Heslop, Milward and Co
of Lowca Foundry, later the Lowca Engine Works
Iron Founders
1794 Heslop and Milward built an engine at Seaton Iron Works (Workington), for the Kells Pit[1]
1800 Brothers Adam Heslop, Thomas Heslop and Crosby Heslop, formerly associated with the ironworks at Seaton near Workington established an iron foundry and engineering business on the seashore by the mouth of the Lowca Beck.
The impetus for the business was probably the success of the double-acting steam engine mechanism Adam had invented while working in Shropshire in 1790, and there was no shortage of finance, hence the company title Heslops, Milward, Johnston and Co. The 'Heslop' atmospheric engine became well known in the north of England. The design evaded the patent of James Watt for a separate condenser by the use of two cylinders, one of which condensed the steam from the other.
1829 Thomas Milward of Heslop, Milward and Co.[2]
The three brothers were all dead by the mid-1830s so the investors sold up, and the works was taken over by local iron mining partnership Tulk and Ley which began a long tradition of locomotive manufacture.
1840s Built railway locomotives for the Maryport and Carlisle Railway[3]
1857 The company was sold again, to Fletcher, Jennings and Co