Bryan Donkin - the man and his machines

Early forms of paper had been made from the treated skins of sheep, goats and calves, or papyrus.  By the eighteenth century most paper was made by hand from cotton rags. Turned to pulp, each sheet of paper was made in a mould, stacked between felts and placed under a press and the water squeezed out, pressed again, and hung up to dry – a laborious process.

In 1801 Donkin was entrusted with the construction of a prototype of a paper-making machine, originally designed by the Fourdrinier brothers, but which they had failed to perfect.  Donkin took manufacturing premises at Bermondsey, London, in 1802, thus starting the enterprise that became the Bryan Donkin Company.    

Donkin later undertook the creation of a new printing machine, in partnership with Richard Mackenzie Bacon, the proprietor of the Norwich Mercury newspaper.  The partners were granted a patent for their new machine in 1813 and in 1814 it was successfully trialled by the Cambridge University Press publishers.  This drawing was used to promote the Donkin and Bacon machine.

For at least 1300 years people in Britain wrote with pens made from birds’ feathers. The tip of the feather was cut into a point with a slit to help the ink flow.  In March 1808 Donkin was the first to bring out a patent for a steel pen.

The advertisement for the pen stated: 'The principle on which these pens are constructed combines at once the elasticity and freedom of the quill with the durability of a metal point'. 

Though popular, Donkin knew there were greater profits to be made in his other work and so in 1811 he auctioned off the rights to his patent.   

Keeping food fresh in the 19th century was a challenge. Drying, pickling or preserving were the main ways in which people kept their food from deteriorating. After experiments with glass and stone bottles, Donkin found metal cans to be the best containers for long term food preservation. 

By September 1812, Donkin, working with his brother in law John Hall and J.H. Gamble, began production of their tin can.  The enterprise was a huge success and by late spring 1813 the firm of Donkin, Hall and Gamble were supplying preserved food to the British Admiralty.

Up until 1819 bank notes had been numbered by hand, a process which had become impracticable. Donkin’s new ‘counting machine’ counted the number of revolutions of any machine, by means of a series of notched ratchet wheels and clicking levers. Its simplicity, accuracy and effectiveness in counting and recording revolutions to the tens of thousands earned it the nickname ‘tell-tale’.