Brimscombe, United Kingdom

The gig mill, which eventually became known as Thrupp Mill, was leased to Edward Ferrabee in 1793. By 1828 the entire premises were leased to the Ferrabees, and an iron works, the Phoenix Iron Works, had been established. The Ferrabees became well known for their production of cloth-making machines, steam engines, agricultural machinery and water wheels. It was here that John Lewis had invented a machine in 1815 to shear the surplus fibres or nap from the surface of cloth, using a horizontal blade.

In the 1820s Edwin Beard Budding, a machinist or "mechanician", was employed by Edward's son, John, at Thrupp. It was while Budding was working at Thrupp that Lewis' machine was developed to use rotary cutters, and Budding realised that this machine could be adapted for other purposes. Using gears, a revolving horizontal shaft and three blades he developed a machine to cut grass, which until then had been cut manually, using a scythe. This resulted in the world's first lawn mower being invented at Thrupp. It received its patent in 1830. Budding is also credited with the invention of the screw adjustable spanner.

Brimscombe was an important local centre during the Industrial Revolution with its canal and rail links, with Brimscombe Port serving as the hub of the Thames and Severn Canal.

Brimscombe Port was originally built to transfer cargo from Severn trows, which travelled from the River Severn onto the Stroudwater Navigation, onto smaller vessels bound for London via the Thames and Severn Canal and the River Thames. This was necessary because the locks to the east of the port were too narrow to accommodate the larger sea-going trows. There were also several boat-building yards at the port, including Abdela & Mitchell, who exported boats, notably paddle steamers, all over the world.

Until the construction of what is now the A419 road along the bottom of the valley in 1815, Thrupp Lane was the main thoroughfare between Stroud and Chalford. The condition of this road was such that it required a whole day for a team of horses to draw a loaded waggon and return, a distance of only four miles each way. Later, the coming of the railway transformed the valley into a major route eastwards from Stroud (see Brimscombe railway station).

According to one source, the legendary riverboat Queen of Africa, which gave a star performance in the John Huston movie The African Queen, was built at the Abdela & Mitchell Brimscombe works between 1908 and 1911. However, other sources state that the boat, which still exists in the USA, can be identified from the plate on her boiler as being built by Lytham Shipbuilding and Engineering Co. as Livingstone. Naturally many vessels built for export by various companies resembled each other. The distinguishing feature which differentiates African Queen from the Brimscombe boats is the use of a vertical boiler on a vessel larger than vessels built by Abdelas with such boilers. Abdela preferred to use horizontal boilers for vessels of this size.

Many of the Abdela & Mitchell river-boats went to the Nile, the Niger and other African rivers, and especially to the Peruvian Amazon and other Amazonian tributaries. The Abdela river-boats were highly regarded for their elegance, shallow draft (often less than 40 cm), and flexibility, viz the Addis Ababa for Lt-Col John Harrington's White Nile/Ethiopia expedition of 1903 – "boiler arranged to burn oil, coal or wood". The Shipyards announced themselves as "Contractors To The Admiralty, War Office, India Office And Allied Governments".

Port Mills was in use in the mid 1930s by a family called Reed who sold Kincade garden tractors, but the enterprise was loss making and during 1937-8 the business was taken over by Bullock, Parsons & Co, who also worked as engineering contractors. Another businessman, Mr C T R Shepheard, who had been running a nearby sign manufacturing business, joined forces with the company and became a director. However the declaration of war in September 1939 meant the garden tractor business continued to be a struggle, especially because of difficulties obtaining import licences. From 1939 the need was for engineering that supported the war effort, and thus Bullock, Parsons & Co redeployed their plant and staff to do contract work for the Bristol Aeroplane Company, Rolls-Royce (for Spitfire engines) and Humber. Towards the end of the war the premises were commandeered for storage by the Admiralty and were only finally restored to Mr Bullock's company after he had written 364 letters to the government and published his story in the Daily Express (26 October 1945). In the 21st century, Port Mill houses the History Press, which, by happy coincidence, published the memoir cited above with reference to Bullock, Parsons & Co.