Philip Hamlyn Williams – Historian

How Britain Shaped the Manufacturing World – reviews

August 6, 2022 — 1 Comment

Points of interest

From gypsum to granite

October 31, 2025 — 0 Comments

A sixteenth century mechanised mint in Segovia

Points of interest

A sixteenth century mechanised mint in Segovia

October 14, 2025 — 0 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

Where has all the money gone?

October 4, 2025 — 0 Comments

Points of interest

The genius of Roman hydraulic engineering

October 2, 2025 — 0 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

Levelling Up – a layperson’s guide

September 28, 2025 — 0 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

A vicious circle

June 30, 2025 — 0 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

Concentrated wealth is bad for the economy, but how did it happen?

January 29, 2025 — 2 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

Living in cloud cuckoo land

November 27, 2024 — 1 Comment

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

The power of railways

October 23, 2024 — 0 Comments

Letters to the editor - unpublished!

Balance of Payments

October 4, 2024 — 0 Comments

William Morris – Lord Nuffield

William Morris was a remarkable man by any measure.Among my father’s books was a biography of Morris by P.W.S. Andrews and Elizabeth Brunner and I drew on this for my book How Britain Shaped the Manufacturing World. Here I record just three anecdotes which seem to me helpful in summing up the man who did […]

The process of invention – the sewing machine and bicycle

“No useful sewing machine was ever invented by one man; and all first attempts to do work by machinery, previously done by hand, had been failures. It was only after several able inventors had failed in their attempts, that someone with the mental powers to combine the efforts of others, with his own, at last […]

West London manufacturing history

The twenties and in some cases earlier saw the establishment of the new motor and electrical industries on the periphery of London and near to the river. Investment by foreign companies became more visible. The thirties in particular witnessed strong growth in manufacturing in London and its surroundings and I explore these and related population […]

North London manufacturing history

As Inner London turned its attention more and more to finance and service industries, manufacturing moved north, much of it into the Lea Valley which, hitherto, had market gardens working hard to feed a growing population. There was also brick making to house that population. Enfield Manufacturing came to Enfield in 1809 in the form […]

Inner London manufacturing in the 19th and 20th centuries

Inner London, having been for manufacturing a place where the many made things for the few, changed as technology advanced and became home to many young industries before they moved to more spacious pastures. Stephen Inwood in his masterly A History of London makes the point that in the interwar years it was not just […]

South London manufacturing in the 19th and 20th centuries

In his book, London: A History, Francis Sheppard observes that ‘by the end of the eighteenth century, London had more steam engines than Lancashire’. London had also employed water power from the fast flowing river Wandle to mill flour and snuff and also to power the printing of calico. Southwark, Lambeth and Vauxhall Southwark and […]

East London manufacturing in the 19th and 20th centuries

Docklands The first decade of the nineteenth century saw an expansion in docks which would guarantee London’s position as the world’s trading city. The first was a West India Docks which had in addition to the docks themselves, warehouses all surrounded by a secure wall. The work was privately funded and financed by a 21 […]

South London manufacturing history

The south bank of the Thames and the rivers flowing into it, the Wandle and Neckinger, attracted industries needing ready transport for raw materials, water power and water itself. Southwark, Lambeth and Bermondsey Ceramics were made in Lambeth and also in Chelsea and Bow. Doulton & Co made rainwater goods and later fine pottery as […]

East London manufacturing history

Writing of London in the Nineteenth Century, Jerry White remarks on the large proportion of the population – some 30% – who made things, countering a common belief that London was a place of commerce with local manufacturing restricted to small and niche workshops. This was largely the result of what had gone before. London […]

Inner London manufacturing history

London does of course reach back into Roman times if not earlier. By 1700 it had a population estimated at 575,00 which grew to 900,000 a century later. It was by far the largest urban area in Britain having attracted migrants from neighbouring rural areas in search of work. In these early days inner London […]