Reasons for Designation
The crucible furnace at the former Russell Works site was built c1860. It was assessed as part of a thematic survey carried out by English Heritage to identify the best surviving examples of buildings associated with Sheffield's metal manufacturing and metal working trades. The building retains the distinctive plan form of a crucible furnace, with a rear wall stack, incorporating flues for 20 melting holes. The reduction of the stack externally does not detract from the fact that this building is one of a very small number of once numerous crucible furnaces to survive. These specialist buildings were crucial to Sheffield's development as a major centre of innovation through the production of high quality crucible or cast steel from the 1740s, with the city retaining the only extant examples in England. Against the loss of many such buildings in the late C20, due to the severe decline of the industry, the crucible furnace at Russell Works clearly expresses a regional specialism, and is highly significant as a rare survivor of this industrial building type. As such it meets the criteria for listing in a national context.
Details
SHEFFIELD
784-1/0/10113 KELHAM ISLAND
04-FEB-08 Former Russell Works, (now part of Kel
ham Island Industrial Museum)
II
Crucible steel furnace, known as a `melting shop', formerly a component of a larger steel works complex, now part of Kelham Island Museum site (building not open to public). Built c1860. Red brick with slate roof.
PLAN: Rectangular with rear wall stack and undivided casting floor lit by front wall openings.
EXTERIOR: Single-storey with mono-pitch roof with skylights, truncated rear wall stack. 5 alternately taller and shorter round-headed windows, most with metal bars set in a timber frame and probably originally unglazed with wooden shutters, though some glazing has been inserted and no shutters survive. To the left, north end is a modern vehicular entrance doorway with a steel lintel and metal door. To the right, south end is the entrance doorway, probably originally round-headed, the head now infilled with brick. Steel doorframe, but now no door.
INTERIOR: A rear wall stack of 2 builds extending the width of the building, providing a total of 20 melting holes (5 to the left, 15 to the right). Wall flues and melting holes positioned in the floor both now blocked (cellar not accessible). Three metal straps above the wall flues brace the stack against distortion. Metal brackets for shelving for drying crucibles. Stairs to mezzanine platform inserted opposite entrance doorway. Braced monopitch roof trusses, with principal rafters and tie beams extending from posts set within recesses in the furnace stack.
HISTORY: The crucible steel furnace originally formed part of a steel works built around 1860 known as Russell Works. The occupying firm is thought to have been Wheatman and Smith who were involved in the manufacture of steel and production of saws, files, and edge tools. The majority of the principal works' buildings have been demolished, and the crucible furnace is now incorporated into the Kelham Island Museum site.
In the 1740s local man Benjamin Huntsman developed the process of refining blister steel, manufactured from iron, to produce a better quality steel known as crucible or cast steel. It transformed Sheffield into a major centre of innovation. Crucible steel furnaces continued to play a highly significant role in Sheffield's industrial development as they remained the most suitable means of production of specialist alloy steels, many of which, including stainless steel, were invented and perfected in the city.
SOURCES:
'One Great Workshop': The Buildings of the Sheffield Metal Trades', English Heritage (February 2000, unpublished analysis of research)
English Heritage, 'One Great Workshop': The Buildings of the Sheffield Metal Trades' (2001)
'Russell Works, Kelham Island, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, NBR No.98272, 1998'
SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE
The crucible furnace at the former Russell Works site was built c1860. It was assessed as part of a thematic survey carried out by English Heritage to identify the best surviving examples of buildings associated with Sheffield's metal manufacturing and metal working trades. The building retains the distinctive plan form of a crucible furnace, with a rear wall stack, incorporating flues for 20 melting holes. The reduction of the stack externally does not detract from the fact that this building is one of a very small number of once numerous crucible furnaces to survive. These specialist buildings were crucial to Sheffield's development as a major centre of innovation through the production of high quality crucible or cast steel from the 1740s, with the city retaining the only extant examples in England. Against the loss of many such buildings in the late C20, due to the severe decline of the industry, the crucible furnace at Russell Works clearly expresses a regional specialism, and is highly significant as a rare survivor of this industrial building type
