Site of Tredegar ironworks and loco factory
Tredegar ironworks, opened in 1800, occupied the area from Commercial Street to the river. Engineer Thomas Ellis designed and built 11 steam locomotives there (see below).
The 1864 drawing and 1900 photo shows the ironworks from the far side of the river, with the town centre beyond. The London & North Western Railway’s line is in the foreground. The complex included coke ovens, a brickworks and forge houses.
In the early years, horses hauled iron ore for the works from the “patches” at Bryn Bach and limestone from Trefil. Coal had an even shorter journey, from the “Yard Level”. The separate Sirhowy ironworks had its own coal and iron sources east of the river.
Thomas Ellis, born in Dowlais in 1805, trained as a mechanic at the Tredegar works. In 1828 ironmaster Samuel Homfray sent him to Newcastle-upon-Tyne to inspect George and Robert Stephenson’s latest loco designs.
The company bought a Stephenson loco named Britannia which completed its first run before Christmas 1829 on the Sirhowy tramroad from Tredegar to Newport – thought to be the first successful loco journey in Wales since Richard Trevithick’s pioneering Penydarren trial in 1804. An overhanging tree branch broke the Britannia’s chimney on that first run, but soon the loco was regularly hauling wagons along the valley.
Over the next 15 years, Thomas built 11 locos at Tredegar. Their names included St David, Jane, Fanny, Charlotte, Lady Sail, Lord Rodney, Prince Albert and Bedwellty.
His achievements weren’t limited to railways. In 1849 the iron company opened a “new and stupendous rolling mill”, said to be the world’s largest. Thomas had designed the mill and supervised its construction. It covered 1.5 acres. Its 200 horse-power steam engine consumed c.1,000 tonnes of coal each week.
Thomas died in Newport in 1870. His son George Falconer Ellis was divisional engineer and locomotive superintendent of the Cambrian Railways in Mid Wales.
Sir Daniel Gooch was an apprentice to Thomas in the early 1830s. He became the Great Western Railway’s locomotive superintendent and was involved in the trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. Daniel later wrote that the ironworks gave him a general knowledge of engineering and his years at Tredegar were “by far the most important” of his life. He’s commemorated by a plaque at the Railway Tavern in Tredegar.
Thanks to Tredegar Community Archive for the old images
Postcode: NP22 3DW View Location Map
Tredegar Community Archive website