Note 35 — INTRODUCTION ENGLAND AT THE CLOSE OF THE AMERICAN WAR (1780–3)
Reading edition
In Pitt MSS., 221, is a petition signed by many persons connected with the navy in favour of granting a pension to Mr. Cort, who had made “malleable iron with raw pit-coal, and manufactured the same by means of grooved rollers, by a process of his own invention.” The petitioners state that though the invention had brought no benefit to Cort, but rather the reverse, yet it had proved to be of national importance.