Bibliography - R. G. Houghton R.I.B.A.
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The Recovered Courthope Manuscripts: Transcriptions, by R. G. Houghton, published 1983 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 3, article, pp.12-17) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506559]   Download PDF

A number of documents, many relating to Wealden ironworks of the 17th century, have recently been rediscovered, having been missing for some thirty years. The period covered by the documents is that of the Second and Third Dutch Wars, from around 1664 to the mid 1670s. Among them are letters, memoranda and documents relating to gun casting at Horsmonden, Hawkhurst, Ashburnham, Barden and Imbham, including copies of contracts. The letters were written by King Charles II's gunfounder, George Browne, to his business associate Alexander Courthope. There is also a family connection, since Alexander Courthope married the widow of George Browne's brother John.
The following two letters were written against a background of rising indignation in England against the Dutch over trading disputes in the East Indies, North America and West Africa. Already in 1664, there was virtually a state of war between the two countries in these areas. Early in the year, the Dutch had been expelled from several important trading centres on the West African coast, only for them to be recaptured in the autumn. In August, New Amsterdam (shortly to be renamed New York) was taken from the Dutch by an expedition under Captain Nicholls.

St. Leonards Lower Forge and Furnace Site Survey 1988, by R. G. Houghton and J. S. Hodgkinson, published 1989 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 9, article, pp.12-17, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

The WIRG Field Group made a number of visits to this site. Based on their discussions during and after their visits, this account supplements and re-examines the information given in the gazetteer of The Iron Industry of the Weald. The site is a complex one and any interpretation must be tentative for the dual use cannot be explained as readily as at Langles.

Heathfield Furnace Site Survey 1989, by R. G. Houghton and J. S. Hodgkinson, published 1990 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 10, article, pp.3-6, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

The WIRG Field Group visited the site (TQ 600186) on three occasions. Heathfield was one of the most important sites in the Weald in the eighteenth century but it has suffered considerable depredation and Cleere and Crossley's description (1985: p.335) requires little amendment

Cuckfield Furnace Site Survey 1989, by J. Berners-Price, R. G. Houghton and J. S. Hodgkinson, published 1991 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 11, article, pp.7-9, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

Due to the undergrowth on the site, distances and directions are deceptive, and for this reason some slight revision of the conclusions in Cleere & Crossley is necessary. The site is, in many ways, typical of Wealden furnace sites, with the probable position of the furnace dictated by the access for wagons, and evidence of water management in the arrangement of water courses.

Reconstruction of a Wealden Gun casting Furnace, by R. G. Houghton, published 1991 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 11, article, p.18, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

Warren Furnace, Worth, Sussex, by J. S. Hodgkinson and R. G. Houghton, published 1992 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 12, article, pp.16-23, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

This survey was carried out in 1979 and particular thanks are owed to Tony Weaver and Ken Housman for their advice and assistance, and to Mr. Peter Curties, the owner, for permission to examine the site over a long period. When the survey was undertaken the site lay in woodland consisting of a few mature oaks and wild cherries amid a low undergrowth of ash saplings. Since the storm of 1987 the site has become virtually impenetrable.

Iron Plat, Buxted, Sussex and Forge Site Survey 1990/1, by D. M. Meades and R. G. Houghton, published 1992 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 12, article, pp.23-26, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506560]   Download PDF

The WIRG Field Group surveyed this site as part of its 1990/1 winter programme. This account supplements the information given in the gazetteer of The Iron Industry of the Weald, 148, 339, which suggests that the furnace at Iron Plat may have been one of four furnaces which are mentioned in the Hogge papers (Crossley 1974:52). No other documentary references to Iron Plat are known. Remains on the ground indicate that, in addition to a furnace, there was a conversion forge at this site. Whether the two were contemporary, or one succeeded the other and if so in what order is unknown.

Ebernoe Furnace - site survey 1996, by J. S. Hodgkinson and R. G. Houghton, published 1997 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 17, article, pp.9-12, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506564]   Download PDF

The site of the iron works at Ebernoe (SU 977278) was located, in common with many other such works, at the point where a valley narrowed, enabling the construction of a bay, or dam, by which a pond could be impounded. The original stream seems to have followed a course on the south side of the valley, where the remains of a natural ghyll can still be seen. The southern valley sides are steep in comparison with those on the north side, and it is for this reason that access to the site would have been more likely on the north side. A deeply worn track is still in evidence, and following a route, at a gradient manageable by wagons, up past the site of a former cottage. Known as Furnace Croft, the building, which is shown on a 1764 map of the manor of Ebernoe, survived until the 1920s.

A reconstruction of a Wealden conversion forge and boring mill, by R. G. Houghton, published 1997 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 17, article, pp.23-40, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506564]   Download PDF

To many people, mention of the Wealden iron industry conjures up a picture of a blast furnace by its pond, busily casting the cannon which, according to Kipling, 'smote King Philip's fleet'. However, there were two stages in the production of iron. The first, at the furnace, was production of pig iron and castings such as cannon and firebacks. The second was less well publicised but was no less important. At the conversion forge, sows or pigs of cast iron were decarburized and hammered, to produce malleable wrought iron for the blacksmith. Some time ago, I produced a cut-away drawing of a furnace. Since then it has several times been suggested that a companion drawing of the forge would complete the picture. In many ways it has proved more difficult than the first.

Frith Furnace, Northchapel - Site Survey 1999, by R. G. Houghton and J. S. Hodgkinson, published 1999 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 19, article, pp.30-33, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 16400] & The Keep [LIB/506566]   Download PDF

This site was first surveyed for the Wealden Iron Research Group by Peter Ovenden in 1972, although the estimated length of the bay was later revised. As part of a continuing programme to make measured survey drawings of water-powered furnaces and forges, the site was resurveyed in January and February 1999. Frith is an extensive site with large quantities of blast furnace slag confirming a working life in excess of a hundred years. The streams which fed the pond for the furnace, rise in springs at the foot of Blackdown, less than a mile to the west of the site, and downstream provided power for three other ironworks: Shillinglee Furnace, Mitchell Park Forge and Wassell Forge.

Iridge Furnace, Hurst Green, by J. S. Hodgkinson and R. G. Houghton, published 2000 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 20, article, pp.32-39, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: The Keep [LIB/506567]   Download PDF

The Field Group first visited this site in May 1971, and revisited it in 1975 and 1997. The incentive for the present survey has been the acquisition, by East Sussex Record Office, of a fine map, by Ambrose Cogger, of the Iridge Estate, dated 1637. In that year, the estate was inherited by Robert Wildgoose, from his grandfather, Sir John Wildgoose. The furnace, however, had been built in 1584 by Robert's great-grandfather, John. Of particular interest with regard to the iron industry, the map illustrates an elaborate water management system for the furnace, which invites comparison with the water systems of other furnaces in the Weald. It also draws attention to the importance of recording the features of the landscape in which ironworks are located.

Bungehurst Furnace, Heathfield, by R. G. Houghton and J. S. Hodgkinson, published 2005 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 25, article, pp.19-2, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: The Keep [LIB/506572]   Download PDF

There is considerable confusion in published sources as to the location of what is known as Bungehurst Furnace. Straker, using latitude and longitude, located it at about TQ 6013 2359, while in Cleere and Crossley it is recorded at TQ 600239.1 While the navigational reference given by Straker appears to be incorrect, his description matches the site which is the subject of this survey. The description given by Cleere and Crossley, which was drawn from notes made following a visit by the Field Group in October 1973, appears to be of another site, all evidence of which seems to have been removed or covered over, for when the site was revisited in December 2002 nothing of it could be found. It would seem that there had been two blast furnace sites on the stream that joins the Rother at Scotsford Bridge.
The site of Bungehurst Furnace lies near the northern edge of Newick Wood, at TQ 5992 2357, on a north-flowing tributary of the River Rother.

The Construction of a Wealden Blast Furnace, by R. G. Houghon, published 2006 in Wealden Iron Research Group (Second Series No. 26, article, pp.10-30, ISSN: 0266-4402) accessible at: The Keep [LIB/506573]   Download PDF

As an architect I have always been interested, not only in the construction of the furnace but in the relationship between that, the layout and the process as it affects the design. It seemed natural to try to understand it by drawing it. Hence this, the last in a series of 1:50-scale axonometric drawings (Fig. 10, pp28-29). It is not meant to show any particular furnace, but is an amalgam of details from various sites and sources, put together to try to give an impression of a 17th-century gun-casting furnace. It must be borne in mind that details may vary, not only at different times and places but with different ironmasters as well.
Over a hundred furnaces were operating in the Weald at some time or other over a period of at least three hundred years, but all that remains of their structures above ground are a few low mounds of rubble and slag. Fortunately there are still enough sources available to enable us to get a fair idea of a typical furnace.