Dudley blast furnaces, Blast furnace, Russell's Hall, Dudley, West Midlands, 1859 (b/w photo)

Blast furnace, Russell's Hall, Dudley, West Midlands, 1859. Mr Mills, dilute albumen print. Mr Mills, otherwise unknown as a photographer, recorded the blast furnaces at Russell's Hall, west of Dudley, when the industry was producing a vast number of iron products, including nails, boilers, vices and chains. Coal mining around Dudley had been recorded in the early 13th century and the area was famous for the manufacture of iron nails in the early 16th century. By the late 18th century Dudley was at the centre of England's iron industry, and the region was dubbed the 'Black Country' because of the blackening of the landscape by the coal and iron industries. Russell's Hall itself was pockmarked by clay pits and coal shafts, and significant urban development only took place after the Second World War.