W.C. Holmes and Co was a gas and chemical engineers and contractors established in Chapel Hill, Huddersfield, in 1850. In 1880 the firm moved to Turnbridge, Huddersfield. The company also had offices in London from at least the 1860s.

Patents dating form 1853 were taken out by William Cartwright Holmes concerning 'improvements to the manufacture of gas and apparatus' led to a new and simplified type of gas plant. Records from this period show that financial assistance was offered to those commissioning the firm's gas plants. By the turn of the century, over 300 installations of extensions had been carried out in towns, villages and private houses in Britain. W.C. Holmes also carried out work overseas, including building a gas works for the King of Siam.

In 1914 W. C. Holmes listed its products and services as ‘apparatus for the purification of gas; roofs, bridges etc.; chemical plant.

The 1940s saw the business expand, acquiring an interest in George Waller and Son Ltd, and majority shares in the manufacturing companies B. Thornton Ltd as well as Schofield and Taylor Ltd.

W. C. Holmes itself was acquired in 1949 alongside Bryan Donkin Co by a new public company, B.H.D. Engineers, formed as a mechanical, chemical and gasworks plant engineering business and iron foundry.

By 1961 W. C. Holmes was described as a gas and chemical engineers, dust collection and control plant with 630 employees. At this time, they were the UK distributers for Connersville-type meters.

In 1973 W. C. Holmes’ parent company BHD Engineers was itself acquired by Hanson Trust. They later sold the majority of the business, with W. C. Holmes and Co going to the American company Peabody Galion. W.C. Holmes was sold again in 1990, this time to US-owned Dresser Roots in 1990. The company finally closed in 2012, by which time there were 60 employees.