Jarrow Chemical Co
Jarrow Chemical Company, chemical manufacturers of Jarrow-on-Tyne
1822/3 Isaac Cookson, a glass maker, founded a small alkali works in the centre of South Shields, moving shortly afterwards to Templetown near Jarrow Slake.
1835 For a short time from 1835 Cooksons also operated another alkali works at nearby Westoe.
1843 James Stevenson senior moved from Glasgow to South Shields as senior partner of the Jarrow Chemical Company, alkali manufacturers.
1843 Such was the damage caused by smoke and effluent gases that a series of prosecutions led to the closure of the Templetown works, then known as the Jarrow Alkali Works.
1844 The works were acquired and reopened by the Jarrow Chemical Co., formed by James Stevenson senior (d. 1866) and John Tennant of Glasgow, William Stevenson of London, and John C. Williamson of Hull. The Tennant family, alkali manufacturers, put up one sixth of the original £36,000 capital for the Jarrow Chemical Company and were involved in other combined ventures. The Tennants set up their own alkali works at Hebburn-on-Tyne in 1863.
The new owners effected rapid improvements and within a few years were manufacturing Epsom salts, bleaching powder, and copper sulphate, as well as the usual products of the Leblanc alkali process.
Revolving ball furnaces, invented by Messrs. Elliott and Russell, of St. Helen's, were used in the Jarrow Chemical Works[1] added to the efficiency of the works.
1854 After the retirement of James Stevenson, the business was managed by his son James Cochran Stevenson (1825-1905) together with John Williamson (c.1822-87), the son of John C. Williamson.
1854 His son, James Cochran Stevenson, took his father's place in the management of the company.
1855 Williamson and Stevenson patented a revolving kiln to improve the efficiency of the production process.
Within a few years it was the second largest chemical company in Britain (after Tennant's St Rollox works). With Tennants, the Jarrow Chemical Company developed brine deposits on Teesside for salt and were also involved with the Tharsis Sulphur and Copper Co, set up to mine pyrites in Spain to supply sulphur.
1858 the firm acquired the Friars Goose Chemical Works, Gateshead
1859 Partnership change. '... the Partnership theretofore subsisting between the undersigned, James Stevenson, James Cochran Stevenson, John Tennant, Charles James Tennant, William Stevenson, Henry Vittoria Rudd, John Cowie Williamson, and John Williamson, together with the late Charles Tennant Dunlop up to the day of his death, as Manufacturing Chemists, at the Jarrow and Friars Goose Chemical Works, both in the county of Durham, under the style or firm of the Jarrow Chemical Company, was, on the 31st day of July, 1858, dissolved, so far as regards the undersigned Charles James Tennant, who retired therefrom on that day. And notice is also hereby given, that the personal representatives of the said Charles Tennant Dunlop, who died on the 6th day of August, 1857, ceased to have any interest in the said firm on the day of his death...'[2]
1858-1868 The company also owned the Willington Quay Copper Works
By the 1870s the Jarrow Chemical Company employed 1400 men.
1885 Jarrow Chemical Company Limited registered 1 July 1885 to take over the Jarrow Chemical Company; it was owned by various members of the Stevenson family, J Williamson and Sir C Tennant.[3]
1889 On 3 Jan new plant was commissioned at Friar's Goose for the recovery of sulphur from waste using technology patented by A M Chance. This calcium sulphide waste stream was one of the major inefficiencies of the Leblanc process.[4]
1890 On 3 Jan, the directors announced their intention to gradually close their Tyne Dock Alkali Works at Jarrow.[5] As a result of competition from Brunner Mond, using the much more efficient Solvay process, Leblanc process operators could only remain profitable by making and selling bleaching powder, something this company did at Frier's Goose, but not Jarrow. The directors had judged that it was preferable to close the works than make the major investment needed to produce bleaching powder at Jarrow. Some operations continued into 1892, but the works was demolished in 1893 and the site sold to the North Eastern Railway.
1890 On 1 Nov the Leblanc process operators merged their interests into the United Alkali Co to rationalize production. Stevenson, who had been very active in the merger negotiations, became a vice-chairman.
The Friar's Goose works, Gateshead, continued to operate for some 40 years, and, along with the former Alhusen Works at Hebburn, became part of Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) when it was formed in 1926 by the merger of Brunner Mond, United Alkali and others. Friar's Goose works closed in the early 1930s, but an exact date has not come to hand. The site was cleared and ready for redevelopment by 1935.
See Also
Sources of Information
- Biography of James Cochran Stevenson, ODNB [1]
- Archives of the British chemical industry, 1750-1914: a handlist. By Peter J. T. Morris and Colin A. Russell. Edited by John Graham Smith. 1988.