Thomas Newcomen
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Thomas Newcomen (baptised 24 February 1664; died 5 August 1729) was an ironmonger by trade, and a Baptist lay preacher by calling. He was born in Dartmouth, Devon, England, near a part of the country noted for a number of tin mines. Flooding was a major problem, restricting the depth at which the mineral could be mined. Newcomen's contribution was to perfect a practicable steam engine for pumping water. In consequence, he is often referred to as a father of the Industrial Revolution, as the inventor of the Newcomen steam engine.
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[edit] Religious life
He could be said to have been rather more than a lay preacher as he was ordained as a teaching elder in the local Baptist church. That he continued in business is almost certainly because the church could not afford to pay him as a full time elder. His father had been one of a group who brought the well known Puritan John Flavel to Dartmouth. Later one of Newcomen's business contacts in London, Edward Wallin, was another baptist minister who had connections with the well known Dr John Gill of Horsleydown Southwark. His connection with the Baptist church at Bromsgrove materially aided the spread of his steam engine.
[edit] Developing the steam engine
Newcomen's great achievment was his steam engine. This was probably developed about 1710, combining the ideas of Thomas Savery and Denis Papin. It is likely Newcomen was already acquainted with Savery, whose forebears were merchants in south Devonin 1712. Savery also had a post with the Commissioners for Sick and Hurt Seamen, which took him to Dartmouth. Savery had devised a 'fire engine', a kind of thermic syphon. In this process, steam was admitted to an empty container and then condensed. The vacuum thus created was used to suck water from the sump at the bottom of the mine. The 'fire engine' was not very effective, and could not work beyond a limited depth.
Newcomen replaced the receiving vessel (where the steam was condensed) with a cylinder with a piston. Instead of the vacuum drawing in water, it was used to draw down the piston. This was used to work a beam engine, in which a large wooden beam rocked up and down upon a central fulcrum. On the other side of the beam was a chain attached to a pump at the base of the mine. Water was drawn into the pump cylinder and expelled into a pipe to the surface by the weight of the machinery, as the steam cylinder was refilled with steam, ready for the next power stroke. One of the first engines was built by Newcomen and his partner John Calley at the Conygree Coalworks near Dudley in the West Midlands. A working replica of this can today be seen at the Black Country Living Museum nearby.
[edit] Later Life
Comparatively little is known of Newcomen's later life. By the time of his death, over a hundred of his engines had been installed by Newcomen and others, operating under Savery's patent (which did not expire until 1713, in most of the important mining districts of Britain, draining coal mines in the Black Country, Warwickshire and near Newcastle upon Tyne, and lead mines in Flintshire and Derbyshire, amongst other places.
In his later life (at least) the engine affairs were conducted through an unincorporated company, The Proprietors of the Invention for raising water by fire. Its secretary and treasurer was John Meres clerk to the Society of Apothecaries in London. That Society formed a company which had a monopoly of supplying medicines to the Navy, providing a close link with Savery, whose will he wintressed. The Committee of the Proprietors also included Edward Wallin, a Baptist of Swedish descent, and pastor of a church at Maze Pond, Southwark. Newcomen died at his house in 1729, and his body was buried at Bunbury Fields.
[edit] After Newcomen
By 1725, the engine was in common use in collieries, and it held its place without material change for about three-quarters of a century. Near the close of its career the atmospheric engine was much improved in its mechanical details by John Smeaton, who built many large engines of this type about the year 1770.
The main problem with the Newcomen design was that it was very expensive to operate. Much heat was lost in the process of condensing the steam, as this cooled the cylinder. This did not matter unduly at a colliery, where coal (or slack) was freely available, but added greatly to the mining costs where coal was not readily available, as in Cornwall. This led to its gradual replacement after 1775 by an impoved design, invented by James Watt, in which the steam was condensed in a separate condenser. The Watt steam engine was much more fuel efficient, enabling Watt and his partner Matthew Boulton to collect substantial royalties based on the fuel saved.
Attempts were made to drive machinery by Newcomen engines, but these were unsuccessful, as the single power stroke produced a very jerky motion. Despite Watt's improvement, Common Engines (as they were then known) remained in use for a considserable time. Probably the last Newcomen-style engine to be used commercially – and the last still remaining on its original site – is at Elsecar, near Barnsley in South Yorkshire.
[edit] Further reading
L. T. C. Rolt and J. S. Allen, The Steam Engine of Thomas Newcomen (Landmark Publishing, Ashbourne 1997).
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Newcomen, Thomas |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 24 February 1664 (baptism) |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Dartmouth, Devon, England |
| DATE OF DEATH | 5 August 1729 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | London |
