OBSCURE EAST LONDON GAS WORKS N0.3.
A demonstration of gas lighting took place in London in 1789. One
of the witnesses to it was Joseph Cotton. His son, William, was
to become the managing partner in a Limehouse rope works which
may have been the site of one of the earliest gas lighting plants
in London. His partner was Joseph Huddart who had patented a new
method of making rope. They had already purchased a steam engine
from the Birmingham partnership of Boulton and Watt, and it was
to them that they went for gas making plant sometime after 1807.
Plans for the plant at the Limehouse ropeworks were drawn up by
Boulton and Watt's gas equipment design team. The drawings, as
fresh as if they were prepared yesterday, have pencilled in
alterations which look like the result of working discussions.
Boulton and Watt's team sited the gas making plant alongside the
steam engine and boilers already supplied by them and perhaps
they saw the ensemble as one installation of power raising plant.
In the first set of drawings, dated 1809, 2 retorts and a
gasometer pit' are situated next to the boilers with the engine
at right angles beyond them. A wall was built between each part
of the installation. Between the retorts and the 'gasometer' is
a 'condenser' with pipes going to a 'tar pit' and a 'drain for
waste water' sited below the retort and alongside the 'ash hole'
for the boilers. There is also a 'rat trap'. Everything is
together in a building adjacent to the main works.
The gas making plant was apparently not installed in 1809; a note
of 21st June 1811 gives instructions: 'Huddart & Co. Desire their
Gazometer, Retorts, etc. to be sent as soon as possible'.
Detailed instructions and plans are included for the lighting
installations in the ropewalk and factory. For the rope walk
itself 'a pipe to join 2 cistern pipe and reserve 1 3/4 wrot
iron pipe, upright. 160 feet 1 3/4 inch pipe 2 [angles]. 6
burners to fit 1 3/4 pipe'. The run of pipework is shown going
from the 'gasometer', down the length of the ropewalk, with a
branch to a three storey building and 'cable warehouses' and
another to the 'cordage warehouses' and 'turners shop'. The
position of burners is marked throughout.
The fate of Huddart's gas making plant may not be known. I will
leave it to other GLIAS members to describe present circumstances
on the ropewalk site. For more about Huddart see: William Cotton,
A brief memoir of the late Captain Joseph Huddart FRS x x A & an
account of his inventions in the manufacture of cordage , School
Press, London, 1885; and William Huddart, Uncharted Waters ,
London, 1989. I would also be grateful for anyone who feels able
to interpret the drawings further for me with particular
reference to the steam engine!
FURTHER NOTE ON LAST MONTH GAS MAKING PLANT AT HAWES SOAP WORKS
I always seem to come across things after I have written them.
An obituary of George Russell of Longlands, Sidcup, dated May
1804 ( Gents. Mag. ) says that the Old Bargehouse Soap Works was
built by him. He sold it (presumably to Hawes) just before his
death.
Mary
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