Ironworking in the Weald

By Merv Allen FWCB

“Out of the Weald, the secret Weald,
Men sent in ancient years
The horse-shoes red at Flodden Field
The arrows at Poitiers!”
From Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Puck’s Song’

The aim of this piece is to provide the reader with an insight into the history and significance of ironworking in the Weald. The Weald (Weald is from the Anglo Saxon meaning Forest) lies between the North and South Downs extending East to West through the counties of Kent, Sussex, Surrey and Hampshire. In the Middle Ages it was known as the Forest of Andredswald. The area has an abundance of iron ore (siderite) in clay deposits containing around 70 % of the iron bearing material. Clay was also used in the construction of furnaces and in brick making.
Bogdan Popov’s illuminating demonstration at last year’s BABA AGM provided a fascinating reminder that iron can be worked successfully using the most basic, ecologically sustainable and environmentally friendly resources. His enthusiasm and knowledge of ‘ancient ways’ and the juxtaposition of perspiring smiths toiling away against the backdrop of the beautiful Sussex countryside brought to mind that this area was for many hundreds of years the major centre for iron production in Britain.
Many towns and villages in this part of England proudly boast a traditional English rural idyll and it may come as a surprise to many that it was not always thus. Touring the magnificent rolling wooded scenery, interspersed with 'Country Life' houses, charming cottage gardens, broadleaf woodlands, village greens, ponds and low beamed pubs, one is left with the warm cosy glow of rustic romanticism. Imagination is needed therefore to reflect upon a time when trees were being felled at an alarming rate, skies were laden with smoke from hundreds of charcoal burners and furnaces, and there was an incessant din from forges, while physical hardship was being endured by those labouring in the making of iron and supporting industries. Place names like Abinger Hammer and Hammerwood are still to be found, illustrating how widespread the industry was and its influence on the region. Around 800 iron-working sites have so far been identified including Crawley, which was an ironworking site for at least 300 years.
Thirteen prehistoric sites have been positively identified, but the two major epochs of ironworking were the Romano-British and the Late Mediaeval. The former began with arrival of the Roman general Aulus Plautius and his legions in 43CE (AD). By that time small scale production using the Bloomery Furnace method was well established, as demonstrated by the discovery of late Iron Age sites found around Crowhurst and Sedlescombe.
The settlement and integration of the Roman invaders led to a growth market in iron for use in homesteads and for farm equipment. Later, the British Fleet (Classis Britannica) took a strategic role in iron production using Dover as its base and within 50 years of the invasion iron production was booming. Archaeological evidence indicates that large sites around Battle, Bardown and Cranbrook produced around 30,000 tons over 150-year period. At present, some 67 Romano-British sites of iron production have been discovered. For reasons that are not entirely clear, iron production had moved to the Forest of Dean by the middle of the third century and had virtually died out by the end of Roman rule at the start of the fifth century.
Little is known of the iron industry between Anglo-Saxon times and the Norman Conquest, there being only one mention in the Doomsday Book (1086) referring to a site at East Grinstead, and it is not until the 14th century that there are accounts of ironworking at Tudeley in Kent and references to iron makers in Crawley and Horsham.
Indigenous tree species such as beech, hazel, ash, chestnut and oak were widely distributed in the area and provided the fuel source in the form of charcoal. Records and archaeological evidence show that huge areas were managed on a sustainable basis by coppicing. In the mid 17th century the diarist John Evelyn estimated that around 200,000 acres were managed in this way. Recent research suggests that the average Bloomery Furnace required approximately two acres of woodland annually to produce a ton of iron. When one also considers that approximately three tons of iron bearing clay produced one ton of iron, ten tons of wood produced two tons of charcoal and a ton-and-a-half of charcoal was required for each ton of iron, one is left with a sense of amazement at the immense logistical problems involved.
Towards the end of the 15th century water, too, became essential for driving the wheels operating the bellows of blast furnaces and trip hammers. The Weald has plenty of streams and rivers to meet this requirement and the remains of many mill-runs and hammer ponds are evident to this day.
It was the introduction of the Blast Furnace in the late 15th century that raised the production of iron to its highest level. Incorporating water driven bellows, the design was a direct descendent of those used in the Namur region of what is now Belgium, and the Pays de Bray in Normandy. The first Wealden blast furnace was constructed in Buxted circa 1491, and it was then that the Weald saw an influx of French and Belgian iron workers looking further afield for employment as the French iron industry declined. These workers had a particular expertise in ordnance founding.
In 1543 the first cannon was cast at Buxted under the supervision of Mr Ralf Hogge, and subsequently cannon producing sites were established at Ashburnham, Heathfield and Robertsbridge. It is known that Hogge, who became one of the wealthiest men in Sussex, worked with a French cannon maker named Pierre Baude.
By the middle of the 16th century at least 50 blast furnaces and forges had been established and by 1580 this number had doubled. This was mainly due to the ability of ironworkers to supply a growing trade for bar iron to the English Tudor Crown. In addition, military ordnance was needed to protect trade routes and arm the British Navy, which most notably fought the Anglo-Spanish war (1585-1604). With a rapidly expanding market for iron, the iron-makers of the Weald faced competition from cheaper overseas suppliers, so they concentrated their efforts on the more profitable business of gun founding. To give an idea as to how intensive was production, it has been calculated that the weight of cannon cast during 1708 and 1709 was 1.2 tons per day in Heathfield foundry alone. Other sites such as Mayfield, Cowden and Pippingford had cannon boring facilities in addition to iron making facilities.
A consequence of this expansion was the ever increasing demand for ore and charcoal with which suppliers ultimately were unable to keep pace. Eventually, around the late 18th early 19th century, with the onset of the Industrial Revolution leading to rapid development in metallurgical processes, the iron industry moved to the northern coalfields where the coke-fired blast furnace developed by Abraham Darby in 1709, led to a dramatic increase in iron production at significantly lower costs than those in the Weald. In 1813 the last remaining Wealden furnace at Ashburnham near Battle in Sussex was closed.

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