Charles T Crowden – Chapel Street, Leamington Spa

Charles Thomas Crowden was born in Bath in 1859, the son of a schoolmaster.
He worked at various places, Stothert and Pitt in Bath who produced heavy cranes.
He worked at Merryweather and Sons who produced Fire Engines.

In 1884 he and another designed the London Safety Cycle.

He became chief engineer at Humber Cycles.
Invents a pressured system for the joining of tubes by water pressure which is sold to Ernest Terah Hooley’s Hydraulic company.
At the Great Horseless Carriage Co in Coventry in 1897, he designed the first parcels van.

In 1897 he moves to Leamington living at Vernon Lodge, 10 Eastnor Grove, Leamington and acquired the old Mulliner carriage works in Packington Place and is a motor car manufacturer of the Leamington Motor Car Works.

By 1901 he has produced a fire engine for the Norwich Union.

But by 1904 the entire Chapel Street Works has been put up for auction and he had moved to Kent, and finally Nottinghamshire.

He died in 1922.

Photos courtesy of the Coventry Transport Museum, which also have an 1898 Crowden motor carriage on show.