BW122
Potter & Son (Runcorn) Ltd
Description
Records of Potter & Son (Runcorn) Ltd: boat certificate 1948.
Date
1948
Reference code
BW122
Access Status
These records are available immediately for research
Administrative / Biographical history
By the beginning of World War II, Potter & Son had been reduced to 30 boats but the company was still the largest of what were known as the 'Potteries Boats'. These companies specialised in the carriage of raw material used in the manufacture of pottery. Some of the boats were owned by various potters and mill owners, who used them to supply their own works, while others were owned by independent carrying companies (such as Potter & Son) and owner boatmen. Potter & Son started its business by buying or hiring boats from owner boatmen. Horse-drawn 'Potteries' boats could carry about 23 tons of cargo. A variety of loads, including flints, china stone, china clay, felspar, quartz and blue or ball clay used in the manufacture of pottery, were carried. These materials were loaded into the hold of the boat in three heaps, with the front two heaps usually being split by a box containing horse feed. The boats originally loaded at Ellesmere Port, reaching the Trent and Mersey Canal via the Middlewich Branch of the Shropshire Union Canal. All the motor boats owned by Potter & Son came from the Anderton Company. The company ceased trading some time in the 1950s.
For more information on Potter & Son (Runcorn) Ltd see Robert J Wilson's 'Knobsticks: Canal carrying on the northern Trent & Mersey' (Robert Wilson Publications, 1974).
System of arrangement
It has not been possible to ascertain any original structure of record-keeping from the small number of records held for this company. The fonds has therefore been arranged in chronological order.