Fate of Cort's patents

This page is part of a website based on the life and achievements of eighteenth-century inventor Henry Cort. Please email site controller Eric Alexander with any comments or queries.

Refutation of allegations of conspiracies against Cort

We have not investigated the truth of the allegations to which we are about to advert, nor, indeed as they refer to scientific matters, and to secret passages of the scandalous history of England 60 years ago, do we esteem ourselves competent to conduct an inquiry of that description.

From Times accolade of 1856.

The main substance of these allegations is that Adam Jellicoe’s superiors at the Navy Office, Treasurer Henry Dundas (later Viscount Melville) and Paymaster Alexander Trotter, deliberately defrauded Henry Cort of the fruits of his labours in the action taken to recover the money Jellicoe had invested in Cort’s business.

These allegations reverberated around the late 1850s, being most explicitly formulated by Thomas Webster, and heavily influenced many later commentators. Mott, in the book drafted from his research in the 1960s, exonerated Dundas, laying all the blame on “Trotter the Plotter”. Although Trotter undoubtedly had his own little scam, there is no evidence of any malice in any of his actions. When Singer edited Mott’s work, he ignored nearly all the references to Trotter’s supposed misdeeds.

The facts, revealed by recent research, are that Dundas and Trotter, aided by Dundas’s son Robert, did their best to minimise the suffering for both Cort and Adam Jellicoe’s son Samuel.

They did, however, need to take legal action to recover the money. To that end Treasury solicitor Joseph White was called in (since the Navy’s own solicitor was away at the critical time): the subsequent legal action, resulting in extents being issued against both Jellicoe and Cort, was doubtless something he felt bound to take. There is also evidence that he tried unsuccessfully to realise the value of Cort’s patents.

To consider the specific points raised about Henry Cort, by The Times and by others:

He expended a private fortune exceeding £20,000 in bringing his patent processes to complete perfection. When that was achieved, and the leading ironmasters of the kingdom had, as related, signed contracts to pay him 10 shillings per ton for their use, his patents were seized by a high Officer of the Crown, holding the responsible and lucrative posts of Treasurer of the Navy and Secretary at War, and under an extent obtained by the perjury of a confidential deputy his freeholds at Fontley, Fareham and Gosport, valued, with the stock and goodwill of a lucrative trade, at £39,000, were handed over to the son of a public defaulter in that Treasurer's office. No account of these proceedings against Cort was ever obtained either before his death in 1800 or afterwards.

From petition to Parliament, quoted in Times accolade of 1856.

The ironmasters’ contracts were wishful thinking by Henry Cort’s son Richard. Only Folliot Scott at Rotherhithe and Richard Crawshay at Cyfarthfa made any wrought iron under agreements with Cort. There may have been a few agreements with other ironmasters, but all indications are that they never actually puddled any iron while Cort was in business.

The allegation of perjury by Alexander Trotter is likewise a figment of Richard Cort’s imagination.

The freeholds, stock and goodwill were not handed over to Samuel Jellicoe. He paid for them, after Cort had specifically relinquished his rights.

The proceedings against Cort were recorded. The records were presented as evidence to the Commission of Naval Enquiry in 1804.

An allegation that Trotter ignored Cort’s pleas to establish the effectiveness of his patents is also refuted by evidence.

Mr. Cort on 17^th May 1790 wrote to Mr Trotter offering his personal services to procure such necessary information to render the patents productive but not receiving any Answer Mr. Cort of course c^d not proceed to procure such information…

From a note, apparently by Henry Cort, of July 1791; quoted in Henry Cort: The Great Finer

I had many conversations with Mr. Cort upon the subject, and Lord Melville’s son, Mr. Dundas, took a great deal of trouble after Mr. Jellicoe’s death in endeavouring to make Mr. Cort’s patent of value, so as to be brought in liquidation of Mr. Jellicoe’s debt.

Evidence of Alexander Trotter to Select Committee, May 1805.

Sir, The Commissioners of the Navy have received your letter of the 4^th instant, and I have it in charge from them to acquaint you that your invention appears of that utility as to induce them to give encouragement to the manufacture of British iron, performed according the methods that have been practised by you.

From letter of Navy Board Secretary John Morrison, supposedly July 1791, quoted by Webster and again in Henry Cort: The Great Finer: “a typical example of official evasion”.

From a Recollection of the great Kindness and condescending Attention which you so repeatedly manifested towards my late father Mr Henry Cort, I am induced to hope you will pardon the Liberty I take of addressing you by Letter…

From letter of Coningsby Cort to Robert Dundas (Melville’s son and secretary during 1790s), 23 March 1808, in Scottish National Archives.

There is no reason why Trotter should lie about his “many conversations with Mr. Cort”. He never lied when referring to his own profitable sideline. As for Dundas senior’s part in this episode, even the Weale documents, which abound with suspicion about plots, give him some credit.

Upon the representation of Mr. H Dundas (Lord Melville), the Treasury by warrant granted him a similar pension of £200 which he enjoyed until his death in 1800.

From Weale collection, Vol 3 leaf 205

Elsewhere it is suggested that this pension resulted from the petition of Cort’s friends in 1791, asking Prime Minister Pitt to find a suitable job for Cort. It is likely that Pitt passed it on to Dundas, who decided that a pension was the best solution. No document detailing such a process has yet been uncovered.

One further allegation in The Times:

It appears that the Treasurer and his confidential deputy a few weeks before the sitting of the commission indemnified each other by a joint release, and agreed to burn their accounts for something approaching to a million and a half of the public money which had passed through their hands. In this general conflagration all the evidence by which Henry Cort's case could have been established perished, and the culprits refused to answer any questions which would have criminated themselves.

From Times accolade of 1856.

The release they cite is probably the one forming an appendix to the Select Committee’s report (National Archives, TS11/386). Its main purpose seems to be clearing the debt Trotter owed to his superior, thanks to their private transactions. It is doubtful whether any material related to Henry Cort perished in the conflagration.

It is observed elsewhere that Cort’s prospects of benefiting from royalties on his patents were meagre, because of difficulties in applying his process to freshly smelted iron. Such allegations as the following can therefore be dismissed.

It is probable, indeed, that from his royalties, and receipts under his patents, Cort or his representatives could have satisfied all claims. Time, however, was denied him, and the simpler plan adopted of ruining him and his descendants outright, and at once. The influence of the culprits and the exigencies of political life forbade all hope of raising the question in Parliament at any subsequent period.

From Times accolade of 1856.

There is little doubt that the part taken by Mr. Trotter in the proceedings against Cort was prompted by fraudulent motives, and were connected with that series of transactions for which Lord Melville was impeached by the House of Commons in 1805. Had time and opportunity been afforded to him, Cort could easily have made up Jellicoe's deficiency, as he was engaged in lucrative contracts for the navy, and his engagements with the ironmasters, then on the eve of completion, would have provided him with ample funds to meet the liability. But no, – Cort had been marked out as the victim of deception on every side. Not only were his patents taken possession of by the Admiralty, but also his contracts with the Welsh ironmasters, who, basely taking advantage of the difficulties which the unfortunate patentee had been thus placed in, faithlessly broke the engagements they were under for the payment of license dues, and never paid Cort a shilling out of the thousands which were justly due to him.

From Alverstoke Parish Magazine, June 1864.

He was deliberately and perseveredly hindered from reaping any other reward but loss from his labours by the acts of official authority…

From letter of David Mushet jnr published in Journal of the Society of Arts, 24 August 1855.

The sight of this man, master of the situation, reaping royalties that were running into the hundreds of thousands of pounds, was too much for poor, weak human nature. Quietly and undreamed of by him, the lines were drawn about him until every vestige of reward was wrested from him.

From unpublished monograph by Charles H. Morgan