Finch Foundry
19th century forge in Devon, England
Finch Foundry is a 19th-century water-powered forge situated in Sticklepath, a small village at the foot of a steep hill on the road from Exeter to Okehampton, Devon, England. Its original name was Manor Mills, and it was originally used to produce agricultural and mining hand tools. At its peak, the foundry produced around 400 edge-tools a day.
The founder was William Finch, who was born in 1779. Several generations of the family ran the foundry, most notably Rebecca Finch, who managed the business at its peak.
It remained an active foundry until 1960 when the roof collapsed and has been a National Trust property since 1994. It contains examples of a tilt hammer, drop hammer, and shear hammer all powered by water wheels. The Trust maintains the forge in working order and demonstrations of the tools are given.
The Finch Foundry (originally Manor Mills) was operated by John Browning and John Stanbury in 1805. The foundry was formed by William Finch in 1814 in the cloth mill, and the deeds show that at this time William Finch was John Stanbury's tennant.
The public source identifies “Finch Foundry” as 19th century forge in Devon, England. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Finch, Foundry and 19th.
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This entry incorporates text from “Finch Foundry” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.