ABSTRACT
BEFORE 1763 Sarah Clayton and her associates did not have things entirely their own way in the coal trade, but the opposition was not nearly so serious as it later became. Down to this time the competitors of the Clayton interest can be divided into two groups. Firstly, there were the proprietors of “land-sale ” collieries to the west of St. Helens, and nearer to Liverpool. The importance of this threat was reduced by the fact that the coalfield terminated some six miles from the port, and this fixed a limit to the effectiveness of such competition. The second set of rivals consisted of other coal-masters on or near the Sankey Canal itself ; these would appear to have been the more immediately dangerous as they might have split the alliance between the Canal proprietors and the Clayton-Case coalowners. So long as one group of coal-masters had something of a monopoly, the Canal proprietors would be content to make their profit by charging high tolls on a restricted traffic, but, as soon as the monopoly was seriously impaired, their best prospects would lie in obtaining the maximum traffic on the Canal. This local competition had been in evidence before the price reduction of 1761, but had generally come from small speculators without the resources which the Claytons and Cases derived from their extensive commercial wealth and landed property.
