Cranes and rails on Prince's Wharf, Central, Bristol

Summary

Group of four Stothert and Pitt high-speed electric cranes, 1951.

Description

Group of four Stothert and Pitt high-speed electric cranes, 1951.

PLAN: the cranes stand on Prince’s Wharf, on the Floating Harbour. Numbered 29 to 32, they are mounted on rails running east-west between the quayside and the M-Shed.
DESCRIPTION: each crane consists of the carriage or truck, upon which is the motor room and driver’s cab, the jib and its counterweight, and the luffing derrick.

The carriages have four legs made up of rivetted iron panels and lattices. Each pair of legs is attached to a base of horizontal paired I-beams, with an enclosed motor and driving wheels on either side, powering the lateral movement of the cranes along the rails. Crane 32, to the west, was designed to carry much heavier loads, and its latticework carriage is broader at the top. The cabs are clad in vertical timber weatherboarding with full-height glazing to the front, in multi-light metal frames, with windows to either side enabling clear views for the driver. The jib is a tapering square-section truss of 65 feet (20m), with the hook assembly, including a Liverpool hook, on one end, and the balancing counterweight, consisting of concrete slabs in iron housing, at the other. The luffing derrick – part of the Toplis Level Luffing system – stands on the top of the cab.

The interior of the cab has four sets of controls – for lateral movement along the tracks, slewing, luffing and hoisting – along with space for the driver, at the glazed front. The motor room is enclosed to the rear, and has three motors driving the slewing, luffing and hoisting mechanisms. The motor room also contains resistance banks and cabinets with electro-mechanical switch gear.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: the cranes stand on rails embedded in the dockside. There are various cast iron fixtures related to the original power supplies to each crane.

History

The four cranes on Prince’s Wharf are the last remaining of a group of eight, erected in 1951 to serve the newly-built L and M sheds.

Following bomb damage in the Second World War and the loss of the large Corporation Granary building, Princes Wharf was renovated to provide a modern general cargo wharf. The L and M transit sheds (now the M Shed Museum) were built between 1948 and 1951 to the design of docks engineer N A Matheson, and eight Stothert and Pitt cranes, numbered 25 to 32, were erected along with the dockside. The cranes were electrically powered, and mounted on rails to enable speed and flexibility in moving cargo, which could be loaded directly onto road or rail wagons, or deposited in the transit sheds. Cargoes included Baltic timber and paper pulp bound for processing nearby in St Annes, and the Bristol Steam Navigation Company ran a twice-weekly service to Dublin, exporting English goods, and returning with bacon, cabbage, butter and Guinness. Originally designed to lift two tonnes, the cranes were modified to increase their load to three; crane 32 was built to lift 10 tonnes.

The decline of the city docks was compounded in the 1970s by containerisation and the increasing size of vessels. The cranes at Princes Wharf were the last in the docks to work with a regular cargo, offloading the last Baltic trader in November 1974. The docks were closed the following year.

The redundant cranes were then sold for scrap. A pressure group, City Docks Ventures, recognised the importance of the structures, and raised the money to buy back two of the cranes, and persuaded the City Council to buy another two. The four cranes are the last of 40 that were present in the wider docks in the 1950s. The associated transit sheds were converted to become the Industrial Museum in 1978, and renovated in the early C21, becoming the M Shed museum of Bristol. The cranes are in the ownership of the City Council and form part of Bristol Museums’ collection. They have been restored to working order.

Stothert and Pitt Ltd, ‘crane-makers to the world’, was an internationally renowned and pioneering firm founded in Bath by ironmonger George Stothert (1755-1818) in 1785. Stothert moved to Bath from Shropshire where he had close contacts with Abraham Darby's Coalbrookdale Company. As Stothert’s firm became established it developed a reputation for heavy engineering, particularly the designing and construction of dockside and offshore cranes. Cranes produced by the company survive throughout the world, particularly within the former Empire. In England, a number of Stothert and Pitt cranes are listed including the Fairbairn Steam Crane at Wapping Wharf, Bristol (Grade II*); the Giant Crane at the former NEM Works, Wallsend, North Tyneside (Grade II*); and a group of 14 at the Royal Victoria Docks, Newham (Grade II), which includes 12 DD2 cranes, and two high speed cranes like those at Princes Wharf, though dating from the 1920s.

Reasons for Listing

The four Stothert and Pitt Cranes on Prince’s Wharf are listed at Grade II, for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:
* designed for utility, but with a resultant architectural and aesthetic quality with a strong industrial character and distinction, speaking of the historic working docks in the heart of the city;
* a highly prominent group of structures that are a focal point of the Floating Harbour, and of a scale and monumental form that has conferred them with emblematic status;
* the second largest ensemble of historic cranes in the country;
* as exemplars of their type, which survive well and are in working order.

Historic interest:
* the only group of Stothert and Pitt travelling cranes known to be in working order;
* increasingly rare survivals of a once-common cargo handling structure, and a reminder of the important industrial function of the Docks, upon which Bristol’s prosperity was founded;
* representative of the output of Stothert and Pitt of Bath, leaders in the industry in the C19 and C20, internationally.

Group value:
* with the other cranes around the docks, particularly the C19 Stothert and Pitt Fairbairn Crane to the west; the hand cranes at Mud Dock and Redcliffe Wharf; and the crane base at Canon’s Marsh;
* with the harbour walls, and the numerous other historic structures in this important area of the City Docks with which the cranes have a strong visual relationship.

External Links

Historic England Listing

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