Wallsend

Location:

• Grid reference: NZ30876612
• x=430870
• y=566120
• 54°59'19"N; 1°31'3"WE
• Civil Parish: Wallsend, Northumberland

Clinker manufacture operational: 1869-?1895

Approximate total clinker production: 103,000 tonnes

Raw materials:

• Thames chalk ballast
• Boulder Clay (Pelaw Clay Member) from 430800,566220

Ownership: Wallsend Cement Co.

Incorporated 1868. The plant was set up on the site of a disused ironworks on the Tyne foreshore. It had five wet process bottle kilns (130 t/week) and was operational in 1890, but was disused in 1898, so it probably closed around 1895, perhaps because of loss of its clay supply. The plant’s transport was entirely by water. After brief redevelopment the site remained vacant for many years, but now has some warehousing.

Power supply

The plant was entirely direct-driven by steam engine.

Rawmills

The plant had at least one washmill, followed by flat stones.

No rotary kilns were installed.

Sources:

• Primary Sources:
  • newspapers
  • Ward’s Directory of Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1890 and 1898
  • Ordnance Survey 1:2500 mapping
  • BGS mapping and monographs
• Confirmatory Sources:
  • Mentioned (but not explicitly) by Francis, p 227