CRAVEN DUNNILL & CO LIMITED JACKFIELD N^R IRONBRIDGE SALOP HARGREAVES CRAVEN DUNNILL & CO JACKFIELD CRAVEN DUNNILL & CO JACKFIELD SALOP CRAVEN & CO * * * * * BENTHALL WORKS.--The manufactory of encaustic tiles, mosaics, and majolica, which has for the last twenty-two years been carried on by Messrs. Maw, at the Benthall works, near Broseley, was initiated at Worcester (as named in my account of the works of Mr. St. John in that city) in the year 1850, where Messrs. Maw commenced experimenting on the processes of manufacture on the premises formerly occupied by the Worcester Porcelain Manufactory, when under the hands of Messrs. Flight and Barr, and afterwards used for the production of encaustic tiles by my late friend Mr. Fleming St. John and his partners, by whom the moulds, &c., which had been used by them in the manufacture of encaustic tiles were sold to Messrs. Maw. These gentlemen at once saw that a much wider field was open to them in the production of tiles than had previously been attempted at Worcester. In 1852, Messrs. Maw, feeling the necessity for carrying on the manufacture in a neighbourhood which would produce both the coal and the clay, abandoned the works at Worcester, and removed their moulds, plant, &c., to the Benthall works, near Broseley, where another seven years was spent by them in a series of costly experiments with no immediate profit except the experience gained by which they have subsequently built up the business. Their first effort was to thoroughly investigate and experiment upon the clays of the Shropshire coal-field, as well as the plastic materials found throughout the kingdom, many of which no one had before attempted to turn to economic account. [Illustration: Figs. 686 to 693.--Examples of Messrs. Maw’s Tiles.] The results of these experiments have been illustrated in an extensive series of specimens of the clays or plastic slates of Great Britain presented by Mr. Geo. Maw, F.S.A., to the Government Museum of Practical Geology, in Jermyn Street, and printed in the supplement to the catalogue by Sir H. De La Beche and Mr. Trenham Reeks. In 1857, after all these years of patient labours, the manufacture was commenced on a commercial scale, which for several years barely paid its expenses; but from that time to the present continual additions have been made to the works to meet the increasing demand for their productions. In 1871 supplementary works were commenced at the Tuckies, about two miles from the Benthall works, celebrated as the spot where the late Lord Dundonald carried on his experiments in the manufacture of coal-gas. [Illustration: Fig. 694.]