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INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY
Iron Workers and Tool Makers
by Samuel Smiles
(This etext was produced from a reprint of the 1863 first edition)
PREFACE.
The Author offers the following book as a continuation, in a more
generally accessible form, of the Series of Memoirs of Industrial Men
introduced in his Lives of the Engineers. While preparing that work he
frequently came across the tracks of celebrated inventors, mechanics,
and iron-workers--the founders, in a great measure, of the modern
industry of Britain--whose labours seemed to him well worthy of being
traced out and placed on record, and the more so as their lives
presented many points of curious and original interest. Having been
encouraged to prosecute the subject by offers of assistance from some
of the most eminent living mechanical engineers, he is now enabled to
present the following further series of memoirs to the public.
Without exaggerating the importance of this class of biography, it may
at least be averred that it has not yet received its due share of
attention. While commemorating the labours and honouring the names of
those who have striven to elevate man above the material and
mechanical, the labours of the important industrial class to whom
society owes so much of its comfort and well-being are also entitled to
consideration. Without derogating from the biographic claims of those
who minister to intellect and taste, those who minister to utility need
not be overlooked. When a Frenchman was praising to Sir John Sinclair
the artist who invented ruffles, the Baronet shrewdly remarked that
some merit was also due to the man who added the shirt.
A distinguished living mechanic thus expresses himself to the Author on
this point:--"Kings, warriors, and statesmen have heretofore
monopolized not only the pages of history, but almost those of
biography. Surely some niche ought to be found for the Mechanic,
without whose skill and labour society, as it is, could not exist. I
do not begrudge destructive heroes their fame, but the constructive
ones ought not to be forgotten; and there IS a heroism of skill and
toil belonging to the latter class, worthy of as grateful record,--less
perilous and romantic, it may be, than that of the other, but not less
full of the results of human energy, bravery, and character. The lot
of labour is indeed often a dull one; and it is doing a public service
to endeavour to lighten it up by records of the struggles and triumphs
of our more illustrious workers, and the results of their labours in
the cause of human advancement."
As respects the preparation of the following memoirs, the Author's
principal task has consisted in selecting and arranging the materials
so liberally placed at his disposal by gentlemen for the most part
personally acquainted with the subjects of them, and but for whose
assistance the book could not have been written. The materials for the
biography of Henry Maudslay, for instance, have been partly supplied by
the late Mr. Joshua Field, F.R.S. (his partner), but principally by Mr.
James Nasmyth, C.E., his distinguished pupil. In like manner Mr. John
Penn, C.E., has supplied the chief materials for the memoir of Joseph
Clement, assisted by Mr. Wilkinson, Clement's nephew. The Author has
also had the valuable assistance of Mr. William Fairbairn, F.R.S., Mr.
J. O. March, tool manufacturer (Mayor of Leeds), Mr. Richard Roberts,
C.E., Mr. Henry Maudslay, C.E., and Mr. J. Kitson, Jun., iron
manufacturer, Leeds, in the preparation of the other memoirs of
mechanical engineers included in this volume.
The materials for the memoirs of the early iron-workers have in like
manner been obtained for the most part from original sources; those of
the Darbys and Reynoldses from Mr. Dickinson of Coalbrookdale, Mr.
William Reynolds of Coed-du, and Mr. William G. Norris of the former
place, as well as from Mr. Anstice of Madeley Wood, who has kindly
supplied the original records of the firm. The substance of the
biography of Benjamin Huntsman, the inventor of cast-steel, has been
furnished by his lineal representatives; and the facts embodied in the
memoirs of Henry Cort and David Mushet have been supplied by the sons
of those inventors. To Mr. Anderson Kirkwood of Glasgow the Author is
indebted for the memoir of James Beaumont Neilson, inventor of the hot
blast; and to Mr. Ralph Moore, Inspector of Mines in Scotland, for
various information relative to the progress of the Scotch iron
manufacture.
The memoirs of Dud Dudley and Andrew Yarranton are almost the only ones
of the series in preparing which material assistance has been derived
from books; but these have been largely illustrated by facts contained
in original documents preserved in the State Paper Office, the careful
examination of which has been conducted by Mr. W. Walker Wilkins.
It will thus be observed that most of the information embodied in this
volume, more especially that relating to the inventors of tools and
machines, has heretofore existed only in the memories of the eminent
mechanical engineers from whom it has been collected. The estimable
Joshua Field has died since the date at which he communicated his
recollections; and in a few more years many of the facts which have
been caught and are here placed on record would, probably, in the
ordinary course of things, have passed into oblivion. As it is, the
Author feels that there are many gaps yet to be filled up; but the
field of Industrial Biography is a wide one, and is open to all who
will labour in it.
London, October, 1863.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
IRON AND CIVILIZATION.
The South Sea Islanders and iron
Uses of iron for tools
The Stone, Bronze, and Iron ages
Recent discoveries in the beds of the Swiss lakes
Iron the last metal to come into general use, and why
The first iron smelters
Early history of iron in Britain
The Romans
Social importance of the Smith in early times
Enchanted swords
Early scarcity of iron in Scotland
Andrea de Ferrara
Scarcity of iron in England at the time of the Armada
Importance of iron for national defence