Priestman Brothers was an engineering company based in Kingston upon Hull, England that manufactured diggers, dredgers, cranes and other industrial machinery. In the later 1800s the company also produced the Priestman Oil Engine, an early design of oil fuelled internal combustion engine.
History
Priestman family ownership (1870–1895)
The company was founded in 1870;[1] William Dent Priestman bought the Holderness Foundry with money from his father, a Leeds corn-miller. William's brother Samuel also joined the company.[2]
It is said the company's entry into the construction of dredging equipment began in 1876 when they were asked to construct machinery to recover lost gold from the sea west of the coast of Spain. No gold was found but the company's equipment proved useful for dredging of harbours and docks;[3]