Fenton, Murray and Jackson was an engineering company at the Round Foundry off Water Lane in

Holbeck Holbeck is an inner city area of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It begins on the southern edge of Leeds city centre and mainly lies in the LS11 postcode district. The M1 and M621 motorways used to end/begin in Holbeck. Now the M621 is t ...

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a Metropolitan counties of England, metropolitan and Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and east, South Yorkshire and De ...

, England.

Fenton, Murray and Wood

Fenton Murray and Wood was founded in the 1790s by ironfounder

Matthew Murray Matthew Murray (1765 – 20 February 1826) was an English steam engine and machine tool manufacturer, who designed and built the first commercially viable steam locomotive, the twin-cylinder ''Salamanca'' in 1812. He was an innovative design ...

and textile machine engineer David Wood to build machine tools (mainly for the

textile industry The textile industry is primarily concerned with the design, production and distribution of textiles: yarn, cloth and clothing. Industry process Cotton manufacturing Cotton is the world's most important natural fibre. In the year 2007, th ...

) and

stationary steam engine Stationary steam engines are fixed steam engines used for pumping or driving mills and factories, and for power generation. They are distinct from locomotive engines used on railways, traction engines for heavy steam haulage on roads, steam car ...

s. The company was capitalised by

colliery Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground or from a mine. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extra ...

owner

James Fenton James Martin Fenton (born 25 April 1949) is an English poet, journalist and literary critic. He is a former Oxford Professor of Poetry. Life and career Born in Lincoln, Fenton grew up in Lincolnshire and Staffordshire, the son of Canon Jo ...

(1754–1834) as the main financier, and

millwright A millwright is a craftsman or skilled tradesman who installs, dismantles, maintains, repairs, reassembles, and moves machinery in factories, power plants, and construction sites. The term ''millwright'' (also known as ''industrial mechanic'') ...

William Lister, a

sleeping partner A partnership is an agreement where parties agree to cooperate to advance their mutual interests. The partners in a partnership may be individuals, businesses, interest-based organizations, schools, governments or combinations. Organizations m ...

. The partnership was approached to design a locomotive that would exploit the rack-and-pinion patent granted to Blenkinsop in 1811. Their 1812 product, ''Salamanca'' was successful, and a total of six engines were built before Murray's death in 1826.

Fenton, Murray and Jackson

After Wood's death in 1820, the company became Fenton, Murray and Jackson. In 1824 the company supplied a 60 hp

beam engine A beam engine is a type of steam engine where a pivoted overhead Beam (structure), beam is used to apply the force from a vertical piston to a vertical connecting rod. This configuration, with the engine directly driving a pump, was first used b ...

to the commissioners of Deeping Fen as one of two erected at Pode Hole. The other engine was supplied by the

Butterley Company The Butterley Company was an English manufacturing firm founded as Benjamin Outram and Company in 1790. Its subsidiaries existed until 2009. Origins This area of Derbyshire had been known for its outcrops of iron ore which had been exploited at ...

as were the scoop wheels for both. Although the Butterley engine was purchased outright (for £3,300), it appears that the Fenton and Murray engine was not. The accounts for 1825 showed a payment of only £127/6/- for the Fenton engine. It was not uncommon for beam engines to be leased, purchased 'on terms', or paid for in other novel ways such as a share of the earnings. The engine was named '' Kesteven'' and worked until 1925. From 1831, work began building engines to

Robert Stephenson Robert Stephenson , (honoris causa, Hon. causa) (16 October 1803 – 12 October 1859) was an English civil engineer and designer of locomotives. The only son of George Stephenson, the "Father of Railways", he built on the achievements of hi ...

's designs, both

2-2-0 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 2-2-0 represents the wheel arrangement of two leading wheels on one axle, two powered driving wheels on one axle, and no trailing wheels. This configuration, which became ver ...

Planets A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is generally required to be in orbit around a star, stellar remnant, or brown dwarf, and is not one itself. The Solar System has eight planets by the most restrictive definition of the te ...

" and

2-2-2 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 2-2-2 represents the wheel arrangement of two leading wheels on one axle, two powered driving wheels on one axle, and two trailing wheels on one axle. The wheel arrangement both ...

"Patentees", many of them under subcontract. Many were exported, and twenty of

Daniel Gooch Sir Daniel Gooch, 1st Baronet (24 August 1816 – 15 October 1889) was an English railway locomotive and transatlantic cable engineer. He was the first Locomotive Superintendent, Superintendent of Locomotive Engines on the Great Western Ra ...

's ''Firefly'' class for the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...

. By 1840, they were turning out up to twenty engines a year. The company's name appears on cast iron bollards still in situ at Victoria Lock (built 1843) on the

River Shannon The River Shannon ( or archaic ') is the major river on the island of Ireland, and at in length, is the longest river in the British Isles. It drains the Shannon River Basin, which has an area of , – approximately one fifth of the area of I ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

as Fenton, Murray and Jackson Engineers of Leeds. However, by 1843, the boom was over and the company closed down.

References

* Lowe, J.W., (1989) ''British Steam Locomotive Builders,'' Guild Publishing * G. Cookson, 'Early Textile Engineers in Leeds 1780–1850' ''Publications of Thoresby Society'' n.s. 4 (1994), 40–61.

External links

Hunslet Engine Archive
''Prince Regent'' engine (Fenton Murray and Wood, 1812) {{Authority control Engineering companies of England Engineering companies of the United Kingdom Locomotive manufacturers of the United Kingdom Beam engines Industrial Revolution History of the steam engine Steam engine manufacturers Machine tool builders