Henry Cort
Inventor - Creator of puddled iron - Father of iron trade
This page is part of a website based on the life and achievements of eighteenth-century inventor Henry Cort.
The creator and owner of the site was Eric Alexander who passed away. The site is now hosted by Hans Weebers
Please contact me with any comments or queries.
Pages
  1. Homepage
  2. Life of Henry Cort
  3. Cort's processes in iron manufacture
  4. Cort's patents
  5. Refutation of allegations of conspiracies against Cort
  6. Adam Jellicoe's death
  7. Henry Cort's birth
  8. A navy agent's business
  9. Early life of John Becher
  10. Attwick & Burges families
  11. "Cortship" of second wife
  12. Thomas Morgan
  13. Henry Cort's hoops contract
  14. 1856 Accolade
  15. Generosity of friends 1789-94
  16. James Watson
  17. Illness of Cort's son
  18. Main sources of information
  19. Contemporary sources
  20. Navy sources
  21. Chancery files
  22. Publications about Cort
  23. Assessment of Cort's character
  24. Images of Henry Cort

  25. Impeach-tranferred to 05

  26. Parliamentary inquiry 1811-2
  27. The furore of the 1850s
  28. Society of Arts
  29. Cort's first marriage
  30. Henry Cort's children
  31. Cort family pensions
  32. Henry Cort's Hertfordshire property
  33. 1791 signatories
  34. Guiana and the Cort-Gladstone connection
  35. Cort's twilight years
  36. Memorials to Henry Cort

  37. Smelting of iron
  38. Fining before Cort
  39. Shropshire & Staffordshire ironmasters
  40. Cumbrians: Wilkinson etc
  41. Early works at Merthyr Tydfil
  42. The Crowley business
  43. London ironmongers
  44. Scottish iron
  45. Cort's promotion efforts 1783-6
  46. Later Merthyr connections
  47. Puddling after Henry Cort

  48. Gosport in Cort's day
  49. Gosport administration
  50. Gosport worthies
  51. The Amherst-Porter network
  52. James Hackman, murderer
  53. Samuel Marshall
  54. Samuel Jellicoe's legacy
  55. Links with Titchfield
  56. Links with Fareham

  57. Fact, error and conjecture
  58. 18th century politics
  59. Law in the 18th century
  60. 18th century finance
  61. Religion and sexual mores
  62. Calendar change of 1752
  63. Shelburne, Parry and associates
  64. John Becher's family
  65. The Becher-Thackeray lineage
  66. Thomas Lyttelton: a fantastic narrative
  67. Eighteenth-century London
  68. Abolition and the Corts
  69. The Burges will tangle

  70. Navy connections
  71. Navy agent's business
  72. Cort's clients
  73. Ships' pursers
  74. History of Adam Jellicoe
  75. Dundas & Trotter
  76. Cort's navy office associates
  77. Toulmin & other agents
  78. Sandwich & Middleton
  79. The Arethusa
  80. John Becher's war
  81. Thomas Morgan's war
  82. The 1782 Jamaica convoy
  83. Sinking of the Royal George

  84. Rickman & Scott: two contrasting naval careers-Missing


  85. Visitors 2006-2009
  86. Developement of the site 2006-2009

    87. ****************
  87. Daniel Guion and family

    88. ****************
  88. Other publications

 

image002

JAMES WATSON


A lawyer who becomes a judge. An MP. There is some useful documentation on Sir James Watson.

His early career, however, is as minister to a dissenting congregation in Gosport.

He enters the Cort story by marrying John Attwick's granddaughter Joanna Burges. Cort's wife is also a granddaughter, thus Joanna's first cousin.

This relationship becomes useful to Cort, though some of the use is conjecture.

Conjecture: he helps to get Cort' patents awarded.

Fact: Cort consults him when he suspects his inventions are being pirated.


In May 1787, Crawshay being at Fontley, Mr. Cort wrote Mr. Sergt Watson that Mr. C-y said he was entitled to the making Iron - see his letter to the Sergeant 28th May 1787 - but that Mr. C-y doubted him being entitled to the Rolls - but Mr. C-y's son William was by at the time & said he believed it was his right & added this remark that there never was any Mill whatever charged with Blooms to roll the same into Bars before Mr. Cort's process - that Wilkinson Raby & Horshell might have used grooved rollers for rolling bar iron of one form into bar iron of another form.

From Weale collection

Conjecture: he helps, after Cort's business collapse, to find Cort accommodation in London, and supports financially.

image003Fact: he supplies information to Henry Dundas about Cort's history.

Conjecture: he is instrumental in getting his contacts to sign the 1791 petition on behalf of Cort.

Fact: his signature is on the petition.

By this time he has become MP for Bridport, he has friends in the City and interests in the British East India Company (which may account for his familiarity with Dundas). His father-in-law, Thomas Burges, is a member of the company in Calcutta.

He has to give up his parliamentary seat in 1795, when he is appointed to the Bench in India.

But he gets a knighthood in compensation.

Before he leaves, he tries to persuade the Bridport electors to accept his brother-in-law Thomas Burges (junior) in his place.

The election takes place after he has left, but he is unsuccessful.

He is accompanied on the voyage by Henry Cort's second son, Coningsby, who hopes to gain advancement from the family connection. He is soon disappointed, as a brief biography of Watson shows.


About three weeks after his arrival, not liking the house he inhabited, [he] purchased a very excellent one at Chouringee, the removing into which terminated his mortal career. Like many other opinionated new comers he affected to hold in contempt the prevalent and justly formed notion that the sun was peculiarly injurious in Bengal, avowing that he had no doubt but any man might go out in it, without more detriment than in other hot countries, and this he put into practice, exposing himself to its burning rays several hours superintending the loading of the hackerys that were transporting his furniture from one house to the other... On the second day, he said he felt rather uncomfortable, with a great degree of giddiness. He lay down upon a sofa, and before sufficient time elapsed to summon medical assistance, he breathed his last [2 May 1796].

From R.G. Thorne, The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1790-1820

Since he has been knighted, his widow takes the title Dame Joanna Watson.


Dame.. the legal title of the wife of a knight or baronet

From Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 1975 edition

Related pages

Attwick and Burges families

Henry Cort's family

Law in the 18th century

Life of Henry Cort

The pages on this site are copied from the original site of Eric Alexander (henrycort.net) with his allowance.
Eric passed away abt 2012
If you use/copy information from this site, please include a link to the page where you found the information.

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