The Adventures of a Piecener

A child or young person employed in a spinning-mill to keep the frames filled with rovings, and to join together the ends of threads which break while being spun or wound (OED).

“The children whose duty it is to walk backwards and forwards before the reels, on which the cotton, silk, or worsted is wound, for the purpose of joining the threads when they break, are called piecers or pieceners.”

Frances Trollope, The Life and Adventures of Michael Armstrong, factory boy (1839).