms already in use, the factory produced "round elastic laces" for the first time in the Saint-Étienne district, with each rubber thread covered in silk or thread, followed by "flat elastic laces" of variable width.

In 1833, the company was still as active as ever, as evidenced by the filing of two patents: one "for the improvement brought to lace looms and its application to the manufacture of cannetilles", and the other for "improvements to lace looms".

In 1835, the price of a kilogram of cotton laces was only eight francs and fifty centimes, three times less than ten years earlier.

This industrialization led to the following statement: "The lace industry only developed under the Empire, in Saint-Chamond, which acquired a virtual monopoly". The industry's influence is cited as an example: "Manufacturers in Saint-Chamond established vast networks that went far beyond the national framework, reaching out to continental horizons and, in some cases, even worldwide".

Circumstances
Charles-François Richard evolved at the start of the Industrial Revolution, and his stubbornness and innovative spirit made him a key player. He supported the idea that "great men are conditioned by general circumstances [...] They can only act by the exceptional firmness of their character".

He is at the origin of Europe's primacy in the lace industry. Certainly, when Isidore Hedde, a contemporary, visited the "Celestial Empire" from 1843 to 1846, he asserted that "the Chinese were making laces, cordonnets, galloons, ganses, padoux, etc. long before the Europeans did". However, as in other fields, they did not pass on this know-how. This enabled historian and economist Jean-Charles Asselain to assert in the 20th century that "Song China (960-1279) was undeniably richer than the Europe of its time. [...] However, the result was never a cumulative process comparable to that of the industrial revolution, and the momentum had already largely subsided when China closed itself off from relations with the outside world in the 15th century".

It wasn't until the start of the Industrial Revolution that Richard, and thus Europe, produced lace looms, developing a patent by the Englishman Thomas Walford in 1748, albeit with incomplete indications. In 1750, probably inspired by the English patent, a braiding loom was developed in Germany by Bockmühl, at Barmen in the Wupper valley. After further refinements, the shuttle stops when a thread breaks; this loom is driven by hydraulic power. However, the efficiency of this type of machine was inadequate due to its design. In 1783, François-Michel Perrault imported an iron model to France from Elberfeld -about 5 km from Barmen- still in the Duchy of Berg. Then his son, Jean-Éléonor, submitted an improved wooden model to Jean-François de Tolozan's office, for which he obtained a privilege in 1784. This is most likely the loom that attracted Charles-François Richard's attention. On the one hand, the characteristics of the loom observed at the Musée des arts et métiers and those built by Jean-Éléonor Perrault make the builder also its inventor. On the other hand, the similarity of the prices with those later charged to Richard-Chambovet for loom construction makes the same. However, the Richard family never specifies this link. A known enmity had developed between the family and Perrault fils. In 1942, this loom is still referenced in the latest series of Conservatoire catalogs, which testifies to its importance. Thus Charles-François Richard "created a hitherto unknown industry by importing the mechanically operated spindle loom and gradually increasing its tooling and manufacture".