Woodcroft, Bennet (FRS FSA) 1803 - 1879

(1803-1879) Engineer and Patent Office Administrator

Bennet Woodcroft was an engineer, patent office administrator and first curator of the Patent Office Museum. He was born on 29th December 1803 and was the son of John Woodcroft, a silk and muslin merchant from Sheffield. He was initially trained as an apprentice silk weaver but sought to further his education and studied chemistry under John Dalton.

Woodcroft would prove to be a talented inventor and registered his first patent in 1826, for an improvement relating to ship paddlewheels. He would go on to register many more including one for printing on yarn before weaving, in 1827, one for an improvement to loom tappets in 1837 and three relating to improvements in screw propellers, in 1832 1844 and 1851.

In 1838 he would enter into a partnership with his father but would leave in 1840 following a disagreement. Following this he would establish a business as a consulting engineer and patent agent. Around this time, he would also join the Manchester Library and Philosophical Society, which put him in contact with many of the prominent engineers of the time including Joseph Whitworth and James Nasmyth.

In 1846 Woodcroft moved to London to continue his business. In April 1847 he would be appointed Professor of Machinery at University College but would leave this post in June 1851, as he found it incompatible with his other interests. Not long after this though, in 1852, he would be appointed Assistant to the Commissioner of Patents, with responsibility for specifications. He would later be promoted to Clerk of the Commissioners of Patents. One of his major works in this position would be to publish the specifications of 14,359 patents taken out between 1617 and 1852, along with an index and other technical papers. This would be made available to public libraries.

Bennet Woodcroft would also be involved in the creation of the Patent Office Museum in 1857, as its first curator. This was a separate exhibition within the building of the South Kensington Museum and was mostly focused on models of contemporary apparatus. Woodcroft would expand this by collecting examples of many historically important engines, and other types of machinery. This included Puffing Billy, the oldest surviving steam locomotive, Stephenson’s Rocket, which would set the pattern for all following locomotives, Henry Bell’s Comet, the first commercial operated steam ship in Europe, and Symington’s marine engine, often described as the first practical marine engine. He would also amass a large collection of stationary engines, including the oldest surviving example produced by Boulton and Watt. This collection would be an integral part of the Science Museum’s collection when it was formed in 1909, the Patent Office collection being transferred first to the South Kensington Museum and then to the new institution. This was not without difficultly though as much of the material Woodcroft acquired was done so personally and upon his death there was a great deal of confusion over its ownership, which would not be fully settled until 1903 when his wife left the entire collection to the museum.

In 1866 Bennet would marry Agnes Bertha Sawyer. He would retire on 31st March 1876 and die on 7th February 1879.