Scotch Drapers in Liverpool

 The story of the Sloan and McMillan families. 

They started off as travelling drapers, going from place to place selling items from a pack. Why they chose  Liverpool to build their empire is a not clear, but Liverpool was a thriving port .

Alexander Sloan was born in Knockterra farm 1853 the eldest of seven children to Peter Sloan, from Roughside farm, and Mary Gall from Crawfordjohn.

Alexander married Jane McMillan from Minnigaff in 1880. He was employed as a travelling draper, and they married in the West Derby district of Liverpool.

Here they are in the census of 1881

Name	Alexander Sloan
Age	28
Estimated Birth Year	abt 1853
Relationship to Head	Head
Spouse	Jeannie Sloan
Gender	Male
Where born	Scotland
Civil parish	Liverpool
County/Island	Lancashire
Country	England
Street Address	9 Brownlow St
Marital Status	Married
Occupation	Travelling Draper
Registration District	Liverpool

Other household members are baby Peter, and three year old Elizabeth (Lizzie) Clive.

Lizzie was the daughter of Jane’s sister Margaret McMillan who had died in January 1878, aged 40, three months after the birth of Lizzie.

Jane’s brother James McMillan, also a travelling draper, married Alexander’s sister Margaret Sloan, and the 1891 census finds them living at 16 Brownlow St. Along with Alexander, Peter, and Lizzie as Jane had died.

Household members

Name	Age
James McMillon	40
Margaret McMillon	32
Margarete McMillon	3
James McMillon	1
Alexander Sloan	38
Pieter Sloan	10
Mary Kean	25
Elizabeth Clive	13

As well as the McMillan/Sloans, Brownlow St. appears to have several families in the drapery trade. They are:

Caroline Bentham  drapers Assistant aged 20,

William Alexander Draper aged 45 (from Auchinleck)

Mary Mitchell Alexander wife aged 43 (from Tarbolton)

Robert Alexander aged 19 assistant draper

Samuel Mitchell aged 29 Draper

James Warrener aged 71 Draper (from Pudsey)

Thomas Pagan aged 42 (from Scotland)

Jane his wife aged 37 (from Scotland)

William Morgan aged 45 Draper

William Rae aged 45 Draper (from Scotland)

Two years later Peter’s father died, and Peter, at the tender age of 12, continued to live with his aunt and uncle.

In the 1901 census, the McMillan sons are listed as being school age, but Peter Sloan, aged 20 is a civil engineer. His cousins would later be taken into the family business that seems to have gone from strength to strength. Peter chose a very different path.

By the time of the census in 1911, the only drapers on Brownlow St. are the McMillans.

The 1921 census refers to the McMillans as ‘credit drapers’. This means that they sold goods ‘on tick’, payment in installments with a premium added. Usually aimed at people in the poorer income bracket, some sales could make 100% profit for the draper. It was an early example of the credit card, and not universally approved of, being seen as temptation to the spendthrifts of the lower classes. The company was referred to as McMillan and Sons.

The term ‘Scotch Drapers’ refers to the travelling salesmen, who although in the early days had been predominantly Scots, they then evolved into drapery businesses employing travelling salesmen working on their own account, and from more diverse ethnic groups. The salesmen had to pay into the business, and act as tallymen, collecting dues from customers who bought goods ‘on tick’.

Peter Sloan however had received his education at the Liverpool Institute and served his apprenticeship with Messrs C. S. Wilson & Co of Regent Road, Bootle. He joined the White Star Line two weeks after the completion of his apprenticeship and served on various vessels both in the Atlantic and Mediterranean routes. He was shown serving as an electrician aboard the Cretic in October 1905, his ship prior to that being stated as the Celtic; at this time his address was listed as 103 Vine St. Liverpool.

Peter married Annie Blair, a Belfast girl, in August 1908 and they set up home together in 14 Newcastle Rd. Wavertree, Liverpool. Peter was a Marine Electrical Engineer by this time.

A year later  Peter had risen to the position of Chief Electrician. It must have been with great enthusiasm that he signed up for his next assignment in Southampton.

The ship he signed up to was HMS Titanic. 

In April 1912, Peter set sail from Southampton, leaving Annie in Liverpool. He was part of the crew that kept the ship’s lights and systems running.

When the Titanic hit the iceberg, electricians like Peter were among the heroes who stayed at their posts to keep the lights on so passengers could see to escape.

Peter Sloan’s body was never recovered, but his story became part of Titanic history — a reminder that sometimes the greatest legacies aren’t in money or business, but in courage.