Crumlin Viaduct Works
Viaduct Works, Crumlin, of Crumlin, south Wales, builders of iron bridges.
1853 In response to a request for tender from the Newport, Abergavenny and Hereford Railway to build a viaduct across the Ebbw river at Crumlin, Mr T W Kennard was awarded the contract. Liddell the engineer for the railway claimed that he had designed it.
Robert William Kennard (1800-1870) MP for Newport, Isle of Wight, a partner in major ironworks at Blaenavon and Falkirk, probably played a major part in the successful establishment of the Crumlin works which were directed by his sons Thomas William Kennard (1825-1893) and Henry Martyn Kennard (1833-1911).
1855 The Crumlin bridge was completed; the castings came from Falkirk Iron Co and most of the wrought iron from Blaenavon Iron and Coal Co, also owned by the Kennards, with assembly in the Viaduct Works.
1857 The Viaduct Bridge was formally opened.
1857 As well as developing its bridge business at home and internationally, the company began to diversify into other areas - railway signal and switching gear, steam-powered machine tools for riveting, striking, drilling and lifting and other civil engineering ironwork, such as lighthouses, piers and railway station roofing.
1858 Henry Nathan Maynard managed the works.
Employed about 200 people
1863 one of their largest bridges was Blackfriars which unusually was not designed by the company but by Joseph Cubitt who also installed it.
The company was proud of its speed of delivery, reducing the time for bridge building from years to months
Silver medal at the Paris Exhibition for a rivetting machine (patented by H. M. Kennard).
1869 T W Kennard retired from the business
1869 D. Davies, of Viaduct Works, Crumlin, designed a coal sawing and breaking machine
1871 a new private company, led by H. N. Maynard, took over from the Kennards. The shares were taken up by many local people including H. M. Kennard of Blaenavon Iron and Steel Co.
1877 Although the order books may have been full, the company was making a loss; soon they ran out of cash.
1878 It was a bad time to borrow. The Blaenavon Iron and Steel Co was forced into liquidation when the West of England Bank collapsed so that there was no help from the Kennards and the Crumlin Works were heavily in debt to the same bank.
The Patent Nut and Bolt Co agreed to postpone a claim for money owed but the Company was finished. The operations producing nuts and bolts passed to John Paton and Co for a while.
1878 Liquidation auction