Montrose connection

The mention in The Courier recently of the First World War Dunning Sopwith Camel biplane constructed by the Lincoln-based engineering company Clayton & Shuttleworth registered with Montrose port archivist John Aitken.

“Located at Stamp End Works,” he says, “the company had been established in 1842 when Nathaniel Clayton formed a partnership with his brotherin-law Joseph Shuttleworth. Initially they were engaged in the production of portable steam engines and later branched into threshing machines. In 1870 their workforce in Lincoln totalled 1,200.

“Production steadily increased and by 1890 output had totalled 26,000 steam engines and 24,000 threshing machines.

“Their product range expanded into the realm of the internal combustion engine and crawler tractor innovation. This latter field brought the Montrose connection when a new lifeboat was planned for the town’s No.1 Station.

“In 1924 the Sarah Jane Turner was replaced by the Portpatrick lifeboat Civil Service No. 3 which had been kept afloat and therefore could be moored in the South Esk until renovation work on the local station was completed.

“In due course, the lifeboat arrived from her builder’s yard at Cowes and named by the then Duchess of York accompanied by her husband the future King George V1 on September 24, 1926.

“To assist with the launching and recovery of No. 2 lifeboat the RNLI supplied a new Clayton-Shuttleworth T17 tractor for the station. An illustration of this vehicle appears in the lifeboat history “Montrose Lifeboat Station – Over 200 years of Service”.

“The company hit hard times during the Great Depression of the 1930s and were taken over by a company based in Gainsborough mainly for their combine harvester technology. Emphasis on export business had seen them set up factories in the late 1800s in what later became Eastern Europe after the Second World War.

“Production units were established in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine and Hungary with the one in Pest lingering on in one form or another until 1973 finally closing in 2010 with apparently some of the buildings still in use by smaller concerns.”