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Bedlam Furnaces is a group of iron-smelting blast furnaces located in Shropshire, dating to the eighteenth century and representing an important phase in the development of English iron production during the Industrial Revolution. The site comprises multiple furnace structures constructed of brick and stone, characteristic of the period's industrial architecture. The furnaces operated using the blast furnace technology that was transforming iron manufacture in the Midlands, and their survival makes them valuable evidence of early industrial processes and the region's metalworking heritage. The site reflects the expansion of iron production that underpinned broader industrial and economic developments in eighteenth-century England.
Bedlam Furnaces is a scheduled monument protected by Historic England under reference 1006234. View the official record →
Bedlam Furnaces is a group of iron-smelting blast furnaces located in Shropshire, dating to the eighteenth century and representing an important phase in the development of English iron production during the Industrial Revolution. It is designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument by Historic England (NHLE) under reference 1006234.
Bedlam Furnaces is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by Historic England (NHLE) — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in England. The official designation reference is 1006234.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including The Iron Bridge (0.6 km), Lilleshall Beam Blowing Engines (1.5 km), Blists Hill Iron Furnaces (1.6 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 15 strands of Bedlam Furnaces's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Bedlam Furnaces stands on Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation And South Wales Lower Coal Measures Formation (Undifferentiated), bedrock that formed in the Westphalian. The rock here is mudstone, siltstone, sandstone, coal, ironstone and ferricrete.