Corrugated Iron Buildings in County Durham

by Norman Emery from Durham Archaeological Journal 6, 1990, 59-73

In 1844 John Spencer, of the phoenix Iron Works in West Bromwich, developed shaped rollers to corrugate metal sheets, giving materials like wrought iron plates extra strength. The sheets could also be galvanised to prevent rusting. Increasingly from the mid 19th century this medium was being used as a roofing material (1), and in the 1860s and 70s for farm use, as rick covers and for Dutch barns. It was also used at industrial works for shelters, such as around smithies, colliery heapsteads and screens, or for use as a cladding for warehouses. At Cardiff docks a corrugated iron warehouse was erected in 1887, capable of holding 6,000 tons of esparto grass, used in paper making (2). Corrugated iron roofs eventually could be seen on buildings from American frontier towns to Ladysmith, Kimberley, and out to New Zealand. In some western countries, corrugated iron was used as a cladding on dwellings. In Iceland, for instance, it was used in both rural and urban contexts. Examples include Arbaer farmhouse, whose turf living-room was rebuilt with cladding on timber in 1891; and Laufasvegur 31, Reykjavik, a Swiss-style timber house with iron cladding, built in 1902 (3). In Britain houses have normally been constructed in brick, stone or wood (ranging from timber-frame to railway sleeper dwellings). Some houses, either wholly or partly of wood, were built in Durham colliery villages, like those at 'Chapel Row', East Hedleyhope; 'The Huts' at Hamsteels Colliery; the 'Stables' at Ushaw Moor (4); 'Stable Row', Cornsay Colliery (5); 'Wood Cottages', Hetton Lyons; and at Auckland Park, Black Boy and Leasingthorne, but cladding dwellings with iron in Durham was not a common practise.

The 19th century development of the Durham coalfield was affected by geological conditions, and the need for particular types of coal. County Durham produced general purpose, gas, and coking coals, with the west Durham coals calcining to produce high grade metallurgical coke. The increasing exploitation of iron ore deposits in the Cleveland district from the 1850s, the proliferation of blast-furnaces and mills, particularly around Middlesbrough (6) along with the development of 'basic steel' in 1879, affected coal production, as did the construction of the railway network, increased shipbuilding, and the export trade. From 1801 the county population steadily increased, and reached a peak during the decade 1871-81. By this stage the indigenous northern community was unable to provide the necessary labour required, and was supplemented by more workers and their families from other parts of Britain. As new villages became established around the pits, often in fairly isolated rural areas, there was increasingly a demand for community buildings, meeting places like institutes, schools, and places of worship, and in many settlements public buildings with corrugated iron cladding began to reappear in the late 19th century.

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