The Cement Factory of Waldringfield 1872 -1907

Visitors to Waldringfield and, indeed, residents of that village might be forgiven for not knowing that it was once the site of a large cement factory.  All that now remains of the industry is the quay – which passers-by would assume to have always been part of the boating business, the factory manager’s house which may be seen behind the sea wall to the north of the village and, on Quay Lane, a 3-ft thick wall, ending in a private garden as a part-ruined kiln.

Photographs of the village, taken from the River Deben at the start of the twentieth century, show that there were three rows of kilns, each row sporting four chimneys, one chimney for each kiln.

In the 1860s there was, in Waldringfield, a small cement works – probably just one kiln. Not long after, the works were sold to George Mason, a slate and timber merchant from Ipswich whose intention was to manufacture Portland cement. Until then he had manufactured Roman cement in the Ipswich area from cement-stone dredged from the River Orwell. There had been no real advances in cement making between the days of the Romans and the 1820s when ‘Portland’ or ‘British’ cement was first patented.

The manufacture of Portland cement, which is two parts chalk to one part clay, had started in 1851 in the Medway where there were plentiful supplies of both chalk and clay.  Demand had increased out of all proportion with the expansion of the London metropolis and the exportation of this ‘British’ cement abroad.

The River Deben, of course, would provide a good supply of clay and there was, already, an established barge route between the Deben and the Thames, with some of the barges being owned by Mason himself. The barges would be readily available to bring chalk and coal or coke from the Medway and to take cement back to the Thames either for use in London or for export.

Today we are told that in the days of the cement works when the wind was from the north clouds of dirty brown smoke would envelop the beach, thus making it totally untenable.  It is very difficult now to imagine such a scene, even without the smoke.

This Portland cement works in Waldringfield was set up in 1872.  It functioned for only 35 years and closed in 1907. Profound technological changes in the 1890s had led to the relatively early decommissioning of the Waldringfield plant.  There was need to upgrade to new ball-and-roller grinding mechanism and to rotary kilns.

 

By 1912 the factory was gone all but a few remnants.  It had taken 5 years to dismantle.

One has to ask why such an industry was ever started in Waldringfield which was, essentially, a small village in an agricultural environment.   Apart from the fact that there was already a small cement factory in the village there appear to be four main reasons

 

• There was an active coprolite industry so that the village was well used to barge traffic, the necessary loading and unloading on the shore and the coming and going of horses and carts.
  

• The ready availability of one of the raw materials – mud

• The availability of ready labour.  Work was becoming scarce on the South Suffolk peninsula – farming was not the employer that it had been and the large private estates were beginning to feel the financial pinch.

• Then, finally, there  was spare land

 

The area of land on which the cement works was built consisted of land belonging to Cliff House (now The Maltings) and an area behind this which had been acquired by Colonel Tomline of Orwell Park, Nacton from one Robert Lacey whose ownership of the said land was shown on the 1839 tithe map.

One family in Waldringfield has deeds  which provide direct evidence that in 1871 George Mason bought from Arthur Thomas Cobbold, one of the heirs to the Cobbold dynasty and then owner of the Maltings, land adjoining the Maybush Inn together with ‘the Quay or dock lying next to the river Deben and also all the land with Maltings office and other erections, including 6 cottages, the 2 parcels of land known as the office piece and the Bush piece’, (probably either side of the main road) ‘together with 1 acre & 23 perches of land’ where, later, the Masons built  cottages for the workers.

George Mason died in 1893 and it was one of his three sons, Frank, who continued the business. Arrangements had been made in 1892 for the land to be inherited by Frank Mason from his father, ‘subject to the payment by the said FW Mason of rent to the successor of the late Colonel George Tomline’ – the Prettyman Estate. [See additional material added at the end of this article].

Apparently Mr FW Mason lived on the North Cliff in Felixstowe where he was able to watch his barges making home to the Deben on the London to Waldringfield run.

Walking down the lower stretches of Maybush Lane (now Cliff Road in Waldringfield) before 1872 just before what is now Deben Lane one would have passed some allotments and a couple of cottages on the left.  To the  right, opposite, there was a row of cottages at right angles to the road – long since demolished and replaced in the 1960s by a single dwelling.  It is not certain what else would have been seen before reaching, on the left, the coach house to The Maltings and, on the right, the Maybush – known then as Bush Inn.

The purchased land lay behind the allotments on the left, behind the left hand side of Cliff Road and behind Mr Cobbold’s land.  It stretched to the edge of the Waller family’s fields to the north of the village and down to the water’s edge.

In addition there was some land to the right of the Cliff Road where there is now a row of twelve cottages. These were built for some of the cement workers. Today they are known collectively as ‘cement cottages’. A house was built for the manager to the north of the factory. It is likely that it was known as ‘factory cottage’. It is now known as ‘Swans Nest’ and, with its commanding view of the River Deben from behind the sea wall, it attracts a market value at least six times that of the average home.

Frank Mason is said to have been a truly philanthropic gentleman who provided well for his workers. Cottages were rented for 2 shillings and sixpence a week and coal was to be had from the factory for a shilling (equivalent to 5p) a bag.  There was a reading room which cost one penny a week (There were 240 pennies in a pound).

There was even a staff health facility with one Dr Hollis who, apparently, attributed most of the illnesses he encountered to an excess of beer – or not enough of it, depending on the drinking habits of the patient.

The banks of kilns dominated the skyline. They were built of firebricks, special heat resistant bricks.  Each bank included four kilns.

A tramway was constructed across the site although much of the fetching and carrying was said to have been done with wheelbarrows. The tramway engine was driven by Charles Bloomfield who was listed in the census 1891 as ‘Engine driver – portable’. Charles Bloomfield lived in Woodbridge Road, Waldringfield, now a ‘By-Road’ to Martlesham.

The machines and the 12.50 lunchtime siren were all powered by a large steam engine brought from Leiston – it was known as the Wunnerful Wissel and could be heard all down the Deben. It seems there were complaints from Ramsholt one day when the Wunnerful Wissel was late thus throwing working schedules into disarray.

 

As many as 100 barge-loads a month of chalk, coal or coke would arrive from the Medway.

The required mud was extracted from the saltings probably from shallow draft mud barges in narrow channels.    Google gives a good birds-eye view of the likely clay workings on the southern side of Waldringfield

First the marsh peat would be removed by means of a shovel, then wooden ‘fly tools’ would be used by skilled labourers known as ‘muddies’ to flick blocks of clay into the barge.  It is said that a really good muddie, like Mr Stebbings of the barge called Kingfisher, could have one block in the air whilst the first block was landing in the barge and the third block was being dug. It is likely that Kingfisher creek was named after Mr Stebbings’ barge. One has to wonder what might have become of these narrow, shallow draft barges and whether any of their hulls lie covered in mud in the saltings.

According to Mr Kenneth Mason, a descendant of Frank, the mud and the chalk were off-loaded from the barges and tipped into a wash mill on the quay.

It was mixed with water into slurry and then it flowed via wooden troughs to slurry reservoirs.  The water rose to the top of the slurry in the reservoir. It was then let off via sluice gates to return to the river.  The remaining mixture was then wheel-barrowed to an oven heated floor, spread about nine inches thick and left until dry enough for barrowing to the kilns.

 

There were twelve kilns.  Three banks of four.  The base of one remains today at the bottom of a private garden in Deben Lane. It is about 20 feet across on the inside. The back walls of the remaining three in that row of four are also to be seen in another private garden.   

The kilns were prepared for firing by placing faggots of wood in an arched duct beneath the floor of the kiln. Then alternate layers of coke and cement slurry were placed in the kiln.  The kiln was bricked up, set alight and left to burn for five days.

Once the process was finished and the kiln had cooled down the cement clinker would be removed, loaded into wheelbarrows and taken to the grinding machine to be ground into fine cement.

 

 

Initially clinker was ground in a Big Ball Mill, a German invention installed in Waldringfield by German engineers.  It seems there was considerable friction between the Germans and the local work-force, not helped by the Germans bragging that each one of them was worth three of the locals both in strength and in work done. There is a story, courtesy of the late Walter Tye, that one day there was a large slab of concrete to be moved. One of the wry locals stood at one of the four corners of this great large slab and said to a passing German.  ‘We’ll soon get this shifted. ‘oi’ll lift this corner and yew can take the other three’

The grindings from the Big Ball Mill were transferred by conveyor belt to the Griffin Mill for finer grinding and then barrowed or conveyed to storage sheds.  Filling sacks and loading barges with the finished product was said to be the dirtiest and hardest job of all – although the clay digging sounds pretty hard going.

Decommissioning and demolition

The factory closed in 1907. The pier was taken down; the kilns were either demolished or filled in by one Arthur Quantril and his Territorials between 1907 and 1912.   It is said that one of the houses in School Road was constructed using 30,000 of the heat resistant bricks from the kilns.

When the works closed Mr Mason gave the occupants of the cottages the opportunity to purchase them, paying as and when they could.  The manager of the works at that time was one Arthur Stollery who went with the Masons to manage their new works at Claydon.  With the close of the factory at Waldringfield the village was left in peace to develop the pastimes it supports today

Dr Gareth Thomas

 In answer to a question raised by a reader the following clarification may help.

Q.”You say George Mason bought the land from Arthur Cobbold, yet on the following page, 11, you state that when Frank inherited the land from his father, it was to be subject to the payment of rent to the successor of Colonel Geoge Tomline; indicating that Tomline and not Mason owned the land. Does this refer to a different plot of land, or did Mason subsequently sell the land he bought from Colbbold to Tomline?

A. Cobbolds had some land and Tomline had other land. JC Cobbold was Arthur’s brother, John Chevallier Cobbold MP DL JP.

1839 Tithe map extract

 

atbara deeds superimposed on 1839 Tithe map

 

deeds superimposed on satellite image of present day