In this post I cover the brickworks which were situated in South Leicestershire.
Market Harborough Brick & Tile Co.
The first reference found to the Market Harborough Brick & Tile Co. at Little Bowden appears in the London Gazette dated 2nd January 1885 & this notice records the partnership which has for some time passed been carried on by John Benjamin Walker, Samuel Symington, William West, John Smith & Thomas Scarborough at the said works had been mutually dissolved on the 31st of December 1884. There are no trade directory entries for the company at this date & I have not been able to ascertain if one or more of these gentlemen carried on running the works afterwards. I have used the 1900 OS map below to show the location of the works which I have coloured yellow.
© Crown Copyright. Reproduced with permission of NLS/Ordnance Survey 1900.
I am undecided about the next bit of information from the Market Harborough Advertiser dated 9th June 1896 below as I have not been able to establish if Harry Hussey was owner of the brickworks or was just operating his chimney building business from a building situated at the brickworks. I favour the latter option. I next found the Market Harborough Brick & Tile Co. at Little Bowden is listed in Kelly's 1899 & 1908 editions.
Market Harborough Advertiser and Midland Mail - Tuesday 09 June 1896
Content provided by THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
The entry in Kelly's 1912 edition now reads Brick & Tile Co. Limited, Little Bowden, Market Harborough. It appears with the company being renamed as a Limited company, the works may have had new owners. I have also come to the conclusion that the brick below was made by this 1912 company.
Photo by Nigel Furniss.
Midland Mail - Friday 09 March 1917
Content provided by THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
This March 1917 advert records the sale of surplus stock at the Little Bowden Brickyard by the Brick & Tile Co. Ltd. & I have come to the conclusion with WW1 still taking place & no men to run the works, the owners were preparing to close the works for good. The 1923 OS map only shows the remains of two clay pits & no buildings, so it appears it was the end of the works in 1917.
Croft Stone Quarry & Brick Co.
© Crown Copyright. Reproduced with permission of NLS/Ordnance Survey 1900.
The Croft Stone Quarry & Brick Co. at Croft near Hinckley was established by brothers Henry Davis Pochin & Samuel Davenport Pochin in 1872 on land they had purchased off the Pratt family in 1871. Then a forty year lease was taken out on Croft Hill to extract it's abundant granite & clay. Then after permission was granted from the London & North Western Railway Co. the brothers build a tramway connecting their works to the railway company's main line nearby. I have coloured the brickworks yellow & the extent of the quarry works in green on the 1900 OS map above.
The construction of a Patent Brick Kiln by Morand of Leeds was completed in 1873 & was capable of holding 100,000 bricks at one time. At the same time a machine house was built to accommodate a Murray's Patent Brickmaking machine which could handle 60 tons of clay per day. A boiler & engine by Messrs Grimson & Co. of Leicester had been ordered. The quarry by 1873 was already in production with the brothers employing 100 men. Plans were also afoot to build houses for their workmen in Croft Village.
The Croft Stone Quarry & Brick Co. is first listed in Kelly's 1876 edition with Samuel Davenport Pochin as Manager. A job advert in the Leicester Advertiser dated 18th May 1878 records the Croft Stone Quarry & Brick Co. were requiring two men to assist in the setting & burning of bricks. In Kelly's 1881 edition the company is now listed as the Croft Granite & Brick Co., with Henry Davis Pochin & Samuel Davenport Pochin listed as Proprietors. Brick output in February 1882 was 5,800 to 6,000 bricks per day. The next change is in Kelly's 1891 when the company is listed as the Croft Granite, Brick & Concrete Co. & this company name remains the same right up to the last available Kelly's in 1941, however there are changes in management & these are, Kelly's 1900 edition records Samuel D. Pochin as Managing Director, Kelly's 1908 to 1922 editions record Charles Henry Robottom as Secretary & Manager, Kelly's 1925 to 1932 editions record Norman Findlay Spence as Manager. In 1933 Spence is elevated to Director, then Managing Director in Kelly's 1936 & 1941 editions. The English China Clays Group took over the Croft Works in 1962.
Kelly's 1908 edition.
Although Croft is listed in the Brick Makers section in Kelly's right up to it's 1941 edition the last reference found to clay brick manufacture is 1918 when the company was paying bonuses to it's female workers & youths that it was employing at the brickworks, so I am slightly bemused why the company continues to be listed if clay brick production had ceased around 1918. The only option I can put forward is that they were producing concrete or reconstituted stone bricks after 1918 ? I did find a December 1916 job advert for the company requiring a Forman for a Common Brick Works, also brick setters, burners & drawers. So with many men at war & the company not being able to fill these positions the decision may have been made to close the brickworks around 1920 ? If I get the answer I will update the entry.
