Barrow-in-Furness in the late 19th Century

Barrow-in-Furness is a large industrial town, in Cumbria* in the North West of England, which grew from a tiny hamlet to the biggest iron and steel centre in the world in just forty years. The railway was introduced to carry iron ore, slate and limestone to the new deep water port. The town's prosperity grew with the development of the steel and ship building industries.
The Furness area has been associated with the production of iron since the 13th century when the monks from Furness Abbey (two miles W of Barrow) smelted iron with wood.
In 1839 H W Schneider came to Barrow, he was a young speculator and dealer in iron and in 1850 he discovered large deposits of iron ore. He subsequently erected blast furnaces at Barrow, which by 1876 was the biggest steel works in the world.

Barrow Town Hall

The population of Barrow had grown to 8000 by 1864, by 1875 this had risen to 18000 and in 1875 it had reached 36000, growing to 47000 by 1891.

The first mayor of Barrow was James Ramsden, who founded the Barrow Shipbuilding Company, which became Vickers in 1891.

* Barrow-in-Furness was in the county of Lancashire until the boundary changes in 1974 when Cumberland, Westmorland and the Furness peninsula merged to form the new county of Cumbria.

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