Management, finance and cost control in the Midlands charcoal iron industry

Abstract

The iron industry was fully industrialized by the seventeenth century. The initial ironmasters were landowners, with clerks managing their ironworks. Professional ironmasters emerged from the clerks by the 1600s. The largest iron businesses (such as that of the Foley family described here) had general managers. Loans (secured by bonds) were important for business finance, including for paying up share capital. Accounting varied between charge and discharge-oriented systems of double entry bookkeeping and those maintained according to the classic Italian method. Cost accounting was not systematically practised, but yields from raw materials were monitored and the information contained in the financial accounts contained data relevant to performance decision making. Managers were trained on the job by experienced managers.

Keywords:

• Foley
• iron production
• double entry
• Italian method
• management
• cost accounting
• bonds

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the late Andrew Foley for access over many years to his family archive at Herefordshire Record Office, and to Miss Sue Hubbard and the other archivists and staff there, who facilitated access to what was then a partly listed collection. I am also grateful to Rupert Foley and the trustees of the Stoke Edith Estate for permission to photograph and reproduce here extracts from the ironworks accounts of his ancestors; also to His Grace the Duke of Norfolk EM, CB, CBE, MC for access to the Arundel Castle Manuscripts [ACM] at Sheffield Archives. I would also like to thank the archivists, librarians and staff of more other record offices and libraries than I can list here, who have assisted me over many years in my research. Suggestions made by the editors and by various anonymous referees have considerably improved this article.

Notes

Their source is SA, SIR/1–29; it is not at Derbyshire Record Office as they state.

None of these works cited precise references, because the collection was then incompletely sorted and listed. This article will therefore cite full archival references, and cite previously published work sparingly.

However, Mott was probably wrong in assuming that (because ironstone came by packhorse) a ‘load’ of ironstone was a horse load.

The differing conclusion on ownership of Goring (1978, 211–4) relates only to the Wealden iron industry, where the use of the blast furnace and finery forge was established considerably earlier than elsewhere.

Schafer took the agreements at face value, apparently anticipating that there would be sales under them. However, the agreed prices seem too low for that to be profitable. For example, bar iron (then worth £16 per ton) was agreed to be sold for a mere £12 per ton.

The relationship between wood and iron prices is occasionally explicitly recorded in agreements elsewhere. It appears in a 1615 contract for sale of wood at Welsh Bicknor, on the northern fringes of the Forest of Dean (TNA, C 115/D24, no. 2077), and in 1736 and 1747 leases of Aberavon Forge (Glamorgan) by successive Lords Mansell (NLW, Penrice and Margam, 5287 5695 5082).

http://www.familysearch.org/eng/default.asp from Kidderminster Parish Register; cf. TNA, C8/146/58 (concerning Ezekiel Wallis’ house at Bristol).

The assignment was in favour of Thomas Foley of Stoke Edith (Paul's son), but he was merely a trustee.

Johnson 1952, 330–1; Riden 1990, 71–3; FIW, MBf/1–8; MBc/1–3; Notts. RO, DD2P/28/6; DDP/84/17–21.

For Glover see HRO, E12/IV/18–9; for Smyrna see E12/IV/18/8/18; E12/IV/18/11/5; TNA, C 5/606/4; cf. E12/IV/AD/1–8 and passim.

DALHS, DE 4/3, Rowley leases, assignment of 1724; cf. DE/T6/6–33; TNA, E112/957/107, answer of Edward Kendall; NLW, Hawarden, 919; and as note 17.

Staffs. RO, D661/3/2/3, notes on pleadings etc; TNA, C 11/1760/29, answer of Edward Hall. These concern the same case.

Staffs. RO, D 661/3/2/1, depositions for defendant, 44; TNA, C 11/1760/29, answer of Edward Hall; cf.Victoria County History, Staffordshire, V (1959), 156.

Staffs. RO, D 661/3/2/3, notes on pleadings, etc.

TNA, Land Revenue (Forests), LR 4/7/8 38 45 (dated 1749–54); LR 4/8/40–1 65 (dated 1757–8) and LR 4/9/28 (dated 1764); after this the purchasers (in LR 4/9-12) are often not named.

Lord Foley's operation of the forges is implied by his appearance as a purchaser of pig iron in the accounts of other ironworks, including FIW, DFf/5–13; DGf, passim; Shropshire Archives, Horsehay Accounts, 6001/332-333; 245/3.

Staffs. RO, D 661/3/2/1, depositions for defendant, Edward Kendall to 14th and 15th interrogatories.

Material considered is listed in the bibliography to King 2003 (466–526).

Foley's address is given as Austin Friars in London in deed of 1652, and as London in the conveyance of Willetts Mills (now Bells Mill) in Kinver in 1654: HRO, E12/S, Compton II, 1652; Kinver VII, 1654.

Material examined is listed in the bibliography to King 2003 (466–526).

Overplus yields are ubiquitous in ironworks accounts. Their nature is apparent from Carlisle RO, DX/46 BRA 93/5; SA, Staveley Ironworks Records, SIR/5, 1717 Journal, 19 and 1719 Journal, 45; SIR/19, 161.

FIW, P/15/1–6; KBf/77–8. KBf/77 appears to be a draft (in undeciphered shorthand) of KBf/78, but has appended (in longhand) a schedule of interest payments to be allowed by Philip's father. This implies that ‘Ladyday next’ was in 1674. KBf/78 is a longhand draft, and refers to a schedule (of the debts to be paid), which has not been found.

There is no adequate published description of this firm: Shrops. Archives, 6000/3093, 3100, 3230 and 14487; NLW, Cilybebyll, 202, 494–527, 1291–4; also TNA, E112/880/Salop. 9.