The History of Bersham Ironworks

Welcome to John Wilkinson's Bersham Ironworks.

John Wilkinson was a famous eighteenth century ironmaster inventor and entrepreneur. He was know as 'Iron Mad Jack' because of his obsession with iron.

He invented the first machine to accurately bore cannon. His cannon were used at sea and on land by Britain and, allegedly, by her enemies!

He invented a machine to bore accurate cylinders. Wilkinson's cylinders were vital to the success of James Watt's revolutionary steam engine. Bersham Ironworks was the centre for cylinder production.

You can find out more about John Wilkinson at Bersham Heritage Centre.

Contemporary drawing of Wilkinson's cannon boring machine

Modern drawing of the cannon boring machine

Simplified drawing of John Wilkinson's cylinder boring machine (view larger version)

John Wilkinson paid his workforce using tokens. Despite this, he was a popular employer

The History of Bersham Ironworks Document

The document is available to download in the following format:

The History of Bersham Ironworks - PDF format 587Kb

To view and print PDF files, you must have Adobe® Acrobat® Reader installed: click the logo below to download the software.

Adobe Acrobat documents can be converted back to plain text using Adobe's Online conversion tools for Adobe PDF documents.