|
| | A printed version of this paper is available for little cost
in the Mere Information Centre in the library. Proceeds of the sales go to the
Friends of St Michaels Church
GASLIGHT
IN MERE
The
rise and fall of Mere's one and only public utility company.
It
is probably safe to say that the majority of homes in Mere are to-day heated by
gas, and that a considerable number of them cook with gas, though almost
certainly none of them have been lit by that medium for nearly half a century.
Gas, however, first became available to the town some 160 years ago, and
at the time was a revolutionary medium that was to have a profound effect on
everyday life, particularly on that of the housewife.
This miracle making substance was a different article altogether from
that used to-day, and at first was employed for completely different uses;
its manufacture, method of supply, and end use were to change
dramatically, whilst it was originally to grow in public esteem, then to be
accepted as a fact of everyday life, for a time to lose popularity, and at last
to be reborn with a new image.
The
first practical distillation of gas from coal for lighting purposes was carried
out by William Murdoch in Cornwall around the end of the XVIIIc, and the idea
rapidly found favour, with the streets of Westminster being lit by gas in 1815;
rapidly the potential was realised, and all over the country plants were set up
to provide the new amenity. The gas
in question was produced by filling "retorts" - long cast iron
cylinders with closed ends - with coal, and then heating them to such an extent
that the coal was broken down into its constituent materials, of which the gas
was the most important, though valuable by-products in the form of coke, tar,
and various chemicals were also produced.
From the retorts, which were arranged in stacks in a retort house, the
gas passed through various processes to clean it and to recover some of these
by-products, before being collected in a gasholder, frequently incorrectly
called a gasometer. This was a large
cylinder, or set of cylinders arranged telescopically within each other, whose
base was sealed in a water tank, and in which gas was accumulated as in a
reservoir before passing through pipes [the mains] to the purchaser.
This
coal-gas, often referred to technically as Towns gas, required careful handling
as it was of necessity highly inflammable and as a result was at one time looked
on with some fear, until its advantages were appreciated.
Initially it was used solely for lighting purposes;
in the home it passed through pipes to small fittings incorporating a jet
which produced a flame so shaped that it became commonly called the "batswing"
burner, and for a long time it was these naked flames, adding a further hazard
to household life, that produced the gaslight of the Victorian Age.
Some of the earliest users of gas were the public authorities who found
the new medium a great improvement on the old oil lamps which had for centuries
provided the only street lighting. Indeed,
unless there was a local authority prepared to commit itself to gas street
lighting, thus giving the supplier a regular outlet on which he could depend for
income, there was little point in setting up the plant in the first place.
The light given by the batswing burners depended on the gas containing a
certain amount of carbon which the heat of the flame would cause to glow, and
the system was far from efficient. During
the last two decades of the XIXc devices were made to increase the level of heat
at the fitting, and to use it to heat a specially made "mantle" which
glowed bright white when heated. This
incandescent mantle - a frail structure of
special clay - will be remembered by the older ones amongst us as being prone to
shatter at a touch! With
the gas being formulated to produce adequate heat for these mantles to be
efficient, it was realised that there was scope for the use of gas for cooking,
and the gas stove, with oven and rings, began to drive out the kitchen range
from the house, though it was slow to gain acceptance.
Gas also became a useful power source for business and industry with the
development of stationary engines working by the combustion of gas.
Gas
had become the most popular domestic fuel in towns by the end of the XIXc, but a
new competitor then appeared in the form of electricity.
Strangely, many of the first users of electricity were to generate their
own supply by fitting generators to gas engines, but soon after the end of WWI
local generating stations rapidly appeared.
The cleanliness, safety and convenience of this new power source was a
serious threat to the gas companies, and gas came to have an old fashioned
image, with the result that by the end of WWII many seriously thought it had
come to the end of its days.
However
developments in the petro-chemical industry, and the opening up of off-shore oil
fields around the
UK
, tapping into vast underground reservoirs of natural gas, led in the mid XXc
to the replacement of Towns gas by natural gas, which needed far less
treatment before passsing into the mains, though handled at far higher
pressures. This new gas was cleaner
and, if properly handled, safer than its predecessor [Towns gas was poisonous
and a favourite suicide choice, but natural gas is non-toxic], and, as a source
of heat but not of light, it has restored the image of gas to favour once more.
Mere
was to be fairly early in the field in making use of gas for lighting, and the
first company to produce it was formed in 1837.
It had a life of just under thirty years, to be followed by a
reincarnation, which was to continue in operation until after WWII.
Gas production was invariably a matter for private enterprise, and
companies were formed all over the country, ranging from the vast Metropolitan
Gas Light and Coke Company Limited down to tiny operations running on a
shoestring. When electricity
came into favour, attitudes had changed, and generation and supply often tended
to be by undertakings established by local authorities.
In 1948 all public utilities fell into the hands of nationalised bodies,
and the Mere gas works were acquired by the Southern Gas Board - one suspects
rather to the relief of its shareholders.
The
original Mere Gas and Coke Company was formed under a Deed of Settlement on 9
August 1837[i] between Charles
Lander, brewer, John Jupe gent [formerly linen man], Henry Jupe, tick
manufacturer, Charles Rumsey, gent [surgeon] and Edmond Lander, miller, with a
capital of 140 shares of £5 each. Strangely
the directors are stated to be a quite different list of men - Robert Cross,
John Mitchell, James Guster [?] & John Ford, all gentlemen, and The Rev
Samuel Little, minister of the Congregational Church.
Mitchell and Cross were farmers, and Ford was probably a blacksmith, but
at present Guster cannot be identified.
Whilst all the original signatories to the Deed, or their descendants,
appear as members of the 1866 company, none of this
group of "directors" seem to have had any connection with it.
It would be interesting to find out what their capacity really was;
certainly none of them were members of the commercial Establishment of the town.
Possibly they were merely acting as nominees for the purpose of forming the
Company.
The
company's works were just off
North Street
, in the lane facing the Methodist Chapel, built in 1846.
The site is open ground on the 1821 Enclosure map, but on the 1848 Tithe
Map, plot 1256, is described as Gas House, owner & occupier, Gas Co.
In the 1851 census, entry Back Lane 127, appears William White, 42 born
Wincanton, shoemaker & manager of gas works; he had 2 children, 16 & 11,
born in Wincanton & 3 more, aged 6 - 9, born in Mere, so that it would seem
that he came to the town c 1840. Harrods
Directory of 1865 shows Charles Lander, brewer, as manager of the Gas Works.
In
1990 Mr. Percy Brown, born 1903, said that his grandfather was the first manager
of the North St. Works, having previously worked for Charles Jupe at Hinks Mill,
and that he continued to manage the new works, being followed on his retirement
by his son[5].
So far, however he cannot be traced on the 1851 census.
Interestingly, the original buildings still stand.
They are simple workshop style buildings in the local stone, with little
to tell the passer-by of their original use.
The imaginative eye can possibly identify one of the buildings as likely
to have been the retort house, but nothing of the specialised plant has
survived.
The
Overseers accounts reveal that the town was first lit by gas in 1839.
On the first occasion £60 was voted, later reduced to £40 & to £25
by 1844. A rate of 1/= in the £ on
all properties in the town tithing valued £5 or over was charged at some stage.
In 1840 the Lighting & Watching Act was adopted, with Charles Jupe,
John Curtis, Hugh Cross, John Lander & James Down as inspectors, several of
them in due course becoming shareholders in the 1866 company!
It was presumably during this early period that the attractive lamp
standards, cast by the Coalbrookdale Comapny, were introduced.
One of these has been carefully conserved and stands a the rear of the
Library; the stumps of two others remain. Landers
provided purpose made direction pointers to place on them.
There seems to have been dissatisfaction with the lighting service, and
the gas rate was abandoned in 1845.
While
the building of the gasworks was a major item of capital expenditure, on their
own the works were no use without the laying of mains to carry the gas to the
streets and houses to be lit, and there must have been careful cost assessment
from time to time to decide whether a proposed consumer would on his own make
the laying of a main profitable - or whether the opportunity opened up would
attract enough new customers to justify the expense.
Margins seem to have been perilously fine.
Even
on what must have been a very small scale of production, the supply of coal must
have been a problem in pre-railway days.
It can only be assumed that supplies came from the
Somerset
coal fields around Radstock, 16 miles away; "sea" coal would have had
to come through Poole or
Weymouth
, 30 miles away, and canal borne coal via Trowbridge, so
Somerset
would have had an unassailable advantage. There
had been early use of coal in the district in Stuart times - it frequently
appears in the probate inventories, and presumably must also have come from
Somerset
. With what we know of the state of
the roads at the time it is almost certain that this early coal would have come
on the backs of packhorses, though by the time of the establishment of the gas
works the turnpikes had produced roads of a quality to carry wagons.
By the 1851 census 8 Mere men gave their occupations as coal carriers,
and a substantial share of their work must have been for the gas works.
In 1852 the railway reached Warminster; this would have brought coal
within more reasonable reach, and in 1859 the Salisbury & Yeovil Railway
[later incorporated into the LSWR] came to Semley and
Gillingham
. These developments will not only have lowered the cost of coal, but will have
given the gas company the choice of coals other than those from
Somerset
. Up till 1875 coal was
apparently bought through agents or merchants, but in that year direct purchase
from the collieries began. In
later years all the coal came to Gillingham by rail, largely from Yorkshire;
in post-nationalisation days the wheel had come full circle, with half
the coal used having come by road from Norton Hill Colliery in
Somerset
, itself shortly to face closure.
By
the mid 1860's the original works were proving inadequate for the demand,
especially as Miss Julia Chafyn Grove is said to have paid for pipes to be laid
to Zeals House, over 2 miles away, and to have found that the supply would not
get there[ii]. Accordingly a new
company was formed, in which she became a large shareholder.
In fact, it is not clear at present whether in fact mains were laid as
far out as Zeals House.
The
new company, Mere Gas, Coal & Coke Company, (Limited) was incorporated on 10
April 1866, no2983c, with an authorised capital of £1,500 in £1 shares, of
which 1,386 had been issued by 1869. Copies
of the original Memorandum & Articles, and of the published accounts from
1866 to 1930, are held in the Wiltshire Record Office[iii]].
The original subscribers were Rev. Charles Townsend, vicar of Mere (50 shares),
Charles Jupe, silk throwster (200), John Farley Rutter, solicitor, secretary of
the company (100), William Thomas Standerwick, currier (50), Edward Austin Card,
bank manager (50), Henry Wickham, accountant (50) & Charles Lander, brewer
(50). These were the leading
lights in the trade of the town at the time.
Miss Chafyn Grove took up 100 shares and George Gray, a baker giving his
address as Haymarket in
London
, 200. In addition, shares,
often in very small amounts, were
taken up at the outset by nearly all the various tradesmen of the town. Charles
Card, father of E.A., who had just retired from his drapery business took 40,
while John Walton & Isaiah Child who had bought it took up 5 each. Charles
Jupe's son Isaiah took up 100. All the surnames of the subscribers to the 1837
Deed are shareholders in the new company, but none of those in the puzzling list
of directors appear. 250 of
these new shares were issued, fully paid up, to the members of the old company,
probably the names shown as the original subscribers; obviously they took up
additional new shares as well. On
the other side of the account appears £250 paid for the old works, mains
&c.
On
5 April 1867 Charles Jupe & E.A.Card, presumably as nominees for the
company, bought from the Duchy of Cornwall for £98 a plot off
Mill Lane
at the N end of the "
Island
", the site of a cottage, previously occupied by Thomas Forward,,
a gardener's labourer[iv] .
Later accounts refer to an annuity of £6 pa to Thomas Forward and his
widow, from which it would appear that he was the copyholder under the Duchy and
had had to be bought out. Tenders
had been invited on 17 April 1866 for the erection of a gas works and laying
mains in the town. Having paid 10
guineas to Messrs Holmes for Plans, the company paid contractors, Messrs Porter
& Co, £691 for the building of the new works, though reference is made in
the first Annual report to difficulties and delays consequent upon the
Contractor's unsatisfactory progress.
The
new works came into operation on 9th November 1867. By the end of 1868 the
works, and an adjoining dwelling house, stood in the books at £1,084, and the
mains at £309. £130 had been
received for the site of the old works, and £17 for old iron.
Porters had been paid their final £100 on the contract,
Mr Hindley [of Bourton?] £80 as Engineer, Mr. Lander £79 for mains
laying and Mr. Coward £80 on account for building the house.
Income for the year was £243 from private consumers, £13 for public
lighting & £4 for coke. Coals
had cost £102. Public lighting was
regarded as unremunerative, but of benefit to the town!.
A dividend of 9d per share was declared.
By
the 1871 census James Brown, 24, appears on the
Island
as "Gasmaker"; he is still there, but now manager of the works, in
1891. Percy Brown, referred to
earlier, said that his father took over the managership from the grandfather
about 1914; the indication is that there was some confusion in his mind about
the managership of the first works, and that it was the new works that James,
the grandfather took over.
In
some ways the choice of site seems strange.
The Island is very low-lying, bounded on either side by the two streams
of the Shreen Water running from the Town Mill to
Edge
Bridge
; although flooding is rare, the site is only inches above the level of the
streams. This meant that whereas
normal practice was for the gas "producers" to be set in pits beneath
the retort house, which would have been at ground level to avoid having to hoist
the coal to the retorts, at Mere the producers had to be built above ground, to
avoid danger of catastrophic damage due to flooding, with the retorts at first
floor level, so that all the coal had to be laboriously raised by hand to feed
them. The buildings were all
of the local stone, the use of brick still being rare in Mere until later in the
century.
At
various times over the years further land on the
Island
was bought for extensions, and also for staff housing.
From the admittedly indistinct detail of the 1st edition 6" OS Map
it would seem that the original 7,500 cu ft holder was at the S end of the
original plot; later a 12,000 cu. ft. column guided holder was built
on the plot immediately to the South, with a below-ground brick tank
In 1885 the original holder, now 18 years old, was too small and a second
one was needed for safety and continuity, and the following
year a good second hand 7,000 cu ft holder
was bought from the Ringwood Gas Co. for £40. It was installed in a brick and
cement tank by Porter & Co of
Lincoln
, the engineers responsible for the earlier installation.
By 1898 the first holder, after 31 years use, had become dangerous, with
holes frequently appearing in the top plates! The framework was reported sound,
but all the iron sheets of the top needed replacement.
It seems to have continued in use till 1905 when Porter & Co
installed a new 11,000 cu ft holder at a total cost of £660.
Much later a far larger, 30,000 cu ft capacity, 2 lift spiral guided
holder was built at the N end of the works, roughly on the site of the first
holder. It was presumably this one
which was out of commission for two
weeks in 1947 when the water froze inside it snapping the outlet pipe.
The Fire Brigade were called in to pump out some 200,000 gals of water,
and later to replace it and the town had no gas during the period.[v]
This figure sounds to be rather suspect - it is in fact approximately the
same as the gas capacity of the holder, which was never filled with water.
The latter was only around the base as a seal; had the holder been filled
with this amount of water the weight of water alone would have been some 112
tons, and the effect on the foundations disastrous!
It seems that the second holder was out of commission by this time; it
was finally demolished in 1955.
Over
the years improvements were made to the remainder of the plant, with retorts
frequently needing replacement. In
their final form the works had a stone built retort house, holding two beds of
six hand charged stop-ended retorts each 22" x 16"" x 9ft
long; There were also atmospheric condensers, a Livesey washer & tower
scrubber, with purifier boxes, and it seems likely that there was a gas engine
driving the exhauster. The plant
would have had a maximum capacity of some 100,000 cu ft per day.
In 1896 new gates "improved the appearance of the works" and
iron girders were put across the river to prevent collapse of the walls;
the stone pillars of the gateway and the iron girders remain to this day.
In
1869 gross receipts were £270, the charge for gas was reduced to 7/6d per
1,000cu ft.and £60 was spent on building a house on the site, presumably for
the manager. In 1870 new mains were
laid along
Church Street
to the Old Vicarage, from
Landers
Bridge
to the Turnpike Gate, and from the works to "the corner near George King's
shop" - presumably near
Edge
Bridge
. A first dividend of 4% was paid,
but this was passed the following year when £90 was spent on new retorts.
In 1872 the 4% dividend was restored, and was then regularly paid till
1877.
Also
in 1877, 2 new street lights were
installed on
Hindon Road
, but the directors stated that public lighting was not remunerative.
This sentiment became a recurring theme, but it was accepted that by
extending the system to provide these lights the mains reached new private
customers. In 1868 the
Overseers collected a Lighting Rate of £40, which had increased to £55 by
1855. Of this latter figure, £47 was paid to the Company, who were to receive
around £50 pa from this source for most of the rest of the century.
The original arrangement was that 34
lamps would be lit for 132 nights @ 25/= each, with the large lamp in the Market
Place being supplied by meter. This
was later modified to 24 lights @ 25/=, with the rest at £1 each. By 1875 there
were 36 public lights. The
Inspectors contracted with James Farthing of
Salisbury St.
to keep the lamps glazed @ 9d per square.
In
1873, with a great advance in the price of coal, charges were increased to 9/=
per 1,000'; this was the highest figure charged, and was shortly after reduced
to encourage consumption, falling to 6/8d in 1875.
The mains were extended to
Edge
Bridge
& beyond Hunts Close, to the bottom of
Pettridge Lane
at the corner with the Lynch, and to the bend in the
Shaftesbury Road
.
In
1875, when direct purchase of coal from the collieries began 213 tons were
bought, of which 55 were sold retail.
In later years the Company ceased to retail coal, confining itself to the
sale of coke, tar and ashes.
By
1876 business was expanding; 3 new retorts were installed, and the directors
were warning that larger mains might be called for.
The following year fresh and enlarged mains were laid from the junction
near the Grange along
Dark Lane
to
Angel Lane
. Charges were progressively reduced
to 5/= per 1,000' and in 1878 the dividend was increased to 5%, though this was
only to last for 2 years. An
independent report on the Company was commissioned from the manager of the
Sherborne Company, who was very satisfied - strangely in view of what was to
come later. Supplies were interrupted that year by the large main breaking owing
to severe snow.
For
the first time, gas stoves were coming into use. In 1879 in their report the
directors stated their wish to to encourage use of these stoves, which were
generally owned by the company and rented to the consumer, a procedure common
throughout both the gas and electricity industries till between the Wars, when
hire-purchase became more common. The
first 3 stoves were installed in 1880. Mr.
Maurice Brown, the retired manager of the works, still living in 1958, could
remember them, each one being some 2 cwt of black cast iron.[vi]
By
1881 consumption had increased, with receipts of £303, but problems were
looming. More gas was being manufactured than actually consumed, and there were
signs of leakage in various parts of the town.
For this, blame was laid on the recent installation of mains drainage;
apparently when the drains were laid the gas mains were not supported, and in
consequence leakages were conveying gas into the drainage pipes!
[Strangely enough, a similar trouble is said to have cropped up in
Church Street
around 1948, though it is not entirely clear that on that occasion it was not
sewer gas to blame.] Moreover,
pressure was insufficient - when the Church was lighted all consumers nearby
suffered a lessening of their lights, and
North Street
suffered similarly. A 3" main
was therefore laid in
Church St
and in
Manor Road
. In 1883 large main pipes were
bought, and 550 yds of 4" & 3" mains were replaced with 6"
& 4", with a 5" main from the works to
Dark Lane
, and for the first time stop cocks were installed to enable areas to be
isolated. The old small pipes were
retained for re-use. All this
involved considerable expense; the dividend was reduced to 2 1/2%
and an issue of Preference Shares was made, paying 4%, increased to 5% if that
or a higher rate was paid on the Ordinary Shares.
A pencil note indicates that 2.1 million Cu Ft of gas was made in 1883,
with total sales of £370.
In
1885 the 5% dividend was restored, but warnings were given about the need for
further capital expenditure, such as the need to replace the first gasholder
and. enlargement of the purifying area. Some adjoining cottage property was
bought, so that the works was now surrounded on 3 sides by public roads.
The Ringwood gasholder was installed and improvements made to the
purifying plant, the whole operation being supervised by T.P.Lilley of
Gillingham, for a fee of £8.8.=. The
dividend was reduced to 4%, paid in that year in the form of Preference shares
to conserve cash, and a further issue of these shares was made, bringing the
total capital up to £2,000.
Over
this time, there had been a number of changes in the board.
Charles Lander, W.T.Standerwick and Charles Jupe had died, and the Rev
C.H.Townsend had left the town, and they were replaced by I.M.Jupe, Charles
Lander Junr, the Rev E.G.Wyld and William Forward, who himself left the country
in 1881. The auditor, John Phillips
left Mere, and was succeeded by Robert Goldsborough, who had in fact been
signing the accounts for the previous two years.
In 1886 I.M.Jupe resigned, to be replaced by Clarence E. Rutter, who also
acted as Secretary for many years. Two years later, Henry Wickham died, to be
succeeded by Thomas Standerwick. Goldsborough
was followed as auditor by John
Sawtell, manager of the local bank.
In
1887 the Company bought Lynch House, overlooking the works, for use of the
manager; as well as giving him a good view of his charge, the domestic
arrangements were described as far more healthful and comfortable.
Mrs. Dorothy George, widow of the last manager of the Company, continued
to live there till recently. Various
cottages around the works were occupied by members of the staff.
By
1889 the directors felt able to increase the dividend to 41/2%,
though capital outlay continued. The
iron retorts were replaced with clay ones, some new mains were needed, and
further public lights were installed, including a powerful Brays Triplet lamp
near the bacon factory, which shed a a far reaching light. New mains were laid
in connection with lamps near the Walnut, in
Boar St
and in
Cemetery Lane
, with the hope of an extension to Waterside.
The retort house was further extended [its roof was badly damaged in a
gale in 1893]and a larger coal shed erected. By 1891 private sales were £414,
public lighting £49 & sales of by products £59;
coal cost £249 and wages £76. Once
again, warnings were sounded of the coming need for more outlay - mains needing
overhaul, the river wall in a weak state, the
Castle St
main damaged by frost. Consumption
held up, despite the closure of the Silk Works.
In
1897 by which time John Walton had died and Charles Lander and the Rev E.G.Wyld
left the town, the Rev E. Borradaile having been chairman for 2 years, E.A.Card,
an original director, former manager of the local bank and son of the founder of
Waltons business, became chairman and expressed satisfaction with the state of
the works after 30 years - in spite
of the fact that the next year he was to call attention to the dangerous
condition of the original holder, and of the top of the chimney which was giving
way, and the retorts requiring rearrangement yet again!
In
1899, J.F.Rutter, apart from Card the last of the original directors, died, with
no immediate replacement on the board; Edmund
Bracher, the retired chemist became auditor, and for the first time a fee of £10.10.=
was paid to the directors and auditor.
Over
the next 3 years the necessary work
was carried out on the retorts, the condenser and purifier were replaced and
penny in the slot meters introduced. New pipes were bought in 1903 for enlarging
the mains in
Water Street
, but not laid until the following year owing to continued wet weather.
In 1902 the dividend was increased to 6%, while the price of gas was
reduced to 5/3d per thousand with a discount of 3d for prompt payment.
By
1904 receipts had increased to £670, new mains had been laid in Water St
connecting to Hazzards Hill, and the Parish had asked for a new main along North
Road to feed a light in Steep St, which would also bring in a number of new
customers. There were now 18 cookers out on hire, and the site of 2 more
neighbouring cottages had been bought. However,
the old holder was finally condemned and the new one erected. Further preference
shares were issued to cover the cost, bringing the issued capital up to its
final figure of £2,500. In
1910 the 3" cast iron mains in
Castle St.
, laid in 1867 were nearly worn out, and were replaced in wrought iron
In
1911, the last year for which detailed accounts have been traced, Card is still
in the chair, with C.E.Rutter as director/secretary.
The other directors were A.R.White, Tom Norris, & Thomas Standerwick,
all well known local figures. Bracher
having died, F.D.Raymond, the headmaster of the
British
School
, was auditor. That year receipts
were £750, plus £109 from the sale of by-products; coal had cost £392, and
wages were £155.
By
1915 the company was making 5.5 million cu ft per year, using some 600 tons of
coal at around 21/= per ton. There
were some 3 miles of mains. The standard charge was 4/9d per 1,000 cu ft; 168
customers were supplied, 68 of them on slot meters, paying an additional 3d per
1,000ft. By contrast the 88 customers who had stoves, which probably covered
both cookers and fires, paid 4/6d per 1,000.
By now the town had 50 public street lamps, paid for at 5/= per 1,000 ft.
Mr J. Brown was manager of the works; he was followed by Mr.A.George, who
remained as manager to the end of the works' life.
In
1930 A.R.White was chairman, with C.L.Rutter & Thomas Standerwick as
directors. The dividend had been reduced to 5%, and the directors were very
anxious that shares in the company should continue to be held by local people -
it is hard to think that they would have been seen as an attractive investment
by anyone else, and the directors' appeal for those wishing to sell to ask the
company to find buyers locally sounds a counsel of desperation.
In
December 1931 the Wessex Electricity Company brought electricity to Mere for the
first time. Initially 84 consumers
were supplied from a transformer station, the power coming from Southampton via
Shaftesbury and
Gillingham
[vii].
This
competition from what was seen as a cleaner and more flexible source of light
and power posed a serious threat to the gas industry which tiny operations such
as Mere were ill-equipped to counter. Indeed by the late 1940's there were many
who saw the industry as a whole as being in terminal decline.
They were not to foresee the growth of central heating and the
development of newer methods of gas generation, culminating in the use of
natural gas - these were far in the future.
By
the end of WWII , and with nationalisation looming, the company was in a poor
way. The Accounts for March 1948
show the freehold works, with dwelling houses & cottages at a written down
value of £2,076, and plant written down to £3,971.
Against these were mortgages of £2,470 & a bank overdraft of £2,412,
charged on the remaining assets of the company.
The trading account for the year had produced a profit of £1, but
various overheads turned this into a loss of £535;
despite this, dividends of £110 were paid from reserves, which were thus
exhausted. By now the directors were
C.L.Rutter, solicitor, W. Burden, nurseryman & M.J.Brown.
In
1949 all gas undertakings were nationalised, the vesting date being 1st May; in
the last 13 months of trading the company made 13.6 million cu ft of gas, using
1,102 tons of coal, but despite an advance from the newly formed Southern Gas
Board of £8,738 made a loss of £910. This
was the general pattern for the small country gas works, which were soon being
subsidised by the larger urban undertakings.
The
new owners, the Dorset Group of the Southern Gas Board, set about improving the
equipment, replacing the gas engine with an electrically driven exhauster, and
output gradually increased, from 11.4m cu ft in 1950/51
to 12.6m in 1953/4. The
efficiency was regarded as reasonable for the type of works; 19% of the coke
made was consumed in the producers, and up to 70 therms of gas made per ton of
coal.. Overall, however, the operation was uneconomic;
the gas cost about 22.5d per therm to make, but distribution &c
brought the total cost to 35d, against a selling price of 22.5d.
Obviously
this position could not continue indefinitely, and the obvious answer was
concentration of production onto the larger works.
However, shortage of capital - and indeed of the iron necessary for new
mains - meant that it was some years before the Board could tackle the problem.
It was in 1957 that a 4" cast iron medium pressure main was laid
from
Gillingham
, linking Mere to the Board's mains
network.
With
the new main in operation, the works closed on 10 November 1957. Over the next 2
years most of the land was sold, reducing the site to the original 1867 site;
most of the original buildings were demolished, and a modern brick building was
erected to house the necessary governors and boosters for automatic operation,
with the spiral guided holder remaining for a while.
In 1988 the main from
Gillingham
was replaced in plastic and enlarged to cope with the increased demand on the
conversion to natural gas. One or
two nondescript buildings remain in a decrepit condition behind the iron gates
of the second works, but the only evidence of the past is the insignificant
housing of the governor and the remains of a gas light by the gates.
Houses
are now built on most of the site, but
amongst them are the houses which were once occupied by the very small work
force. Overlooking the site is the house formerly that of the manager of the
works. In two bungalows at the S end
of the site live the sons of Harry Whatley who describe the fantastic weights of
coal their father shovelled into the retorts during the many years that he
worked there. It seems that the
company provided houses for its employees and that they were able to buy them on
closure.
One
innovation which the Gas Board made was the provision of a showroom in 1955 to
sell appliances and to give a facility for the payment of accounts.
Rather than establishing a purpose built fully staffed showroom, the
Board came to an arrangement with Mrs. Genevieve Anna Westcott for part of her
shop in
Castle St
to be used. She provided a shop
window to display appliances, on the sale of which she received 7.5% commission,
plus 6d for each account settled through her.
This arrangement ceased after a short time.
Half
a century after its dissolution it is interesting to re-assess the performance
of the local Gas Company. At
the time of nationalisation there was much uninformed criticism of the lack of
past investment, resulting in the need, which we have seen, for heavy
expenditure by the new Board. This lack of investment was frequently blamed on
greed on the part of the shareholders. However,
when we look at the figures known to us of the Company's performance over its 80
year life, we see that no dividends were paid till 1870. For the next 7 years a
dividend of 4% was declared, raised to 5% in 1878, reduced to 4% again in 1880
and further reduced to 21/2%
from 1882 to 1885. A 4% dividend was resumed in 1886, but to conserve cash, it
was paid in the form of 5% Preference shares - there had already been an issue
of £500 of these shares in 1883 to help pay for the mains renewal.
From 1890 a 5% dividend was resumed, increased to 6% in 1902; this seems
to have been the regular rate till 1930. when it was reduced once more to 5%,
the level in force at the time of nationalisation.
Thus fairly high risk venture capital was being found at little more than
mortgage rates. Nor could the
directors be accused of milking the Company - no directors or audit fees were
paid till the payment of £10.10.= in 1899, and thereafter their remuneration
was very modest indeed.
Who
were these altruistic shareholders and directors?
The original subscribers on the formation of the second company were
virtually all local tradespeople; apart from two small exceptions the local
farming community were not represented.
The first chairman was the Rev. C.H.Townsend, vicar till 1881, followed
by his successor the Rev. B.A.Wyld till 1890.
There is nothing to suggest that the pattern of shareholding changed much
over the life of the company - indeed the shares can hardly have enjoyed much of
a market, and unfortunately, though on a couple of occasions there are mentions
of small holdings being offered at property auctions, on the death of
shareholders, we do not know what they fetched.
It is pretty certain that the shares were not a particularly attractive
investment on purely commercial grounds. One thing that is noticeable is that as
the years went by the directors tended to be found amongst the town's
non-conformist community. The names
of Jupe, Goldsbrough, Bracher, Burden, Raymond and Standerwick appear regularly,
as do the Rutter family who for many years provided the Secretary.
This is probably not an unexpected finding, as non-conformity was usually
particularly strong amongst the traders in country towns.
[i]
Information from John Horne of
Southampton
, formerly of Southern Gas, to whom I am grateful for
much help
[ii]
Mrs. D. George, in “The Story of Mere”, 1958 p134 et seq.
[iv]
Tithe Map & 1851 census
[vii]
“Mere Memories”, George & Doddington
It
is probably safe to say that the majority of homes in Mere are to-day heated by
gas, and that a considerable number of them cook with gas, though almost
certainly none of them have been lit by that medium for nearly half a century.
Gas, however, first became available to the town some 160 years ago, and
at the time was a revolutionary medium that was to have a profound effect on
everyday life, particularly on that of the housewife.
This miracle making substance was a different article altogether from
that used to-day, and at first was employed for completely different uses;
its manufacture, method of supply, and end use were to change
dramatically, whilst it was originally to grow in public esteem, then to be
accepted as a fact of everyday life, for a time to lose popularity, and at last
to be reborn with a new image.
The
first practical distillation of gas from coal for lighting purposes was carried
out by William Murdoch in Cornwall around the end of the XVIIIc, and the idea
rapidly found favour, with the streets of Westminster being lit by gas in 1815;
rapidly the potential was realised, and all over the country plants were set up
to provide the new amenity. The gas
in question was produced by filling "retorts" - long cast iron
cylinders with closed ends - with coal, and then heating them to such an extent
that the coal was broken down into its constituent materials, of which the gas
was the most important, though valuable by-products in the form of coke, tar,
and various chemicals were also produced.
From the retorts, which were arranged in stacks in a retort house, the
gas passed through various processes to clean it and to recover some of these
by-products, before being collected in a gasholder, frequently incorrectly
called a gasometer. This was a large
cylinder, or set of cylinders arranged telescopically within each other, whose
base was sealed in a water tank, and in which gas was accumulated as in a
reservoir before passing through pipes [the mains] to the purchaser.
This
coal-gas, often referred to technically as Towns gas, required careful handling
as it was of necessity highly inflammable and as a result was at one time looked
on with some fear, until its advantages were appreciated.
Initially it was used solely for lighting purposes;
in the home it passed through pipes to small fittings incorporating a jet
which produced a flame so shaped that it became commonly called the "batswing"
burner, and for a long time it was these naked flames, adding a further hazard
to household life, that produced the gaslight of the Victorian Age.
Some of the earliest users of gas were the public authorities who found
the new medium a great improvement on the old oil lamps which had for centuries
provided the only street lighting. Indeed,
unless there was a local authority prepared to commit itself to gas street
lighting, thus giving the supplier a regular outlet on which he could depend for
income, there was little point in setting up the plant in the first place.
The light given by the batswing burners depended on the gas containing a
certain amount of carbon which the heat of the flame would cause to glow, and
the system was far from efficient. During
the last two decades of the XIXc devices were made to increase the level of heat
at the fitting, and to use it to heat a specially made "mantle" which
glowed bright white when heated. This
incandescent mantle - a frail structure of
special clay - will be remembered by the older ones amongst us as being prone to
shatter at a touch! With
the gas being formulated to produce adequate heat for these mantles to be
efficient, it was realised that there was scope for the use of gas for cooking,
and the gas stove, with oven and rings, began to drive out the kitchen range
from the house, though it was slow to gain acceptance.
Gas also became a useful power source for business and industry with the
development of stationary engines working by the combustion of gas.
Gas
had become the most popular domestic fuel in towns by the end of the XIXc, but a
new competitor then appeared in the form of electricity.
Strangely, many of the first users of electricity were to generate their
own supply by fitting generators to gas engines, but soon after the end of WWI
local generating stations rapidly appeared.
The cleanliness, safety and convenience of this new power source was a
serious threat to the gas companies, and gas came to have an old fashioned
image, with the result that by the end of WWII many seriously thought it had
come to the end of its days.
However
developments in the petro-chemical industry, and the opening up of off-shore oil
fields around the
UK
, tapping into vast underground reservoirs of natural gas, led in the mid XXc
to the replacement of Towns gas by natural gas, which needed far less
treatment before passsing into the mains, though handled at far higher
pressures. This new gas was cleaner
and, if properly handled, safer than its predecessor [Towns gas was poisonous
and a favourite suicide choice, but natural gas is non-toxic], and, as a source
of heat but not of light, it has restored the image of gas to favour once more.
Mere
was to be fairly early in the field in making use of gas for lighting, and the
first company to produce it was formed in 1837.
It had a life of just under thirty years, to be followed by a
reincarnation, which was to continue in operation until after WWII.
Gas production was invariably a matter for private enterprise, and
companies were formed all over the country, ranging from the vast Metropolitan
Gas Light and Coke Company Limited down to tiny operations running on a
shoestring. When electricity
came into favour, attitudes had changed, and generation and supply often tended
to be by undertakings established by local authorities.
In 1948 all public utilities fell into the hands of nationalised bodies,
and the Mere gas works were acquired by the Southern Gas Board - one suspects
rather to the relief of its shareholders.
The
original Mere Gas and Coke Company was formed under a Deed of Settlement on 9
August 1837[i] between Charles
Lander, brewer, John Jupe gent [formerly linen man], Henry Jupe, tick
manufacturer, Charles Rumsey, gent [surgeon] and Edmond Lander, miller, with a
capital of 140 shares of £5 each. Strangely
the directors are stated to be a quite different list of men - Robert Cross,
John Mitchell, James Guster [?] & John Ford, all gentlemen, and The Rev
Samuel Little, minister of the Congregational Church.
Mitchell and Cross were farmers, and Ford was probably a blacksmith, but
at present Guster cannot be identified.
Whilst all the original signatories to the Deed, or their descendants,
appear as members of the 1866 company, none of this
group of "directors" seem to have had any connection with it.
It would be interesting to find out what their capacity really was;
certainly none of them were members of the commercial Establishment of the town.
Possibly they were merely acting as nominees for the purpose of forming the
Company.
The
company's works were just off
North Street
, in the lane facing the Methodist Chapel, built in 1846.
The site is open ground on the 1821 Enclosure map, but on the 1848 Tithe
Map, plot 1256, is described as Gas House, owner & occupier, Gas Co.
In the 1851 census, entry Back Lane 127, appears William White, 42 born
Wincanton, shoemaker & manager of gas works; he had 2 children, 16 & 11,
born in Wincanton & 3 more, aged 6 - 9, born in Mere, so that it would seem
that he came to the town c 1840. Harrods
Directory of 1865 shows Charles Lander, brewer, as manager of the Gas Works.
In
1990 Mr. Percy Brown, born 1903, said that his grandfather was the first manager
of the North St. Works, having previously worked for Charles Jupe at Hinks Mill,
and that he continued to manage the new works, being followed on his retirement
by his son[5].
So far, however he cannot be traced on the 1851 census.
Interestingly, the original buildings still stand.
They are simple workshop style buildings in the local stone, with little
to tell the passer-by of their original use.
The imaginative eye can possibly identify one of the buildings as likely
to have been the retort house, but nothing of the specialised plant has
survived.
The
Overseers accounts reveal that the town was first lit by gas in 1839.
On the first occasion £60 was voted, later reduced to £40 & to £25
by 1844. A rate of 1/= in the £ on
all properties in the town tithing valued £5 or over was charged at some stage.
In 1840 the Lighting & Watching Act was adopted, with Charles Jupe,
John Curtis, Hugh Cross, John Lander & James Down as inspectors, several of
them in due course becoming shareholders in the 1866 company!
It was presumably during this early period that the attractive lamp
standards, cast by the Coalbrookdale Comapny, were introduced.
One of these has been carefully conserved and stands a the rear of the
Library; the stumps of two others remain. Landers
provided purpose made direction pointers to place on them.
There seems to have been dissatisfaction with the lighting service, and
the gas rate was abandoned in 1845.
While
the building of the gasworks was a major item of capital expenditure, on their
own the works were no use without the laying of mains to carry the gas to the
streets and houses to be lit, and there must have been careful cost assessment
from time to time to decide whether a proposed consumer would on his own make
the laying of a main profitable - or whether the opportunity opened up would
attract enough new customers to justify the expense.
Margins seem to have been perilously fine.
Even
on what must have been a very small scale of production, the supply of coal must
have been a problem in pre-railway days.
It can only be assumed that supplies came from the
Somerset
coal fields around Radstock, 16 miles away; "sea" coal would have had
to come through Poole or
Weymouth
, 30 miles away, and canal borne coal via Trowbridge, so
Somerset
would have had an unassailable advantage. There
had been early use of coal in the district in Stuart times - it frequently
appears in the probate inventories, and presumably must also have come from
Somerset
. With what we know of the state of
the roads at the time it is almost certain that this early coal would have come
on the backs of packhorses, though by the time of the establishment of the gas
works the turnpikes had produced roads of a quality to carry wagons.
By the 1851 census 8 Mere men gave their occupations as coal carriers,
and a substantial share of their work must have been for the gas works.
In 1852 the railway reached Warminster; this would have brought coal
within more reasonable reach, and in 1859 the Salisbury & Yeovil Railway
[later incorporated into the LSWR] came to Semley and
Gillingham
. These developments will not only have lowered the cost of coal, but will have
given the gas company the choice of coals other than those from
Somerset
. Up till 1875 coal was
apparently bought through agents or merchants, but in that year direct purchase
from the collieries began. In
later years all the coal came to Gillingham by rail, largely from Yorkshire;
in post-nationalisation days the wheel had come full circle, with half
the coal used having come by road from Norton Hill Colliery in
Somerset
, itself shortly to face closure.
By
the mid 1860's the original works were proving inadequate for the demand,
especially as Miss Julia Chafyn Grove is said to have paid for pipes to be laid
to Zeals House, over 2 miles away, and to have found that the supply would not
get there[ii]. Accordingly a new
company was formed, in which she became a large shareholder.
In fact, it is not clear at present whether in fact mains were laid as
far out as Zeals House.
The
new company, Mere Gas, Coal & Coke Company, (Limited) was incorporated on 10
April 1866, no2983c, with an authorised capital of £1,500 in £1 shares, of
which 1,386 had been issued by 1869. Copies
of the original Memorandum & Articles, and of the published accounts from
1866 to 1930, are held in the Wiltshire Record Office[iii]].
The original subscribers were Rev. Charles Townsend, vicar of Mere (50 shares),
Charles Jupe, silk throwster (200), John Farley Rutter, solicitor, secretary of
the company (100), William Thomas Standerwick, currier (50), Edward Austin Card,
bank manager (50), Henry Wickham, accountant (50) & Charles Lander, brewer
(50). These were the leading
lights in the trade of the town at the time.
Miss Chafyn Grove took up 100 shares and George Gray, a baker giving his
address as Haymarket in
London
, 200. In addition, shares,
often in very small amounts, were
taken up at the outset by nearly all the various tradesmen of the town. Charles
Card, father of E.A., who had just retired from his drapery business took 40,
while John Walton & Isaiah Child who had bought it took up 5 each. Charles
Jupe's son Isaiah took up 100. All the surnames of the subscribers to the 1837
Deed are shareholders in the new company, but none of those in the puzzling list
of directors appear. 250 of
these new shares were issued, fully paid up, to the members of the old company,
probably the names shown as the original subscribers; obviously they took up
additional new shares as well. On
the other side of the account appears £250 paid for the old works, mains
&c.
On
5 April 1867 Charles Jupe & E.A.Card, presumably as nominees for the
company, bought from the Duchy of Cornwall for £98 a plot off
Mill Lane
at the N end of the "
Island
", the site of a cottage, previously occupied by Thomas Forward,,
a gardener's labourer[iv] .
Later accounts refer to an annuity of £6 pa to Thomas Forward and his
widow, from which it would appear that he was the copyholder under the Duchy and
had had to be bought out. Tenders
had been invited on 17 April 1866 for the erection of a gas works and laying
mains in the town. Having paid 10
guineas to Messrs Holmes for Plans, the company paid contractors, Messrs Porter
& Co, £691 for the building of the new works, though reference is made in
the first Annual report to difficulties and delays consequent upon the
Contractor's unsatisfactory progress.
The
new works came into operation on 9th November 1867. By the end of 1868 the
works, and an adjoining dwelling house, stood in the books at £1,084, and the
mains at £309. £130 had been
received for the site of the old works, and £17 for old iron.
Porters had been paid their final £100 on the contract,
Mr Hindley [of Bourton?] £80 as Engineer, Mr. Lander £79 for mains
laying and Mr. Coward £80 on account for building the house.
Income for the year was £243 from private consumers, £13 for public
lighting & £4 for coke. Coals
had cost £102. Public lighting was
regarded as unremunerative, but of benefit to the town!.
A dividend of 9d per share was declared.
By
the 1871 census James Brown, 24, appears on the
Island
as "Gasmaker"; he is still there, but now manager of the works, in
1891. Percy Brown, referred to
earlier, said that his father took over the managership from the grandfather
about 1914; the indication is that there was some confusion in his mind about
the managership of the first works, and that it was the new works that James,
the grandfather took over.
In
some ways the choice of site seems strange.
The Island is very low-lying, bounded on either side by the two streams
of the Shreen Water running from the Town Mill to
Edge
Bridge
; although flooding is rare, the site is only inches above the level of the
streams. This meant that whereas
normal practice was for the gas "producers" to be set in pits beneath
the retort house, which would have been at ground level to avoid having to hoist
the coal to the retorts, at Mere the producers had to be built above ground, to
avoid danger of catastrophic damage due to flooding, with the retorts at first
floor level, so that all the coal had to be laboriously raised by hand to feed
them. The buildings were all
of the local stone, the use of brick still being rare in Mere until later in the
century.
At
various times over the years further land on the
Island
was bought for extensions, and also for staff housing.
From the admittedly indistinct detail of the 1st edition 6" OS Map
it would seem that the original 7,500 cu ft holder was at the S end of the
original plot; later a 12,000 cu. ft. column guided holder was built
on the plot immediately to the South, with a below-ground brick tank
In 1885 the original holder, now 18 years old, was too small and a second
one was needed for safety and continuity, and the following
year a good second hand 7,000 cu ft holder
was bought from the Ringwood Gas Co. for £40. It was installed in a brick and
cement tank by Porter & Co of
Lincoln
, the engineers responsible for the earlier installation.
By 1898 the first holder, after 31 years use, had become dangerous, with
holes frequently appearing in the top plates! The framework was reported sound,
but all the iron sheets of the top needed replacement.
It seems to have continued in use till 1905 when Porter & Co
installed a new 11,000 cu ft holder at a total cost of £660.
Much later a far larger, 30,000 cu ft capacity, 2 lift spiral guided
holder was built at the N end of the works, roughly on the site of the first
holder. It was presumably this one
which was out of commission for two
weeks in 1947 when the water froze inside it snapping the outlet pipe.
The Fire Brigade were called in to pump out some 200,000 gals of water,
and later to replace it and the town had no gas during the period.[v]
This figure sounds to be rather suspect - it is in fact approximately the
same as the gas capacity of the holder, which was never filled with water.
The latter was only around the base as a seal; had the holder been filled
with this amount of water the weight of water alone would have been some 112
tons, and the effect on the foundations disastrous!
It seems that the second holder was out of commission by this time; it
was finally demolished in 1955.
Over
the years improvements were made to the remainder of the plant, with retorts
frequently needing replacement. In
their final form the works had a stone built retort house, holding two beds of
six hand charged stop-ended retorts each 22" x 16"" x 9ft
long; There were also atmospheric condensers, a Livesey washer & tower
scrubber, with purifier boxes, and it seems likely that there was a gas engine
driving the exhauster. The plant
would have had a maximum capacity of some 100,000 cu ft per day.
In 1896 new gates "improved the appearance of the works" and
iron girders were put across the river to prevent collapse of the walls;
the stone pillars of the gateway and the iron girders remain to this day.
In
1869 gross receipts were £270, the charge for gas was reduced to 7/6d per
1,000cu ft.and £60 was spent on building a house on the site, presumably for
the manager. In 1870 new mains were
laid along
Church Street
to the Old Vicarage, from
Landers
Bridge
to the Turnpike Gate, and from the works to "the corner near George King's
shop" - presumably near
Edge
Bridge
. A first dividend of 4% was paid,
but this was passed the following year when £90 was spent on new retorts.
In 1872 the 4% dividend was restored, and was then regularly paid till
1877.
Also
in 1877, 2 new street lights were
installed on
Hindon Road
, but the directors stated that public lighting was not remunerative.
This sentiment became a recurring theme, but it was accepted that by
extending the system to provide these lights the mains reached new private
customers. In 1868 the
Overseers collected a Lighting Rate of £40, which had increased to £55 by
1855. Of this latter figure, £47 was paid to the Company, who were to receive
around £50 pa from this source for most of the rest of the century.
The original arrangement was that 34
lamps would be lit for 132 nights @ 25/= each, with the large lamp in the Market
Place being supplied by meter. This
was later modified to 24 lights @ 25/=, with the rest at £1 each. By 1875 there
were 36 public lights. The
Inspectors contracted with James Farthing of
Salisbury St.
to keep the lamps glazed @ 9d per square.
In
1873, with a great advance in the price of coal, charges were increased to 9/=
per 1,000'; this was the highest figure charged, and was shortly after reduced
to encourage consumption, falling to 6/8d in 1875.
The mains were extended to
Edge
Bridge
& beyond Hunts Close, to the bottom of
Pettridge Lane
at the corner with the Lynch, and to the bend in the
Shaftesbury Road
.
In
1875, when direct purchase of coal from the collieries began 213 tons were
bought, of which 55 were sold retail.
In later years the Company ceased to retail coal, confining itself to the
sale of coke, tar and ashes.
By
1876 business was expanding; 3 new retorts were installed, and the directors
were warning that larger mains might be called for.
The following year fresh and enlarged mains were laid from the junction
near the Grange along
Dark Lane
to
Angel Lane
. Charges were progressively reduced
to 5/= per 1,000' and in 1878 the dividend was increased to 5%, though this was
only to last for 2 years. An
independent report on the Company was commissioned from the manager of the
Sherborne Company, who was very satisfied - strangely in view of what was to
come later. Supplies were interrupted that year by the large main breaking owing
to severe snow.
For
the first time, gas stoves were coming into use. In 1879 in their report the
directors stated their wish to to encourage use of these stoves, which were
generally owned by the company and rented to the consumer, a procedure common
throughout both the gas and electricity industries till between the Wars, when
hire-purchase became more common. The
first 3 stoves were installed in 1880. Mr.
Maurice Brown, the retired manager of the works, still living in 1958, could
remember them, each one being some 2 cwt of black cast iron.[vi]
By
1881 consumption had increased, with receipts of £303, but problems were
looming. More gas was being manufactured than actually consumed, and there were
signs of leakage in various parts of the town.
For this, blame was laid on the recent installation of mains drainage;
apparently when the drains were laid the gas mains were not supported, and in
consequence leakages were conveying gas into the drainage pipes!
[Strangely enough, a similar trouble is said to have cropped up in
Church Street
around 1948, though it is not entirely clear that on that occasion it was not
sewer gas to blame.] Moreover,
pressure was insufficient - when the Church was lighted all consumers nearby
suffered a lessening of their lights, and
North Street
suffered similarly. A 3" main
was therefore laid in
Church St
and in
Manor Road
. In 1883 large main pipes were
bought, and 550 yds of 4" & 3" mains were replaced with 6"
& 4", with a 5" main from the works to
Dark Lane
, and for the first time stop cocks were installed to enable areas to be
isolated. The old small pipes were
retained for re-use. All this
involved considerable expense; the dividend was reduced to 2 1/2%
and an issue of Preference Shares was made, paying 4%, increased to 5% if that
or a higher rate was paid on the Ordinary Shares.
A pencil note indicates that 2.1 million Cu Ft of gas was made in 1883,
with total sales of £370.
In
1885 the 5% dividend was restored, but warnings were given about the need for
further capital expenditure, such as the need to replace the first gasholder
and. enlargement of the purifying area. Some adjoining cottage property was
bought, so that the works was now surrounded on 3 sides by public roads.
The Ringwood gasholder was installed and improvements made to the
purifying plant, the whole operation being supervised by T.P.Lilley of
Gillingham, for a fee of £8.8.=. The
dividend was reduced to 4%, paid in that year in the form of Preference shares
to conserve cash, and a further issue of these shares was made, bringing the
total capital up to £2,000.
Over
this time, there had been a number of changes in the board.
Charles Lander, W.T.Standerwick and Charles Jupe had died, and the Rev
C.H.Townsend had left the town, and they were replaced by I.M.Jupe, Charles
Lander Junr, the Rev E.G.Wyld and William Forward, who himself left the country
in 1881. The auditor, John Phillips
left Mere, and was succeeded by Robert Goldsborough, who had in fact been
signing the accounts for the previous two years.
In 1886 I.M.Jupe resigned, to be replaced by Clarence E. Rutter, who also
acted as Secretary for many years. Two years later, Henry Wickham died, to be
succeeded by Thomas Standerwick. Goldsborough
was followed as auditor by John
Sawtell, manager of the local bank.
In
1887 the Company bought Lynch House, overlooking the works, for use of the
manager; as well as giving him a good view of his charge, the domestic
arrangements were described as far more healthful and comfortable.
Mrs. Dorothy George, widow of the last manager of the Company, continued
to live there till recently. Various
cottages around the works were occupied by members of the staff.
By
1889 the directors felt able to increase the dividend to 41/2%,
though capital outlay continued. The
iron retorts were replaced with clay ones, some new mains were needed, and
further public lights were installed, including a powerful Brays Triplet lamp
near the bacon factory, which shed a a far reaching light. New mains were laid
in connection with lamps near the Walnut, in
Boar St
and in
Cemetery Lane
, with the hope of an extension to Waterside.
The retort house was further extended [its roof was badly damaged in a
gale in 1893]and a larger coal shed erected. By 1891 private sales were £414,
public lighting £49 & sales of by products £59;
coal cost £249 and wages £76. Once
again, warnings were sounded of the coming need for more outlay - mains needing
overhaul, the river wall in a weak state, the
Castle St
main damaged by frost. Consumption
held up, despite the closure of the Silk Works.
In
1897 by which time John Walton had died and Charles Lander and the Rev E.G.Wyld
left the town, the Rev E. Borradaile having been chairman for 2 years, E.A.Card,
an original director, former manager of the local bank and son of the founder of
Waltons business, became chairman and expressed satisfaction with the state of
the works after 30 years - in spite
of the fact that the next year he was to call attention to the dangerous
condition of the original holder, and of the top of the chimney which was giving
way, and the retorts requiring rearrangement yet again!
In
1899, J.F.Rutter, apart from Card the last of the original directors, died, with
no immediate replacement on the board; Edmund
Bracher, the retired chemist became auditor, and for the first time a fee of £10.10.=
was paid to the directors and auditor.
Over
the next 3 years the necessary work
was carried out on the retorts, the condenser and purifier were replaced and
penny in the slot meters introduced. New pipes were bought in 1903 for enlarging
the mains in
Water Street
, but not laid until the following year owing to continued wet weather.
In 1902 the dividend was increased to 6%, while the price of gas was
reduced to 5/3d per thousand with a discount of 3d for prompt payment.
By
1904 receipts had increased to £670, new mains had been laid in Water St
connecting to Hazzards Hill, and the Parish had asked for a new main along North
Road to feed a light in Steep St, which would also bring in a number of new
customers. There were now 18 cookers out on hire, and the site of 2 more
neighbouring cottages had been bought. However,
the old holder was finally condemned and the new one erected. Further preference
shares were issued to cover the cost, bringing the issued capital up to its
final figure of £2,500. In
1910 the 3" cast iron mains in
Castle St.
, laid in 1867 were nearly worn out, and were replaced in wrought iron
In
1911, the last year for which detailed accounts have been traced, Card is still
in the chair, with C.E.Rutter as director/secretary.
The other directors were A.R.White, Tom Norris, & Thomas Standerwick,
all well known local figures. Bracher
having died, F.D.Raymond, the headmaster of the
British
School
, was auditor. That year receipts
were £750, plus £109 from the sale of by-products; coal had cost £392, and
wages were £155.
By
1915 the company was making 5.5 million cu ft per year, using some 600 tons of
coal at around 21/= per ton. There
were some 3 miles of mains. The standard charge was 4/9d per 1,000 cu ft; 168
customers were supplied, 68 of them on slot meters, paying an additional 3d per
1,000ft. By contrast the 88 customers who had stoves, which probably covered
both cookers and fires, paid 4/6d per 1,000.
By now the town had 50 public street lamps, paid for at 5/= per 1,000 ft.
Mr J. Brown was manager of the works; he was followed by Mr.A.George, who
remained as manager to the end of the works' life.
In
1930 A.R.White was chairman, with C.L.Rutter & Thomas Standerwick as
directors. The dividend had been reduced to 5%, and the directors were very
anxious that shares in the company should continue to be held by local people -
it is hard to think that they would have been seen as an attractive investment
by anyone else, and the directors' appeal for those wishing to sell to ask the
company to find buyers locally sounds a counsel of desperation.
In
December 1931 the Wessex Electricity Company brought electricity to Mere for the
first time. Initially 84 consumers
were supplied from a transformer station, the power coming from Southampton via
Shaftesbury and
Gillingham
[vii].
This
competition from what was seen as a cleaner and more flexible source of light
and power posed a serious threat to the gas industry which tiny operations such
as Mere were ill-equipped to counter. Indeed by the late 1940's there were many
who saw the industry as a whole as being in terminal decline.
They were not to foresee the growth of central heating and the
development of newer methods of gas generation, culminating in the use of
natural gas - these were far in the future.
By
the end of WWII , and with nationalisation looming, the company was in a poor
way. The Accounts for March 1948
show the freehold works, with dwelling houses & cottages at a written down
value of £2,076, and plant written down to £3,971.
Against these were mortgages of £2,470 & a bank overdraft of £2,412,
charged on the remaining assets of the company.
The trading account for the year had produced a profit of £1, but
various overheads turned this into a loss of £535;
despite this, dividends of £110 were paid from reserves, which were thus
exhausted. By now the directors were
C.L.Rutter, solicitor, W. Burden, nurseryman & M.J.Brown.
In
1949 all gas undertakings were nationalised, the vesting date being 1st May; in
the last 13 months of trading the company made 13.6 million cu ft of gas, using
1,102 tons of coal, but despite an advance from the newly formed Southern Gas
Board of £8,738 made a loss of £910. This
was the general pattern for the small country gas works, which were soon being
subsidised by the larger urban undertakings.
The
new owners, the Dorset Group of the Southern Gas Board, set about improving the
equipment, replacing the gas engine with an electrically driven exhauster, and
output gradually increased, from 11.4m cu ft in 1950/51
to 12.6m in 1953/4. The
efficiency was regarded as reasonable for the type of works; 19% of the coke
made was consumed in the producers, and up to 70 therms of gas made per ton of
coal.. Overall, however, the operation was uneconomic;
the gas cost about 22.5d per therm to make, but distribution &c
brought the total cost to 35d, against a selling price of 22.5d.
Obviously
this position could not continue indefinitely, and the obvious answer was
concentration of production onto the larger works.
However, shortage of capital - and indeed of the iron necessary for new
mains - meant that it was some years before the Board could tackle the problem.
It was in 1957 that a 4" cast iron medium pressure main was laid
from
Gillingham
, linking Mere to the Board's mains
network.
With
the new main in operation, the works closed on 10 November 1957. Over the next 2
years most of the land was sold, reducing the site to the original 1867 site;
most of the original buildings were demolished, and a modern brick building was
erected to house the necessary governors and boosters for automatic operation,
with the spiral guided holder remaining for a while.
In 1988 the main from
Gillingham
was replaced in plastic and enlarged to cope with the increased demand on the
conversion to natural gas. One or
two nondescript buildings remain in a decrepit condition behind the iron gates
of the second works, but the only evidence of the past is the insignificant
housing of the governor and the remains of a gas light by the gates.
Houses
are now built on most of the site, but
amongst them are the houses which were once occupied by the very small work
force. Overlooking the site is the house formerly that of the manager of the
works. In two bungalows at the S end
of the site live the sons of Harry Whatley who describe the fantastic weights of
coal their father shovelled into the retorts during the many years that he
worked there. It seems that the
company provided houses for its employees and that they were able to buy them on
closure.
One
innovation which the Gas Board made was the provision of a showroom in 1955 to
sell appliances and to give a facility for the payment of accounts.
Rather than establishing a purpose built fully staffed showroom, the
Board came to an arrangement with Mrs. Genevieve Anna Westcott for part of her
shop in
Castle St
to be used. She provided a shop
window to display appliances, on the sale of which she received 7.5% commission,
plus 6d for each account settled through her.
This arrangement ceased after a short time.
Half
a century after its dissolution it is interesting to re-assess the performance
of the local Gas Company. At
the time of nationalisation there was much uninformed criticism of the lack of
past investment, resulting in the need, which we have seen, for heavy
expenditure by the new Board. This lack of investment was frequently blamed on
greed on the part of the shareholders. However,
when we look at the figures known to us of the Company's performance over its 80
year life, we see that no dividends were paid till 1870. For the next 7 years a
dividend of 4% was declared, raised to 5% in 1878, reduced to 4% again in 1880
and further reduced to 21/2%
from 1882 to 1885. A 4% dividend was resumed in 1886, but to conserve cash, it
was paid in the form of 5% Preference shares - there had already been an issue
of £500 of these shares in 1883 to help pay for the mains renewal.
From 1890 a 5% dividend was resumed, increased to 6% in 1902; this seems
to have been the regular rate till 1930. when it was reduced once more to 5%,
the level in force at the time of nationalisation.
Thus fairly high risk venture capital was being found at little more than
mortgage rates. Nor could the
directors be accused of milking the Company - no directors or audit fees were
paid till the payment of £10.10.= in 1899, and thereafter their remuneration
was very modest indeed.
Who
were these altruistic shareholders and directors?
The original subscribers on the formation of the second company were
virtually all local tradespeople; apart from two small exceptions the local
farming community were not represented.
The first chairman was the Rev. C.H.Townsend, vicar till 1881, followed
by his successor the Rev. B.A.Wyld till 1890.
There is nothing to suggest that the pattern of shareholding changed much
over the life of the company - indeed the shares can hardly have enjoyed much of
a market, and unfortunately, though on a couple of occasions there are mentions
of small holdings being offered at property auctions, on the death of
shareholders, we do not know what they fetched.
It is pretty certain that the shares were not a particularly attractive
investment on purely commercial grounds. One thing that is noticeable is that as
the years went by the directors tended to be found amongst the town's
non-conformist community. The names
of Jupe, Goldsbrough, Bracher, Burden, Raymond and Standerwick appear regularly,
as do the Rutter family who for many years provided the Secretary.
This is probably not an unexpected finding, as non-conformity was usually
particularly strong amongst the traders in country towns.
[i]
Information from John Horne of
Southampton
, formerly of Southern Gas, to whom I am grateful for
much help
[ii]
Mrs. D. George, in “The Story of Mere”, 1958 p134 et seq.
[iv]
Tithe Map & 1851 census
[vii]
“Mere Memories”, George & Doddington
|
