The Dacorum Heritage Trust
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•• New Publication
Men of Iron
by Joan and Roger Hands, edited by Denis Miles.
The History of Boxmoor Ironworks and the Davis, Lane and Bailey families.
This book is designed as a companion volume to the popular 'Paper Pioneers'. It tells the fascinating, but rarely known, story of iron founding and agriculture in Dacorum through the ages, culminating in the history of Boxmoor Ironworks.
This foundry was in the Marlowes, Hemel Hempstead, for over one hundred years, but vanished when the New Town was created in the 1950s.
The lives of the families who owned it, the people who worked there, the agricultural machinery they skilfully made, together with the history of the plough itself, make this book a valuable addition to the series about our local industrial heritage.
We first learnt about the existence of Boxmoor Ironworks in the early 1980s, whilst into the second day of one of our series of special events called 'Boxmoor Weekend' in the then St John's Hall (now known as the Boxmoor Playhouse). Surrounded by photographs and other memorabilia connected to our local area, a visitor approached us.
"Why haven't you got anything on display about the Boxmoor Ironworks?" was the initial query. We admitted we had never heard of it, not having been born or brought up in the district. This establishment had certainly not featured during the ten years or so in which we had become interested in local history, having only been Dacorum residents since 1964.
On questioning the visitor, Sydney Dollimore, we learnt that he had worked there and were grateful to him for his recorded memories of his time at the Ironworks. This initial lead took our research further into the detailed story of the Davis, Lane and Bailey families, the founders/owners of the Ironworks from 1841. Subsequently, we made contact with some remaining family members, Rex Davis in Buckinghamshire, Helen Belcher (nee Lane) in New Zealand and Michael Bailey in the Isle of Man, and benefited from their family history research. We were also fortunate to track down Harry Howe, Ivor Barnes, Harold Woolveridge and other workers who had many stories to tell of the old firm.
Fully illustrated in colour, 128 pages, A5 sized.
Click
the picture to order.
Price: £10.00 + p&p
It is also available from the following retail outlets:
• David Doyle's Estate Agents in St John's Road, Boxmoor.
• Woods of Berkhamsted (Garden Centre).
Men of Iron and Paper Pioneers (2nd edition) are also sold as a set, price £17.00 plus p&p.
Click here to buy both books (£1.00 discount).