Hams Hall

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hams Hall is a place near Lea Marston in North Warwickshire, England, named after the manor house which formerly stood there.

The house was the home of the Adderley family was dismantled in the 1920s, when the City of Birmingham bought the land and built an electricity generating station there (Hams Hall A). Part of the hall was exported to the USA. The other was reassembled as Bledisloe Lodge, a Residence Hall for students at the Royal College of Agriculture, at Coates near Cirencester in Gloucestershire. Descendants of the Adderley's now live in Fillongley.

Hams Hall A (as it come to be known) was built under the auspices of Richard Alexander Chattock (1865-1936), Birmingham City Electrical Engineer from the creation of the City Council's Electric Supply Department in 1903 until his retirement in 1930^[1].

Two more stations (Hams Hall B and C) were later built on the site, reputedly the largest in Europe at the time of its construction. The City's electricity generating and supply functions were nationalised in the late 1940s^[1]. The Central Electricity Generating Board took over responsibility for the site from Birmingham and founded an environmental studies centre. Lea Ford Cottage (a local medieval timber framed building) was re-erected there to preserve it.

The area alongside the confluence of the River Blythe and River Tame became the West Midland Bird Club's Ladywalk Reserve. All three stations were closed and themselves demolished in the 1990s. The land was cleared and an industrial park was built. Only the sub stations now remain, on the other side of the road.

The Hams Hall Industrial Park, owned by E.ON includes^[2]

• a Channel Tunnel Railfreight terminal opened by John Prescott on 11 July 1997^[3]
• E.ON's Power Engineering and Plant Test facility
• a BMW car engine plant
• a Marley Building Materials Ltd Thermalite block production factory
• distribution and warehousing facilities for
  • Sainsbury's
  • Bell Micro
  • Birds Eye Walls
  • Chubb Locks
  • Expeditors
  • DHL
  • Incorporatewear
  • Leggett Logistics
  • Nestle Purina Petcare

[edit] See also

• Charles Adderley, 1st Baron Norton

[edit] External links

Hams Hall Environmental Studies Centre

[edit] References

1. ^ ^{a b} Electric Relief, J. P Lethbridge, in Stand to (Journal of the Western Front Association), April 2007
2. ^ Environmental Studies Centre
3. ^ “Hams Hall Freight Terminal opened by Deputy Prime Minister”, RAIL (no. 310), 30 July 1997