The Furness Shipbuilding Company was a

shipbuilding company A shipyard, also called a dockyard or boatyard, is a place where ships are built and repaired. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships. Dockyards are sometimes more associated with maintenance a ...

Haverton Hill Haverton Hill is an area within the borough of Stockton-on-Tees and ceremonial county of County Durham, England. Once considered a part of Billingham, Haverton Hill was once a thriving industrial community which has suffered significant depopu ...

, Stockton on Tees,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It was established during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

and operated from 1917 until 1979.

Establishment

Shipbuilding during the First World War Q20133

The yard was initially established as an emergency shipyard to repair ships damaged in the war. It was incorporated as a

Private company A privately held company (or simply a private company) is a company whose shares and related rights or obligations are not offered for public subscription or publicly negotiated in the respective listed markets, but rather the company's stock is ...

in 1917 and covered an 85-acre site on the north bank of the

River Tees The River Tees (), in Northern England, rises on the eastern slope of Cross Fell in the North Pennines and flows eastwards for to reach the North Sea between Hartlepool and Redcar near Middlesbrough. The modern day history of the river has be ...

at Haverton Hill, opposite

Middlesbrough Middlesbrough ( ) is a town on the southern bank of the River Tees in North Yorkshire, England. It is near the North York Moors national park. It is the namesake and main town of its local borough council area. Until the early 1800s, the a ...

. As completed it included 50 acres reclaimed from tidal land with 2,500 feet of river frontage, with twelve building berths and a fitting-out basin measuring 1,000 feet by 250 feet. It operated as a subsidiary within the Furness, Withy Shipping Company, with the first ship being laid down in March 1918, before the yard had been completed. It initially built ships for the British Government and foreign companies as well as ships for Furness, Withy & Co and its subsidiaries. During the 1920s it built colliers,

tramp steamer A boat or ship engaged in the tramp trade is one which does not have a fixed schedule, itinerary nor published ports of call, and trades on the spot market as opposed to freight liners. A steamship engaged in the tramp trade is sometimes called ...

s, twin-funnelled passenger/cargo liners,

whaling ship A whaler or whaling ship is a specialized vessel, designed or adapted for whaling: the catching or processing of whales. Terminology The term ''whaler'' is mostly historic. A handful of nations continue with industrial whaling, and one, Japa ...

s and five deep-sea tankers. In the late 1920s it built a number of ships for service on the

Great Lakes The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lakes ...

of North America, transporting grain and gypsum rock. These vessels were of the bridge-forward/engines-aft design typical of the

lake freighter Lake freighters, or lakers, are bulk carrier vessels that operate on the Great Lakes of North America. These vessels are traditionally called boats, although classified as ships. Since the late 19th century, lakers have carried bulk cargoes of m ...

s. One such ship built by the Furness Shipbuilding Company was the ''Cementkarrier'', one of the first diesel-electric ships built in the North East of England. RFA Wave Conqueror

With the economic decline of the 1930s affecting shipping and shipbuilding companies, the yard had few orders during the early 1930s. Business improved during the mid-1930s and in 1936 the yard produced 11 ships. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, between 1939 and 1946, 26 deep-sea tankers, sixteen coastal CHANT tankers, six tramp ships and three whale factory ships were built. To cope with wartime demand the yard added four extra berths. The postwar years also saw significant orders from the yard, with 76 large ships and tankers built between 1947 and 1963. In around 1951 ownership of the yard was vested in Haverton Holdings, and by 1961 the yard employed 2,750 workers and was producing ships of to 52,000 tons

deadweight tonnage Deadweight tonnage (also known as deadweight; abbreviated to DWT, D.W.T., d.w.t., or dwt) or tons deadweight (DWT) is a measure of how much weight a ship can carry. It is the sum of the weights of cargo, fuel, fresh water, ballast water, provi ...

and steelwork for bridges and

gasholder A gas holder or gasholder, also known as a gasometer, is a large container in which natural gas or town gas is stored near atmospheric pressure at ambient temperatures. The volume of the container follows the quantity of stored gas, with pressu ...

Decline

The yard was modernised in 1963 to be able to build

supertanker An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a ship designed for the bulk cargo, bulk transport of petroleum, oil or its products. There are two basic types of oil tankers: crude tankers and product tankers. Crude tankers move large quant ...

s and

bulk carrier A bulk carrier or bulker is a merchant ship specially designed to transport unpackaged bulk cargo — such as grains, coal, ore, steel coils, and cement — in its cargo holds. Since the first specialized bulk carrier was built in 1852, econom ...

s, building its first bulk carrier, ''Essi Gina'', shortly afterwards. A slump in orders followed and in 1967 the holding company owning the Furness Shipbuilding Company sold off its shipbuilding interests. In March 1968 it was announced that the yard was to be closed with the loss of 3,000 jobs and that same year it was merged into the

Swan Hunter Swan Hunter, formerly known as Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson, is a shipbuilding design, engineering, and management company, based in Wallsend, Tyne and Wear, England. At its apex, the company represented the combined forces of three powe ...

group. Further orders were placed and on 12 October 1970 the yard launched the first of six Bridge-class ore/bulk/oil carriers, ''Furness Bridge''. Five others were launched at the rate of one per year. In 1977 the yard and the other Swan Hunter assets were nationalised into the British Shipbuilders Corporation and two years later, in 1979, the yard was finally closed.

Legacy

The Furness Shipyard, Haverton Hill - geograph

The site of the yard passed into the ownership of the Tees Alliance Group, which acquired it to build offshore structures for the oil industry. With the bankruptcy of the company in 2014, its assets, including the shipyard site, were acquired by the Dano-German venture Offshore Structures (Britain) Ltd.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Furness Shipbuilding Company 1917 establishments in England Companies based in County Durham Defunct shipbuilding companies of England Engineering companies of England Former defence companies of the United Kingdom History of County Durham 1979 disestablishments in England Manufacturing companies established in 1917 British companies established in 1917 British companies disestablished in 1979