Charles Nelson of Warwick, Stockton, Southam & Crackley Hill House Kenilworth

"Charles Nelson"

Driveway to The Fields House Southam Photography by Andy F

On the Death of his Father George Nelson, his mother Sarah looked to her elder son Charles, to be put in with other staff, to assist in the management of the business at Stockton and others unrelated to the process of gelatine. His father had been involved in several businesses at the time of his death. At Warwick a timber business which was said to be his main business at that time – timber and building materials, slates and coal and others. He owned an estate at Stockton which at the time was believed to be a farm which he had bought for the Blue Lias rocks that lay beneath it. It was ultimately developed into Lime and Cement works carried out under the firm of Charles Nelson and Company. Those businesses were later put into Charles’s name when he became of age. At that time Charles had nothing to do with the Gelatine manufactory which remained entirely in the management of Thomas Dale. Sarah Nelson had two thirds of the partnership in that process with Mr Dale having the remainder. She took no part in its management of the gelatine manufactory. The leases to the Properties at Emscote belonged to Sarah Nelson however, inherited by way of her late husband George Nelson’s will.

Charles Nelson was involved within the Gelatine part of the business at a later period though for just eight years. Having not studied the process to the same degree as his younger brother George Henry, he kept the books during his time and was considered a good engineer, drawing plans for some of the buildings.

He is more associated with building the Blue Lias Cement and Lime Works at Stockton near Southam. Taken from Edward Montague Nelson sworn testimony Smith v Nelson Tuesday December 13^th 1904 (May 2010)