Newsletter Newsletter of theBroseley Local History Society Incorporating the Wilkinson Society November 2004 New Members Chairman John Freeman The Society would like to welcome the following Secretary Dot Cox new members: Treasurer Steve Dewhirst Curator David Lake Ann Derry, Ironbridge Membership Janet Robinson Roger Edmundson, Shrewsbury Secretary 26 Coalport Road Graham Hamilton, Little Wenlock Broseley Sheila Hewish, Coalbrookdale TF12 5AZ Peter Jones, Broseley 01952 882495 Michael Pitchford, Bewdley Programme Secretary Neil Clarke Dorothy Rolfe, Bearsted, Kent and Journal Editor Newsletter Editor Jan Lancaster Society News Publicity Michael Pope Christmas Dinner CD archiving Vin Callcut Date: Wednesday, 1 December Website www.broseley.org.uk Venue: Lion Hotel, High Street, Broseley Email [email protected] Time: 7.30 for 8.00 pm Cost: £17.50 per head The Society’s Christmas dinner will be held at the Meetings Lion Hotel, High Street, Broseley on 1 December; Meetings of the Broseley Local History Society are the cost will be £17.50 per head. If you would like held on the first Wednesday of each month at 7.30 pm to attend, please complete the form on page 13, at the Broseley Social Club, High Street, unless indicating your choice of menu and return it, otherwise announced. Car parking is available at together with your cheque made payable to the back of the Club. Members are requested to be Broseley Local History Society, to Janet Robinson, seated by 7.30 pm to allow speakers a prompt start. 26 Coalport Road, Broseley, TF12 5AZ, by not later Visitors are welcome but are asked to give a than Saturday 27 November. donation towards Society funds. Benthall Book Launch The bookBenthall Edge, Five Historic Guided Programme Walks, published by the Severn Gorge Countryside 1 Dec Christmas dinner Trust, was finally launched in September when 5 Jan Ancient Bridleways in and around Society members were among some 70 people who Broseley, by Derek Pountney gathered at Benthall Hall for an evening walk down 2 Feb A tribute to Eustace Rogers, presentation to Patten’s Rock, before joining the less agile in by Ken Jones and Ron Miles front of a blazing fire in the Hall itself. 2 Mar John Wilkinson, Copper King?, by Vin The book, which was the result of the Society’s first Callcut joint venture, has been over a year in the making, For further information contact Neil Clarke on but the wider interest it occasioned has made it well 01952 504135. worth the wait. 1 hill rose out of the plain above Morecambe Bay and when the high spring tides rolled in they transformed the hill into an island. So when in later years John’s genius had made him the great and wealthy John Wilkinson, Ironmaster of Broseley, and he could build his dream house, Castlehead was the site he chose. When members Frank and Fev Dawson retired from teaching careers in Africa, they bought Castlehead and created a Field Studies Centre for school groups. Whilst in Broseley earlier this year to give An evening walk down to Patten’s Rock was followed by a the Annual Wilkinson Lecture, Frank cordially welcome glass of wine back at Benthall Hall invited other members to visit them, to be shown the house, have lunch in John’s dining room and climb the hill to the walled garden he built on the summit. The Society hopes to take advantage of this uniquely interesting opportunity with a visit in the summer of 2005. The tentative date is Saturday John Freeman, 2 July so, if you would like to be one of the party, Chairman of the Society, please contact David Lake on 01746 762813. left, with Ian Baker, Backbarrow furnace was where Isaac Wilkinson and Chairman of his son John lived for some years, developing skills the Severn in the working of what was for the time a major Gorge Countryside ironworks. Trust, at the Their house was Bare Syke, across the road from the launch of the bookBenthall now derelict blast furnace, and the Society is Edge, Five fortunate in that Bare Syke is now occupied and Historic under renovation by Robin Beadle, a friend of the Guided Walks Photographs courtesy of the SGCT Society. The idea of holding the launch at Benthall Hall also Members able to visit the Backbarrow site could brought other parties into the arena. Eve Madeley, well contact him in advance: Robin Beadle, Bare who is a member of the Society, is also the curator Syke, Backbarrow, Ulverston, Cumbria, LA12 8QF. of this National Trust property and together she and the SGCT put on an evening to be remembered. The New owner of the Lawns company was great, the food and wine even better At the September meeting John Freeman introduced and the venue superb, and both Eve and Pauline Mel Mars, a glass and ceramic designer who has just Levesley of the SGCT, in particular, are to be bought the Lawns, John Wilkinson’s former home congratulated on making this such a very special in Church Street. occasion. According to Mel the building is currently in a very Proposed visit to Castlehead poor condition and needs a considerable amount of David Lake was recently in Cumbria where he work. He does, however, have great plans for it and took the opportunity of visiting Castlehead and these include renovating the kitchen, which has the Backbarrow furnace. This is what he has to say largest cast iron range, with a complicated looking about his trip. spit driven by a chimney fan, in the county. When John Wilkinson was a teenager, working the Although he now works in glass only overseas, Mel Lindale furnace with his father, nearby Castlehead says he intends doing some ceramic work at the must have been a magical place for him. The great Lawns, and has plans to hold an open day next year 2 to introduce people to the making and decorating of Ivor Southorn then passed round some of his ceramics. extensive collection of Coalport china, while keeping the meeting amused with stories from some Ceramic Industries in the Broseley Area of the characters of the time. One was of a driver, The subject for this autumn’s Memories Evening Jackum, who could neither read nor write, but found wasCeramic Industries in the Broseley Area. This his way by asking for directions in each town. covered everything from drain pipes, through Once, when about to return from Soho in London, decorative floor and roof tiles to chinaware and he stopped a policeman to ask him how to get back tobacco pipes. While much of this industry is to Broseley. This time, however, his usual tactics already documented, there were many failed him for, as Jackum told it, “do you know, the recollections that evening which had not made the silly fool didn’t even know!” reference books. David Lake, for instance, recalled buying land drains in the mid 1960s from Benthall Potteries, one of the last clay industries to be working in the Broseley area. He had also taught the two sons of the owner, Edward and Richard Bennett, who claimed that it was their family who had developed a process for extruding hollow land drains and which had led to them taking over Benthall Potteries. Photograph courtesy of Roger Edmundson This company had originally made encaustic tiles, This loving cup, which has a view of Benthall Hall on one employing 40 people in 1938. The following year, side and Benthall Church on the other, is a unique example however, they changed to making sanitary ware of the work of Arty Hartshorne, head of design at Benthall Pottery in the early 1900s before moving to the production of land drains. The works finally closed in the late 1970s when Lena Evans’ daughter remembered her mother plastic drains took over the market. working at the Benthall Potteries putting spouts on teapots, while Vera Francis said she had a small Broseley is, of course, famous for its encaustic bowl made of red clay with a high black glaze, floor tiles and Eve Madeley, curator of the known as Jackfield Ware. In the 18th century there National Trust property Benthall Hall, said that had been three kilns below Jackfield church all they had a good collection of these, in particular on making such ware. The making of this type of china the floor of the entrance hall which had been used became so widespread that the term Jackfield Ware by the Maw brothers as a showpiece. Neda eventually became a generic name. Meyrick remarked that when visiting her native Denmark with her grandchild, they had gone into a Another industry which grew up in Broseley was church near Copenhagen and had been delighted to the manufacture of clay tobacco pipes. Broseley find Broseley tiles on the floor. pipes became famous all over the world and by 1890 the Southorn factory was employing 90 David also commented on the increasing interest in people. The pipes were made in a variety of Caughley china and Roger Edmundson, author of shapes and sizes, the churchwarden probably Benthall Pottery, Shropshire and its Salopian Art being the most well known. Pottery,* said that although the Caughley works A variation on this, a pipe 216 inches long and were mainly known for their blue and white printed coiled like a spring, made by Ivor Southorn’s father, chinaware, research now showed that it had been came to the attention of King Farouk of Egypt, who made in a number of different colours. The main immediately decided he had to have one. By the problem had been in identifying what was actually time this was made and packed ready for shipping, Caughley china, as it was easy to confuse it with however, King Farouk had been ousted in a coup such other wares as chinese and spode.