Thomas Taylor & Sons was founded in c.1727. In 1755 Edward Taylor began his business as a linen manufacturer and merchant in Shambles Street. His son Thomas Taylor continued the firm and opened the Peel Street Mill in 1845. By 1870 it was reputed to be the largest of its kind in the country. Taylor's also owned weavers cottages on Taylor's Row and bough a bleaching works at Swithen. The firm relocated to Ireland in around 1939. (SMR PIN 3550). Most of the buildings associated with the mill had been demolished by the 1970s and replaced by a Dunnes store and Peel Street Arcade. Prior to the development of the textile mills this was part of the historic settlement of Barnsley as shown on the 1777 enclosure map. This would have been part of the medieval settlement which transferred to this location from Old Town in the 12th or 13th century (Elliot 2002, 27). There is fragmentary legibility of the earlier street layout.