| Biography | In 1790 Benjamin Outram and Francis Beresford became partners to exploit the coal and ironstone on the Butterley Estate in the parishes of Pentrich and Codnor. In the following year William Jessop and John Wright joined the partnership. They were primarily iron masters who mined coal to supply their own furnaces. Originally called Benjamin Outram and Co, it had became known as the Butterley Company by 1807. Outram himself died in 1805, but the Wright and Jessop families continued the business. In 1888 the Company became a public company, incorporated to carry on the business of coal masters, iron masters and iron founders. It remained, however, a family concern for the most part, the majority of directors being members of the Wright family until the 1950s.
From the earliest days there was a furnace and foundry at Butterley, and very shortly a second set of ironworks was established at Codnor Park, where one of their early major collieries was situated. During the 19th century the Company became a thriving success. In 1862 there were seven furnaces at Butterley and Codnor Park which produced one-fifth of the total output of iron in Derbyshire. Later in the 19th century the production of ironstone declined locally, but the Company still remained a major force in the iron industry. It was heavily involved in the expansion of the railway industry, by the manufacture of track and wagons at its foundry and engineering works, and Butterley was famously used for the huge arched roof of St Pancras Station in London. The Company was heavily involved with the production of bridges, heavy structural steelwork, mining equipment and machinery, presses, castings and overhead cranes.
The Company set up and owned several mines in the East Midlands coalfield. They were primarily set up to supply the Company's own furnaces, but by the late 19th century, the Company had one of the major coal mining enterprises in the country, producing ever-increasing coal outputs. Collieries owned by the Company included Bailey Brook, Britain, Denby Hall, Exhibition, Loscoe, Lower Hartshay, Upper Hartshay, New Langley, Ormonde, Ripley, Waingrove and Whiteley in Derbyshire and Kirkby, Portland and Ollerton in Nottinghamshire. Following the Coal Nationalization Act 1946, the Company lost all their collieries, railway wagons, Kirkby Brickworks, and houses mainly occupied by colliery workmen.
With the nationalization of the coal mining industry after World War II, it was necessary for them to diversify and concentrate on other areas such as civil engineering and brick-making. They took over several companies such as A H Couser Ltd of Warwickshire in 1947 for their plant and contracts, T Darnell and Sons Ltd (of Colwick, Nottinghamshire) in 1954 for their light engineering works, and F C Hibberd and Co Ltd of london in 1964 for the manufacture of diesel locomotive parts. Occasionally the Company experimented with projects as part of their diversification policy but soon dropped them, such as their involvement in the construction of car-park lifts and oxygen plants around 1960.
The Company had also been a major landowner since the initial purchase of the Butterley Estate in 1790. It is believed that the Company was the third largest landowner behind the Dukes of Devonshire and Rutland. Although not regarded as part of their core business, their lands were still farmed as profitably as possible until the 1950s, when the incursion of open-cast mining led to the abandonment of large scale farming. As major employers in the area, they also built and let several thousand houses for colliers and ironworkers, including the new village of Ironville. The Company also had limestone quarries at Crich, which operated to supply the ironworks but which also ran its own operations. Limekilns were built at Codnor Park and Amber Wharf.
Although there had been brickworks in the Company for several decades, these were similarly regarded as a by-product of their other, larger activities, with the clay sites being physically located close to the coal pits. After 1945, however, that side of the business was developed and expanded. There were works at Ollerton and Waingroves. There had been works at Kirkby, which had been taken over by the government at the same time as the collieries. As part of their expansion they acquired the quarry of Mugginton Sand and Gravel Ltd in 1947, as well as the brickworks at Ambergate and Blaby in Leicestershire and gravel pits of Apex Sand and Gravel Ltd in Lincolnshire. In 1955 they acquired Richard Lees Ltd, who made pre-stressed concrete beams at works in Lancashire. In 1956 they moved into the area of lightweight aggregate, known commercially as Aglite. They also gained control of several companies known as the Lincolnshire Traffics Group in 1963, which had various interests in the extraction, processing and sale of sand, gravel and limestone, and G Tucker and Sons Ltd, brick and tile manufacturers of Loughborough in 1964.
In 1968 the Company was taken over by the Wiles Group, later called Hanson Trust Ltd, and eventually Hanson plc. They sold off the engineering side of the business, including the Butterley Works, very shortly after takeover, and concentrated their efforts on the brick-making side of the business, operating all their operations under the new name of Butterley Building Materials in 1969. Several businesses were taken over by Hansons and run by Butterley Building Materials. These included the National Star Group in 1971, seven brickworks from the British Steel Corporation, (including the six that formed the Castle Brick Co) in 1972 and the London Brick Co in 1984. The name of the whole brick enterprise became Butterley Brick Co Ltd in 1985. |