Bridgewater Trust

Bridgewater Trust - wrongly indexed as Bridgwater Trust in some sources.

1803 After the death of the Duke of Bridgewater, the management of the Bridgewater Canal company was placed in the hands of three trustees. These were Sir Archibald Macdonald, who was Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, Edward Venables-Vernon-Harcourt, at the time the Bishop of Carlisle and later the Archbishop of York, and, as Superintendent, Robert Haldane Bradshaw, the Duke's agent. Bradshaw managed the estate, for which he received a salary of £2,000 a year and the use of the Duke's mansions at Worsley and Runcorn. The other two trustees had each married nieces of the Duke and were "dummy trustees".

During the time the canal was administered by the Bridgewater Trustees, it made a profit every year. Until his retirement in 1834, the administration was carried out entirely by Bradshaw. It has been calculated that the average annual profit between 1806 and 1826 was of the order of 13%, and in 1824, the best year, it was 23%.

1844 The Bridgewater Trustees bought the Mersey and Irwell Navigation Co.

1849 Single cylinder condensing beam engine at the Bridgewater Canal Warehouses at Preston Brook. Photographed by George Watkins in 1935. Drove hoists and wharf cranes by shafting.

1872 the Bridgewater Navigation Co acquired the canal in the names of Sir Edward William Watkin and William Philip Price, respectively chairmen of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway and the Midland Railway for £1,120,000.

• For further details of the Trust and the Canal see Bridgewater Canal

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