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the first working atmospheric steam engine at Dudley’s Coal Farm in Coneygreve in 1712. A working Newcomen engine, possibly the second one to be built, has been on display in the Engine Room attached to the Dartmouth Visitor Centre since 1964. For the next 70 or so years, Newcomen’s “fire


engine” were installed in hundreds of mines and factories across Great Britain, Europe and the World, and became the gold standard to be developed and improved. The next generation of engineers set about doing just that: with men like Smeaton, Washborough, Watt, and Heslop, improving its efficiency, applying its power to rotary applications in mills, and using improvements in iron working and casting to use higher steam pressures safely. Finally, in 1804 Trevithick applied high- pressure steam to both sides of the piston, small enough to be used for transport, on rail, road, and on the water. Now, Dartmouth Museum is very fortunate


to have been gifted a unique collection of 8 working models of these engines, by their creator David Hulse. Working from first principles and largely without drawings of the engines, but with huge experience and expertise from his time as Chief Development Engineer at Royal Doulton china, David worked out the designs. Over 40 years he then went on to forge, turn, cast, saw, and fire every single component part of each engine,


left: Craning in the exhibits


below: Engraving of the first ‘floating bridge’


including each of the 150,000 miniature bricks that he used. Visitors will see the engines inside the buildings in which


they worked, above the mines they helped drain, or alongside the machines that they powered. They’ll see how they enabled a step-change in efficiency, power and productivity, that transformed the way Britain worked, setting the world on the pathway to the industrial revolution, powering mills, machine shops, and ultimately transport. David Hulse had been looking for a place to house his


collection and was introduced to the Museum by Geoff Wallis of the Newcomen Society. He approached the Museum who were delighted to accept his most generous donation. His collection arrived in August and was carefully lifted into the Museum, where the project team has worked hard to open up two new rooms that will showcase the machines and the exhibition.


David and his machines at his home in Stone


Brick making machine designed and made by David


Coal hulks in the river


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