Hainaut-Sambre was a Belgian group of steel companies based in the

Charleroi Charleroi ( , , ; wa, Tchålerwè ) is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. By 1 January 2008, the total population of Charleroi was 201,593.

region, it was founded in 1955 by the merger of ''Usine Métallurgiques du Hainaut'' (based in Couillet,

Charleroi Charleroi ( , , ; wa, Tchålerwè ) is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. By 1 January 2008, the total population of Charleroi was 201,593.

), and the metal making division of '' Sambre et Moselle'' (based in

Montignies-sur-Sambre Montignies-sur-Sambre ( wa, Montgneye-so-Sambe) is a town of Wallonia and a district of the municipality of Charleroi, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. It was a municipality of its own before the fusion of the Belgian municipalities ...

, Charleroi). The company absorbed another Charleroi based steel group ''

Thy-Marcinelle et Providence Thy-Marcinelle is a steelworks in Charleroi, Belgium, a subsidiary of the Riva group. The company is the descendant of one part of various steel companies based in the Charleroi industrial basin. Its history traces back through Cockerill-Sambre to ...

'' in 1980 before being merged with the

Liège Province Liège (; wa, Lîdje ; nl, Luik ; german: Lüttich ) is the easternmost province of the Wallonia region of Belgium. Liège Province is the only Belgian province that has borders with three countries. It borders (clockwise from the north) the Du ...

based steel group Cockerill in 1981 to form

Cockerill-Sambre Cockerill-Sambre was a group of Belgian steel manufacturers headquartered in Seraing, on the river Meuse, and in Charleroi, on the river Sambre. The Cockerill-Sambre group was formed in 1981 by the merger of two Belgian steel groups – SA Cock ...

. A predecessor company SA Marchinelle & Couillet built locomotives at the ''Usines Métallurgiques du Hainaut'' which were used on industrial railways, and exported around the world. The locomotive builder was commonly known as Couillet.

History

Background

It has been speculated that the beginnings of industrialised iron working around Charleroi may date at least to 1000AD, with water powered forge, and furnace fed by charcoal. The first official record of an iron industry dates to ~1600 By the 19th century the metallurgical inventions of the industrial revolution had reached Belgium; in the Charleroi area Paul-François Huart-Chapel would be instrumental in the development of the steel industry as his contemporary, the naturalised Belgian John Cockerill was in the nearby Liège area.Notice historique sur Couillet, "Siderurgie", pp.36-39 In the 1820s he introduced puddling furnaces then coke fired blast furnaces. In 1828 the ''maison de commerce'' "Fontaine-Spitaels" bought land for the construction of iron works and in 1830 merged with ''Usines des Hauchies'' of Paul Huart-Chapel to form ''Fontaine-Spitaels et Cie''. The company had, in addition to blast and reverbatory furnaces and coke ovens, licenses for the extraction of coal and iron ore. In 1835 the company became the ''Société Anonyme des Hauts Fourneaux, Usines et Charbonnages de Marcinelle et Couillet'' with a capital of 4.5 million francs. Further expansion and development took place, with a mill for iron bar installed, then railways in the 1840s aiding the transportation of ore, the

Siemens–Martin process An open-hearth furnace or open hearth furnace is any of several kinds of industrial Industrial furnace, furnace in which excess carbon and other impurities are burnt out of pig iron to Steelmaking, produce steel. Because steel is difficult to ma ...

introduced in 1888, in 1892 a Gilchrist–Thomas converter, and in 1894 a mill for rolling metal. In 1906 the metal working and mining divisions separated; with the colliery at Marcinelle becoming a separate company, the metal division of the company became ''La Société Métallurgique de Couillet'', renamed as ''Société Métallurgique du Hainaut'' in 1910. In 1955 the company merged with the metallurgical division of '' Sambre et Moselle'' to form Hainaut-Sambre.

Hainaut-Sambre

In 1967 the group acquired 51% of the shares of ''Société des Aciéries et Tréfilerie de Neuves-Maisons - Chatillon'', this subsidiary was acquired by ''Chiers-Chatillon'' in 1977. In 1978 the company had a steel production capacity of ~2million tonnes pa. In 1980 it merged with ''

''. The mergers created a company that represented the majority of the steel production in the Charleroi area, which represented mostly long products. Since the

steel crisis The steel crisis was a recession in the global steel market during the 1973–75 recession and early 1980s recession following the post–World War II economic expansion and the 1973 oil crisis, further compounded by the 1979 oil crisis, and ...

of the 1970s the company had been in a poor financial state; in 1980 the company had total debts of 1,115million EUR and no capital, Cockerill was in a similar position. On 16 January 1981 Hainaut-Sambre and Cockerill announced that they were to merge the two groups. The company

was formed as a result.

Locomotives "Couillet"

The ''Société anonyme Usines Métallurgiques du Hainaut'' (English: 'Hainaut metal works company'), part of ''SA Marcinelle & Couillet'', built steam locomotives at a plant in Couillet near

Charleroi Charleroi ( , , ; wa, Tchålerwè ) is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. By 1 January 2008, the total population of Charleroi was 201,593.

, so they are commonly known as "Couillet Locomotives". The locomotives were exported and a few now operated on

heritage railway A heritage railway or heritage railroad (US usage) is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period (or periods) i ...

s. No's. 861 "John Benn" and 986 "Carbon" were built by ''Couillet'' for

Decauville Decauville () was a manufacturing company which was founded by Paul Decauville (1846–1922), a French pioneer in industrial railways. Decauville's major innovation was the use of ready-made sections of light, narrow gauge track fastened to stee ...

, for use in the works of the

Melbourne Metropolitan Gas Company The Australian state of Victoria has a number of defunct energy supply and distribution utility companies. The North Melbourne Electric Tramways and Lighting Company The North Melbourne Electric Tramways and Lighting Company operated an electric ...

in Australia. They are now part of the locomotive fleet of the

Puffing Billy Railway The Puffing Billy Railway is a narrow gauge heritage railway in the southern foothills of the Dandenong Ranges in Melbourne, Australia. The railway was one of the five narrow gauge lines of the Victorian Railways which opened around the beg ...

One locomotive on the ''Chemin de fer touristique du Tarn'' (

Tarn Light Railway The Chemin de Fer Touristique du Tarn (CFTT), or Tarn Light Railway, is a narrow-gauge light railway near the village of Saint-Lieux-lès-Lavaur, in the vicinity of Saint-Sulpice in the department of Tarn, France. It is run as a heritage railw ...

) in France is classified as a historic monument (''

Monument historique ''Monument historique'' () is a designation given to some national heritage sites in France. It may also refer to the state procedure in France by which National Heritage protection is extended to a building, a specific part of a building, a coll ...

''). In 2010, its 100th birthday was celebrated.

References

Sources

* *

Further information

External links

* {{PM20, FID=co/052679, TEXT=Documents and clippings about, NAME=Société Métallurgique de Sambre-et-Moselle S.A. Steel companies of Belgium Defunct locomotive manufacturers of Belgium Companies based in Hainaut (province)