HADEN
- the -
Victorian Family and Firm in Trowbridge |
A
potted history about this family of famous engineers
during their lifetime in Trowbridge Wiltshire, Each of
the four generations either starting or ending their
lives in the Victorian era. Spanning nearly 130 years
from 1816 to 1945. Each generation being instrumental in
pioneering advancements in the science of heating and
ventilating. |
INTRODUCTION
What makes
researching the history of the Haden family and
engineering firm so remarkable and enjoyable, is
the fact that an Archive of Haden information is
held at the Wiltshire History Centre in
Chippenham. This archive is dedicated to Haden's
and contains a treasure chest full of historical
dates, documents, order books, drawings, newspaper
articles, pictures and letters.
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Many books,
magazine and newspaper articles have been
written about the Haden
brothers beginnings in Trowbridge and
their lives working in the County of Wiltshire
on the erection of Steam Engines and the
repair and maintenance of machinery for the
local Woollen Mills.
This short
history attempts to draw together various
documents, letters, articles and photographs
which relate in particular to the four
generations of the family who became trusted
and respected members of the local
community, and to give an insight into their
achievements. Showing how
George and James and their descendants
progressed, by building up a successful
Heating & Ventilating firm from the
early 1800’s, and
later adding its own iron foundry. The firm
expanded during
the 1900’s into a
national company with a network of
branch offices throughout the United
Kingdom.
The family
were deeply religious with a Congregational
non-conformist
denominational
background, who were at the heart of the
Tabernacle Church activities throughout
their entire lives. Most members of the
family at some time were Teachers
at the Sunday School and also progressed to
become Deacons and Superintendents.
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This
family history begins with George Haden snr who
worked at the famous Birmingham Soho Manufactory
of Boulton and Watt
at the end of the 18th century. |
George Haden
(1788 - 1856) was
apprenticed at the age of 15 for a period of
5 years to the firm of Boulton and Watt at
their Soho Birmingham
Manufactory as an Engineer, working on the
erection of steam engines. From around the
age of 22 years (1809) he was sent out on
the road as a travelling agent / engineer by
the firm assembling, erecting and
commissioning steam engines manufactured by
the firm at the Soho works.
His
work took him first to the North of
England. His first job
according to the list of engine
erectors (beginning in January 1808)
was circa December 1809, for Birley
& Hornby in Manchester.
He
then
spent several years in Scotland
carrying out the erection of many
steam engine installations for the
firm. After living away from his
home in lodging houses for so long
and missing the close family ties
of his Father and siblings he
became disenchanted. His many
letters written to his family read
how he became more disgruntled
with his way of life and his
earnings and must have made these
feelings well known to his
employers.
So
in 1814 Messrs Boulton and Watt sent
George southwards to the West of
England where there was an ever
increasing demand for steam engines
needed to power the machinery in the
woollen mills being built
in the counties of Somersetshire,
Wiltshire and Gloucestershire. The
woollen firm of J&T Clark had
decided they needed to have a steam
engine to power their Trowbridge
Mill so this became the
first engine George had to erect. He was
much taken with the
town and in a letter to his
father dated March 1815 said,
“In the first place allow me to inform you that I scarcely ever saw such a place for business, the town is but small it should contain 6000 inhabitants but I really believe there are 10000 in it at this time”. There was so much work to be had around the area that it wasn’t long before he was joined by his new wife Ann Nelson (whom he had recently married in Harborne Staffs ) and later by his brother James Haden and set up home in Trowbridge. Their work thrived during the period 1815 to 1820 and their reputation for quality of work is shown by the local business men being prepared to support them financially as given in an extract of a letter written to his father in 1815. “Several Gentlemen in this town have offered to subscribe together so as to allow me £50 a year to take care of their engines, and as my time would not be half employed in this occupation I should have the opportunity to transact other business, I think to my advantage”. In the first of his surviving letters
written to his
father in 1810
he mentions AN
and in
every
subsequent
letter he asks
to be
remembered to
Ann and her
family so it
is no surprise
when he
marries Ann
Nelson on the
1st May1816 at
the Parish
Church of St
Peter's in
Harborne
Staffs. The
wedding must
have been a
great occasion
as the Wedding
certificate is
signed by no
less than
seven members
from both
families.
Ann soon joins
him in
Trowbridge in
1816 and
together they
set up house.
In 1817 Ann and George had their first
child who they
named George
Nelson Haden.
The brothers quickly started to expand their activities to include millwrighting work repairing and maintaining the machinery of the Woollen Mills. They were so busy that they wrote in letters to their Father of the long working hours needed and also while others were able to have Christmas holidays. “engineers were still required to work” Tragedy
struck
George in
August 1819
when his
beloved wife
Ann died
suddenly only
five days
after giving
birth to their
second child
who was named
Benjamin. The
infant child
also died
quickly just
five days
after his
mother.
Young George Nelson was only two years old when his mother died and was then looked after and cared for by George’s two older sisters Mary and Sarah, with Sarah carrying by far the largest share of his upbringing. His appreciation of her efforts was to show in later years. Little is known about why and how the two brothers came to be interested in the erection of warm air stoves and when their working priorities changed towards the Heating & Ventilating side of their business. From the family letters we first note mention of heating stoves by James in October 1816 when writing to George from Matthew Boulton’s house in Great Tew Oxfordshire. Whether the brothers were making their own stoves at this time or erecting another firms stove is unknown. However, we know that George and James started their firm of G & J Haden in 1816 and stoves manufactured in their Trowbridge works commence from around 1819 as shown in the firm’s order books. We may be given a clue from a note held in the Boulton & Watt Soho Archive which says, On 10 Feb. 1830 Creighton wrote to Brown “Mr. Hardwick should by all means apply to G. & J. Haden Trowbridge, who have done much in heating about London, and with great satisfaction. BW&Co. have several years ago ceased to prepare stoves, and in their favour.” This comment could suggest that George and
James were
using
BW&Co.
designs
originally but
when
BW&Co. no
longer became
interested in
making stoves
G&J may
have taken
over the old
stove patterns and improved them to develop their own range of warm air
stoves.
Every stove
made by
G&J Haden
was given an
unique number
and the first
order book
lists stove No
1 to a Mr
Bythesea of
Trowbridge.
Stoves
Nos. 2 -
6 were erected
for the Earl
of Pembroke at
Wilton House
Wiltshire.
Times
were good for George and
James as the order books
show that between 1820 and
1855 around 1500
warm air stoves were
made and erected. The
census of 1851 records the
firm employing 83 men at
St George’s Works in
Silver Street Trowbridge.George and James carried out the erection of a large number of warm air stove installations in Mansions, Churches, Banks, Colleges and public buildings under the name of G&J Haden, which can be seen in their impressive lists of contracts (of unknown date, possibly 1840's) which was prepared hopefully to influence future clients. Note: in the list of contracts the reference to Mr Creighton of Soho House Birmingham, who wrote the letter to Mr Brown commenting on the great satisfaction with G&J Haden. |
George Haden was a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers for twenty-two years, having joined in 1834 as member No 314. His certificate of membership being signed by the presiding chairman Thomas Telford. He always took a lively interest in the proceedings, but his constant residence in the country prevented his frequent attendance at the meetings. |
The List of His
Patents
Number
5773 2nd March
1829
Machinery for dressing cloths
Number 6561 24th February 1834 Machinery applicable to the manufacture of wollen-cloths Number 7927 8th October 1842 Manufacturing Soap for compostion for the felting and other processes employed in the manufacturer of wollen-cloth Number 9259 15th February 1842 Apparatus for warming and ventilating buildings |
When
George
Haden died in 1856 the tributes in the
obituaries speak for themselves showing the
respect and esteem in which he was held by the
local community, the industry and his
professional Institution.
The
following extract from the
obituary memoir written by the
secretary Sir
Charles Manby and printed by the
ICE in 1856, gives a word picture
of his lifetime of
dedication to
his work and other duties.
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“He received his education
in Handsworth near |
The local Advertiser, in alluding to his death says: “ In the decease of Mr Haden, Science has lost an able engineer, society a useful member, and the poor a generous man and sympathising friend. Independently of the benefits he afforded the town from the number of men he employed, and the productions of skill he sent all over the globe, he was always ready to lend a helping hand to any good work. He was religious without sectarian bigotry – liberal without ostentation.” |
At a special meeting of
the Committee of the Mechanics Institution the
following resolution was passed:
“that the Committee of the
Trowbridge Mechanics Institution (on behalf of
themselves and the other members of the
Institution ) have heard with deep regret of the
death of Mr George Haden, their late
President, benefactor, and friend and
expressing
their |
James
Haden
1790 -
1871 being
a bachelor he
was able to be
the partner in the firm who travelled the
country
erecting,
supervising
and taking
orders for the installation of warm air
heating &
ventilating
stoves and expanding the firms business. His
travels took
him the
length
and breadth of
the British
Isles and his
notebook shows
visits to
counties as
far apart as
Kent and
Invernesshire.
James after completing his apprenticeship in 1811 worked in the Soho Manufactory of Boulton and Watt. We know from letters to his brother George that in 1816 he was working at the home of Matthew Boulton in Great Tew Oxfordshire erecting a warm air stove. Another letter in June 1816 comments on several stoves that he is erecting in Oxfordshire when he says, "I
have asked Mr
Boulton to
allow me to
put up warm
air stoves
about here and
he has given
leave
providing it
does not delay
his work . I
have one under
hand now about
four miles".
James is still in Great Tew in December 1817 carrying out estate work for Matthew Boulton repairing farm machinery. From his letters we can see that James is always seeking advice from his brother on many matters including finances, work and employment prospects. In 1821 an example of him seeking the advice of his brother occurs when he is offered employment with the East India Company at their Calcutta Mint. Matthew Boulton writes to James stating, The Directors of the Honourable East India Company having fixed the appointment of the parties to be employed in the erection and management of the machinery of the Calcutta Mint have authorised me to state that the foreman machinist will have a salary of £400 per annum and his passage provided at the expense of the Company. As James did not take up this
appointment we
may assume
that his
brother George
did not
recommend its
acceptance.
One of James notebooks has survived, which covers the years 1829 - 1832. It gives an interesting insight into his travels and varied engineering interests. This notebook accompanied him on his various site visits to take details about the buildings he was to survey. the notebook has a strange mixture of information in it ranging from firstly, quite detailed dimensioned survey sketches that he drew, complete with the calculations necessary to establish the size and number of warm air stoves required to heat the premises. Other pages give various scientific technical notes on,
He copied out in detail in his notebook a letter written to the The Times newspaper in November 1841 which gave numerous examples of fires and damage caused to various buildings by 1) Dr Arnotts heating stoves, 2) Perkins HPHW heating systems and 3) over-heating chimney flues. No doubt James used this information when in discussions with prospective clients, to explain and extol the benefits of using a Haden warm air stove. James Haden remained a batchelor, and apart from his business travelling for the firm, lived the majority of his adult life in Trowbridge. He decided to retire in 1855 at the age of 65 staying in Trowbridge for his retirement. The census of 1861 and 1871 shows him living at Homefield, Polebarn Road. James died in 1871 at 81 years of age. |
The
firm expanded and flourished under Nelson Haden's
control with Branch Offices opening in London,
Manchester and Birmingham.
In 1874 Haden's opened their own iron foundry named St Georges Foundry sited in Bythesea Road Trowbridge. Nelson Haden went into partnership with John Woodfin the husband of Sarah Woodfin. Sarah was Nelson's aunt who had brought up the young Nelson from the age of 2 years after his own mother died in 1819. All three of his sons, Joseph Poyton from his first marriage, together with William Nelson and Charles Ingham from his second marriage joined and were apprenticed to the family firm. As
Nelson Haden and his father George worked together
there was never a need for correspondence to pass
between them. Nelson Haden greatly revered his father.
In one of the few letters that were written by him to
his father, this one on the occasion of his 36th
birthday, when he is away working in Taunton he says,
....... I would first name the uniform kindness of a tender Father, to whom judicious training I owe (under God) my present comfortable position. My prayer is that any future life may exhibit in all my actions that gratitude to you my Dear Father for all you have done for me. May our heavenly Father long spare your valuable life ......... Another example of his
affection for his father is the dedication of a
stained glass window to his Father's memory in the
Tabernacle Church. The inscription reads,
To George Haden
died October 29th 1856
by his son George Nelson Haden |
On
the 3rd January 1892 in Trowbridge he
died of Influenza aged
73 years in. His wife Emma survived him and
lived until 1901 when she died at the age of
73 years on 9th June.
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William
was also an active member of the local community
and involved with many public duties for the
County and Town serving on their committees as,
The opening took place on the 22nd July and the first band to perform that evening was the band of HM Royal Artillery Portsmouth. At that time it was said to be one of the finest bandstands in the West Country. |
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When
the firm was incorporated in 1919 he became joint
Managing Director of the firm and took charge of
the contracting branch of the company. He became
Chairman of the company in 1933 upon the
retirement of his brother, a post he then held
until his own retirement in 1938.
Charles was an active member of the Institution of Heating and Ventilating Engineers being elected a member in September 1902, and being made President in February 1910. He gave as his presidential address "Ventilation of Schools". Charles was also an active member of the local community and involved with several public duties for the County and Town serving on their committees as,
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An extract from
the Wiltshire Times summarizes the significant
and important contribution the
Haden firm and family made to the town of Trowbridge for nearly 130 years. The disappearance of Hadens from the Industrial life of Trowbridge in 1945 was the severing of a link with a firm and a family which had played an outstanding part in the town’s affairs for over a century, and had made the name of Trowbridge known far and wide on almost as large a scale as the reputation of Trowbridge woollen cloth. In 1814 the woollen firm of J & T Clark decided they must install a steam engine in their Trowbridge Mill, and ordered one from the famous firm of Boulton and Watt. The firm sent a young engineer, George Haden to supervise the work. The machine was in use by 1815, but George Haden saw an opening in Trowbridge and settled in the town to found his own business. For some years he specialised in steam engines and accessories for the local factories, but in due course the firm he founded developed into one specialising in heating systems. Among the many large contracts secured by Haden’s were the installation of heating in the new Law Courts in the Strand London; the new Liverpool Anglican Cathedral ; and the Northern Ireland Parliament building to name only a few of those carried out while the firm was operating from Trowbridge. The original
George Haden’s son and grandsons played
their part not only in industry but also
in the general life of Trowbridge, as
members of the local authority,
Magistrates, and sincere and generous
supporters of their
church, the Tabernacle Congregational
Church. In successive
generations, members of the family
endowed the Tabernacle with most of
its splendid
range
of ancillary buildings, including the
fine gymnasium, and gave the town a
new bandstand in
the park in memory of the founder of
the firm; and their
interest in and voluntary
service
for the cause of local education was given
permanent recognition in the naming of the
Nelson Haden Schools, opened shortly
before the war. |
The
firm of Haden established in 1816 had the
misfortune to find that its centenary occured
during the first World War and its 125th
anniversary during World War II. This prevented
the distribution of any commemorative publications
to celebrate these anniversaries, due to the firms
participation in the production of ordnance during
the first world war, and working on military
contracts for the Government during the second
world war. No publication was made to commemorate the centenary but a limited issue was made to celebrate its 125th anniversary. This took the form of a simple booklet designed by G Nelson Haden, which showed a series of twelve advertisements which first appeared in the Architectural Press for 1941-1942. The foreword to the booklet was written by G Nelson Haden in 1942 as shown below. |
When the year 1966 was reached, the firm for the first time in its history, was able to celebrate the anniversary with a commemorative publication understandably titled "Haden 150 years." During the year an exhibition of artefacts from the firm's historic past toured the regional offices of the company enabling the employees to enjoy contact with items that brought the firm's founders George and James "back to life." |
In
1991 a further anniversary was reached and another
booklet was published illustrating 175 years of
the firm's history. The Haden company must now
surely have become the Heating & Ventilating
industry's longest surviving firm, still trading,
which continues to use its original name. The bicentenary year of the founding of the firm was only 9 years away, when the owning company in 2007 arbitrarily dropped the use of the Haden name. So a landmark opportunity for a H&V firm that started in the reign of George IV to celebrate its 200th anniversary was killed off. |
Advertisements |
PRISONS |
George
& James Haden were major installers of warm
air stoves in Prisons, Gaols, and other Penal
Institutions during the first half of Victoria's
reign.
One such installation carried out between 1846 and 1848 is Springfield Gaol, now called HM Prison Chelmsford, in the county of Essex. The
Gaol was extensively remodelled between 1845 and
1848 to cater for the transition from the silent
to the separate system of containing prisoners.
One part of the rebuild involved enclosing the
middle yard, making in into a central hall. A
chapel was then built above the hall, and a
basement was dug beneath. During this time the
first heating system was installed. Before this
time the cells were unheated with little or no
ventilation.
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An
article printed in the Chelmsford Chronicle of
December 1847 describes in some detail
the new system of heating and ventilating the
cells at all floor levels. An excerpt from this
article is shown
below.
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The
now unused basement area of the remodelled
prison buildings, was originally used as a
kitchen for vegetable and food preparation, and
an original oven with
a
large cast iron front plate which survives. The
oven was installed circa
1880 to enable the Prison to be able to bake its
own bread.
The front plate of the oven is in remarkably good condition considering its age and usage. There is visual evidence that there used to be a second oven sited opposite the surviving one. |
Hadens
of Trowbridge supplied several items of cooking
equipment for the Kitchen in addition to the bread
oven. 2 - iron steam boilers 3 - cooking boilers 45, 40, 35 gallon capacity for preparing gruel and broth. 3 - coppers 2 - 45 gallon cast iron steamers for potatoes. 1 - large roasting oven. Cast iron frame & stove top. The kitchen equipment is shown in the drawings below. |
Swinton
House
in the Scottish Borders
is a category Grade A
Listed building. It was the residence of the Swinton family during the 19th Century with George and Anne Swinton being the owners from1839 to 1854. They had inherited the house in 1839 upon the death of Anne's father Samuel Swinton. It
is
interesting to note in
the Haden order book
entry 1841 that the
details of the
warm
air stove are in the
name of Mrs Swinton. Samuel's
widow
Isabella remained
in
residence and is
probably the Mrs
Swinton referred to in
the Haden
order
book entry. Samuel
invested heavily in
the house and it may
be he
planned
the Haden heating
system but after his
death it was left to
Isabella to
actually
organize having the
heating system
installed.
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1841 Sept
25th
Mrs
Swinton
Swinton House Nr
Duns Berwick on Tweed
A wrot iron stove 541 see G H letter 23rd Sent 15th Oct £9 - 1s - 11d Hillier & May |
This
is the first example found in the UK with this
style of wrought iron front plate
displaying top corner rose emblems. All later cast iron front plates had the distinctive Haden portico top section |
This nameplate shows a Royal Warrant which must relate to the stoves they installed at Windsor Castle for George IV |
The Haden stove provided warmed air to the lower floors through a system of ducts and grilles all of which were removed during the recent renovations. One exception was a circular brass floor grille of the punched louvre 'hit & miss' pattern with centre damper adjustment position. |