A HISTORY OF SURREY 



Kingc in the ward of Bridge-Without in 

 1582 or 1583.' These latter had both re- 

 ceived letters of denization. Another alien 

 was perhaps Olyf Burr of Southwark, copper- 

 smith, who petitioned the Council on 11 

 August 1579 that, in consideration of cer- 

 uin losses he had sufiFered, his shipping might 

 be employed by the Company of Merchants 

 trading to Spain in preference to any other. 



A copper mill is marked on the map issued 

 with Aubrey's Natural History and Anti- 

 quities of Surrey, published in 171 9, at Mer- 

 ton Abbey on the Wandle. This is prob- 

 ably the copper mill at the north-east corner 

 of the abbey premises which is said in 1792 

 to have been long established there.' At the 

 latter date it was occupied by Mr. Thoytts, 

 but in 181 1 had passed into the hands of 

 Messrs. Morgan.* Other copper mills on 

 the Wandle were in Wimbledon, but at a 

 considerable distance from the village. They 

 were owned in 1792 by Messrs. Henckell" 

 and in 181 1 by Mr. Benjamin Paterson.* 



Although the native ore of the county has 

 long since ceased to be worked, the business 

 of iron founding has been carried on at vari- 

 ous places, chiefly in the neighbourhood of 

 the capital, for some considerable time. The 

 iron plate mill at Wimbledon, which is men- 

 tioned in 1649, and an iron mill which 

 appears to have existed at Byfleet at the be- 

 ginning of the eighteenth century, have 

 already been noticed in the account of the 

 extinct iron works of the county, though 

 they belong more properly to the category of 

 works dealt with here. 



Several iron foundries must have existed in 

 Southwark during the eighteenth century, 

 and both here and in Lambeth there were 

 numerous works for the manufacture of iron 

 goods and machinery at the beginning of the 

 nineteenth. The iron railings for St. Paul's 

 Cathedral are said to have been finished at 

 the Falcon foundry just within the north- 

 western boundary of St. Saviour's parish after 

 having been cast at Lamberhurst in Sussex.' 

 An iron foundry in the same parish is noted 

 as one of the ' things observable ' there in 

 1756.* Mr. Bradley's iron foundry next to 

 the house called the Unicorn described by Stow 

 is mentioned in St. Saviour's in 1814.^ In 



1 Kirk, Returns of Aliens, etc. il. 294. 



' S. P. Dom. Eliz. cxxxi. 61. 



' Lysons, Environs of London (ed. 1), i. 345. 



« Ibid. (ed. 2), i. 250. 



s Ibid. (ed. i), i. 539. 



' Ibid. (ed. 2), i. 404. 



' Surr. Arch. Coll. xvi. 99. 



8 Maitland, Hist, and Survey of London, ii. i 391. 



» Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. iii. 590. 



1783 John Bradly(«V) of Bankside in South- 

 wark, founder, took out a patent for ' his new 

 invented forge back, the iron and frame on a 

 new construction for conveying wind by the 

 blast of bellows or otherwise,'" and in 1807 a 

 patent was taken out by James Bradly, an 

 iron founder of Maid Lane, Southwark, for 

 an iron bar to be used in fire-places, the 

 principle of his invention consisting in making 

 the bars hollow so as to allow the air a free 

 passage through." 



To conclude our notices of those works in 

 Surrey which were early in the nineteenth 

 century more particularly devoted to iron 

 founding, we may mention the two, Mr. 

 Joseph's and Messrs. Weale & Co.'s, in 

 existence at Lambeth in 1811.'^ At the 

 same date there were in Rotherhithe the 

 extensive ironworks of Messrs. Gardner, 

 Howard & Co., which were chiefly devoted 

 to the manufecture of iron bolts out of old 

 scrap iron ; " and in Wandsworth were Mr. 

 Henckell's iron mills,'* which had been there 

 at least as early as 1792.'" Writing of these 

 latter in 1808 Dr. Hughson says : — 



Here are cast shot, shells, cannon, and other 

 implements of war ; in another part the wrought 

 iron is manufactured, and the great effect of 

 mechanic power is exemplified in all their opera- 

 tions — in the splitting of iron bars of prodigious 

 lengths, in a pair of shears which will cut asunder 

 pieces of iron more than two inches in thickness, 

 and in the working of a hammer which weighs 

 from five hundred and a half to six hundred 

 pounds ; the timbers employed are of an enormous 

 size, and the wonderful powers of all the elements 

 are here made subservient in the production of 

 various tools and implements necessary for man in 

 the arts of war and peace.i' 



Though the mills have long since dis- 

 appeared their memory is still kept alive in 

 the name of Ironmill Road at Wandsworth. 



Iron foundries have continued to the pre- 

 sent day to form one of the staple industries 

 in the north of the county between Bermond- 

 sey on the east and Nine Elms on the west. 

 The number of firms engaged in this indus- 

 try and established in this district is very con- 

 siderable, but many of them have works in 

 the midlands and more northern parts of the 

 country, where the casting of the larger 

 classes of goods is more generally done. 



'" Pat. of Invention, No. 1362. 

 •1 Ibid. No. 3061. 



" Lysons, Environs of London (ed. 2), i. 229. 

 " Ibid. (ed. 2), i. 354. 

 '• Ibid. i. 379. 

 " Ibid. (ed. i), i. 503. 



" Quoted by C. T. Davis, Industries of Wands- 

 worth, 24. 



414 



