Dyfi Furnace

The site for Dyfi Furnace was chosen downstream of the waterfall on the River Einion to take advantage of the water power from the river and charcoal produced from the local woodlands, with the iron ore being shipped in from Cumbria via the Afon Dyfi.

The furnace built around 1755 was only used for about fifty years to smelt iron ore. By 1810 it had been abandoned and the waterwheel removed.

[1] The etching by John George Wood to accompany his "The Principal Rivers of Wales", published 1813, shows the furnace in its transitional form with no waterwheel attached.

It is likely that the furnace was then transferred to Kendall & Co. [citation needed] (Jonathan Kendall and his brother Henry), ironmasters from the West Midlands with extensive interests scattered across Staffordshire, Cheshire, The Lake District and Scotland.

After the original lease expired in 1796, it appears [citation needed] the furnace was then owned by Bell and Gaskell, including Thomas Bell, who had managed it for the Kendalls, whose main activity by then was running the Beaufort Ironworks in Beaufort, Ebbw Vale, in the South Wales Valleys.