Ickok - Keep up the good work in saving what you can on the Butterley site, it really is a very important industrial archaeology site. It was lucky you happened to be driving past the site at the start of demolition and managed to contact Derbyshire County Council and Amber Valley District Council as you did, who I hope are going to keep an eye on what is happening. Too many people watch demolition (often without planning consent) of important industrial archaeology sites, sit back and do nothing, and then complain afterwards when it is too late. More people need to object when planning applications are applied for (that is if they are) or if they see activity on dormant sites. It only needs one or two people to set the ball in motion for what is happening to be investigated, one doesn't have to belong to a protest group.
Below is a quote from "Industrial Archaeology of Derbyshire" by Frank Nixon published 1969 by David & Charles, Newton Abbot: pp. 59-60.
"In 1829 the coke smelting process was improved greatly by Neilson's invention of the hot-blast. The Butterley Company was quick to adopt this, as shown by a letter of 18 June 1835 from Mr. Joseph Glynn to the editor of the "Mechanics Magazine" - 'The Butterley Company employ in their mines, coal fields, blast-furnances, rolling mills, forges, boring-mills, and steam engine manufactory, 35 steam-engines of all sizes, from 80 inches diameter of cylinder, and have six blast-furnaces, of which four are now in work. The whole of these furnaces are blown with heated air....' According to Ure, hot blast increased the output of each furnace from 29 tons per week to 49 tons per week and required less than half as much coal per ton. In 1966 a bank of ruins of these furnaces still stood alongside the recently demolished Codnor Park puddling and rolling mills. They must have been an imposing sight, as the furnaces proper surmouted the present embankment by another 40 ft or so.
An impetus had been given to the production of iron by Henry Cort's invention, in 1783-4, of a method of producing wrought iron direct from cast iron by puddling and rolling. (n.b. I live just a stone's throw away from Henry Cort's iron mill at Tichfield, Hampshire, where he invented this process - unfortunately Hampshire County Council and Fareham Urban District Council don't publicise Henry Cort and this important site very well at all). The Codnor Park works of Butterley, established in 1807-11, became an important supplier of wrought iron, and continued in this field until June 1965. Latterly it produced rod for anchor chains for floating harbours, ships, and lightships, the corrosion resistance of high-quality wrought iron having an advantage over steel. Fortunately it was possible in 1964 to take a colour film of the whole process; this is now in the possession of the Industrial Museum, Birmingham.
As the puddling process depends upon manual effort, it is not normally possible to produce a bloom of more than about 100 lb weight. In 1861 Sir John Alleyne of the Butterley Company invented an improved means of handling plate and bar through the rolls, and in 1862 he invented a method of forge-welding together a number of billets. The Derby Red Book of 1863 reported that Butterley was rolling 'the largest masses of iron yet made'. These included the beam for a pumping engine for the Clay Cross Company, comprising two slabs each 34 ft long x 7 ft in the middle, 3 ft 6 in(ches) at the ends, 2 and a quarter inches thick, and weighing about 7 tons. Alleyne's technique made possible the erection of ambitious structures, the most impressive of which is the roof of St. Pancras station. This has a free span of 240 ft, which at the time of its erection, 1867, was the largest in the world. The iron girders were made by riveting sections together; a visual estimate of size of the biggest members suggests that they weigh about 700 lb, and before trimming probably nearly half a ton. On some of them can be seen what may be indications of the weld line. And where the black/brown paint is chipped can be seen traces of the sky-blue paint which must have made the station a striking sight when the roof was first erected. The total weight of ironwork in the St. Pancras roof is 6,894 tons, and the roof covers an area of 4 and a half acres.
In 1827, the Butterley Company was employing nearly 1,500 men. This whole period is characterised by the energy shown in the enterprises. For example, in 1862 Barrow of Staveley produced 400 tons of girders in three months for the London Exhibition Building of that year. Consequently, with Bessemer's invention of his converter for steel-making, in 1856, cheap steel and large rolled-steel sections became available, and the use of wrought iron declined rapidly."
p.s. Are you by chance turning into a Yogurt Knitter! :devil: