Abram Combe

Abram Combe (15 January 1785 – 11 August 1827) was a British utopian socialist, an associate of Robert Owen and a major figure in the early co-operative movement, leading one of the earliest Owenite communities, at Orbiston, Scotland.

Combe was born in Edinburgh on 15 January 1785, son of George Combe, a brewer and strict Calvinist. He attended Edinburgh High School but, unlike his brothers George and Andrew, he preferred practical pursuits to academic ones and became apprenticed to a local tanner. After his apprenticeship Combe worked as a currier in London and Glasgow, before returning to Edinburgh in 1807 to set up his own tannery business. He married Agnes Dawson in 1812 and started a family.

Combe was a hard-working and successful businessman, motivated by self-interest but honourable in his dealings with others. He strongly believed that every man was responsible for his own character and was scathing in his criticism of anyone whose standards of behaviour differed from his own. Such criticisms were often expressed satirically in verse and prose.

In 1820, Combe met Robert Owen during a visit to his mill at New Lanark and was impressed by Owen's views on the formation of character, the defects in the principles and practices of society and the virtues of co-operation and universal benevolence. Following a period of reflection and study Combe radically altered his former views and habits. He ceased to be motivated by self-interest and where once he had criticised other people's weaknesses he now showed compassion. He even abandoned some of the social activities that he had previously enjoyed, such as eating meat, drinking alcohol and going to the theatre.

In 1821 Combe put his Owenism into practice by becoming a founder-member of the Edinburgh Practical Society, an Owenite group which opened its own co-operative store and founded its own school. Although the Society claimed 500 members, it fizzled out within a year. Combe then tried to set up a co-operative with his own employees at his tanyard, but this too was short-lived.

Combe continued to proselytise on Owen's behalf by writing pamphlets and books. These included Metaphorical Sketches of the Old and New Systems (1823), in which he satirically attacked the prevailing capitalist economic theories by comparing the British economy to a cistern, which was capable of supplying the wants of the entire nation until the guardians of the stopcock cut off supply. He also attempted to defend Owen's religious views. Owen had scandalised large sections of society by attacking all forms of organised religion and was widely believed to be an atheist and infidel. Combe went to great lengths to present Owen's ideas as prophetic truths, wholly consistent with the laws of nature, which, he argued, were the laws of God. He referred to these beliefs as “Divine Revelation”, which he explained as “the facts and truths which the Great Governing Power of the Universe reveals to the senses and understanding”.

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