Founders The company was named after
William Losh,
Thomas Wilson, and Thomas Bell.
William Losh (1770 Carlisle–4 August 1861, Ellison Place, Newcastle) came from a rich family that owned coal mines in
Northeast England. He was educated in Hamburg, and trained in Newcastle, Sweden and France. He married Alice Wilkinson of Carlisle on 1 March 1798 at Gateshead. He was a friend of the explorer
Alexander von Humboldt and a one-time business partner of rail pioneer
George Stephenson. His brother James Losh was also a partner in the firm, and kept a diary recording his anxieties about the firm during the
Napoleonic Wars. In 1810 he married Mrs Fell of Kirklinton.
Thomas Bell, (5 March 1784 – 20 April 1845) partner, was married to Katherine Lowthian of Newbiggin, Cumberland on 25 March 1815. Bell's father was a
blacksmith.
Origins: from alkali to iron The firm's origins can be traced back to 1790 when Archibald Dundonald, with John and William Losh, experimented on producing
soda from
salt. In about 1793 they opened a works at Bells Close, near Newcastle. Dundonald sent William Losh to Paris to study
Nicolas Leblanc's process for making soda from salt. In 1807, the Loshes opened an
alkali works at
Walker, Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland. It was the first in England to use the
Leblanc process. Dundonald left the partnership and the business continued as Walker Alkali Works. By 1818,
George Stephenson's original wooden wagonway was completely relaid with
cast-iron edge-rails made in collaboration between Stephenson, who owned the patent, and Losh, Wilson and Bell. Around 1821, George Stephenson was briefly a partner in the Walker Ironworks. In 1833, the
iron puddling process was installed at Walker. In that year, at the age of nineteen, Thomas Bell's son
Lowthian Bell entered the firm's Newcastle office under his father. In 1836 he joined his father at the firm's ironworks at Walker. In 1838, a second mill for rolling rails was added, run by the engineer
John Vaughan (who went on to found
Bolckow Vaughan); he strongly influenced Lowthian Bell to become an
ironmaster. In 1842, the shortage of
pig iron persuaded Bell to install its own
blast furnace for smelting mill cinder; this was a key decision, enabling the firm to expand. Only two years later, in 1844, the firm installed a second furnace at Walker for
Cleveland Ironstone from
Grosmont, six years before the boom in Cleveland iron when
Vaughan and
Marley discovered ironstone in the Eston Hills in 1850. , c. 1852 On 25 January 1851, Lowthian Bell He went on to have a career in chemistry and politics, becoming a member of parliament among many other distinctions. On 8 October 1855, there was a serious
boiler explosion at the Walker Iron Works, which killed at least seven workers. According to a contemporary account, the boiler "unfurled like a sail, was blown upwards, carrying with it two roofings of the sheds, and blowing down two furnaces, with their chimneys, and scattering the molten metal and red hot bricks around, while one end of it was hurled into the midst of the works, and the other about 200 yards over the hill top, into the lumber-yard". All the dead were aged between 19 and 33, and the event created something of a sensation at the time.These iron-works, situate on the Tyne, and belonging to Messrs. Losh, Wilson, & Bell, originally consisted of only one furnace, being the first blast furnace that was specially erected for this bed of ironstone (in connection with Scotch, and other ores, for mixing), viz., about the year 1842 or 1843, and which ironstone was purchased from the aforesaid mines belonging to Mrs. Clark, in the
Whitby district, the first cargo being sent in June or July, 1843, since which time these works have been increased by one extra furnace, built for the Whitby district ironstone in 1844, and by other three [at
Port Clarence] for the north part of Cleveland, about 1852, making now a total of five furnaces.
Bells, Lightfoot In 1875, the Bells, Goodman partnership was dissolved when Alfred Goodman retired. The firm became known as Bells, Lightfoot & Co. On 30 November 1876, Thomas Bell Lightfoot, Managing Partner, was granted a patent for his developments on machines for squeezing metals into shape. However, on 28 August 1883, Thomas Bell moved to Bilbao, Spain, where he continued to describe himself as an Ironmaster, and by mutual consent his partnership with Henry Bell and Thomas Bell the younger was dissolved. The deed was witnessed on 7 December 1883.
Bell Brothers By 1873, Bell Brothers owned 9 coal mines in County Durham and Yorkshire. There were 10 mines in 1882; in 1888 the "Clarence Salt Works" was also recorded. In 1896 and 1902 the company had 11 mines. In 1914 there are 12; in 1921 there are 14. In 1903, Lowthian Bell, then aged 87, sold a majority holding of the Bell companies to the rival firm
Dorman Long. It was not a comfortable merger. Bell Brothers, along with the plate maker
Consett Iron Company and another family ironmaking firm of Northeast England,
Bolckow Vaughan, Further, as regards the Bells and the Dormans, Bell Brothers was recorded in the
Colliery Year Book and Coal Trades Directory of 1923 as having an annual output of 600,000 tons of coal for coking and manufacturing.
Sir Hugh Bell was chairman and managing director;
Arthur Dorman and Charles Dorman were directors. That same year, Bell Brothers, described in
The Sydney Morning Herald as "owners of coal and ironstone mines and blast furnaces and rolling mills", was finally merged completely with Dorman Long. Sir Arthur Dorman was chairman; both Hugh Bell and his son Maurice Bell were among the directors. When Arthur Dorman died in 1931, Hugh Bell, aged 87, briefly became chairman of 'Dorman versus Bell'; he died on 29 June 1931. ==Wages and social conditions==