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The Museum collection includes varied material relevant to the history of shipbuilding as a significant local industry, of which our Simpson and Strickland archive forms a part. For details of our search service, click here.
Simpson, Strickland & Co.
The firm of Simpson, Strickland & Co., engineers, ship, yacht and steam launch builders, started about 1870 as Simpson & Denison, with premises in Clarence Street, Dartmouth, with slipways into the waterway which is now Mayors Avenue. About the mid-1880s, the firm changed its name and moved to the north end of Sandquay, Dartmouth, in what had been Robert Moore’s shipyard. In 1890 they acquired the site at Higher Noss Point, in Brixham parish, where they built an entirely new works. Here they remained until overtaken by bankruptcy in 1917. The works and plant were then bought by Philip & Son, who made many alterations over the years, though some of the original buildings remain.
In their heyday, Simpson, Strickland & Co. were considered among the world’s leading steam engine designers and builders in their field. Their steam launches and pinnaces were in use by several navies and leading shipping lines, and they built many shallow-draft paddle and screw steamers for use on the Nile, in Africa and South America, beside many pleasure craft and yachts for home and abroad. Several are known to be still running with the original engines and boilers. Works also existed at Teddington, and one Simpson steam dinghy is apparently still running on the Thames.
They did much experimental work. Their products included a patent boiler (the Kingdon), steam dynamo sets, engines for Thorneycroft steam lorries, a portable agricultural steam engine, marine oil engines and petrol engines and a wide range of high-speed yachts and launches. Much of their work was ahead of its time.
Their bankruptcy is said to have been due to efforts to raise extra capital to buy the rights to build the first pure diesel engine. With the enforced closure a fine team of brilliant designers and engineers was broken up, as well as one of the most forward-looking companies in Britain.
Selection from our Simpson & Strickland engineering drawings collection
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