Catalogue description Letters to Sir Andrew Noble and the Noble family, 1860-1924

This record is held by Tyne and Wear Archives

Details of DF.NOB
Reference: DF.NOB
Title: Letters to Sir Andrew Noble and the Noble family, 1860-1924
Description:

Family Papers
Date: 1860-1924
Related material:

For other records relating to Armstrong Whitworth and Co Ltd see accessions 1027, 130 and D/VA. For letters written to Lord Armstrong see DF/A. For the business papers of Lord Stuart Rendel see accession 31
Held by: Tyne and Wear Archives, not available at The National Archives
Language: English
Creator:

Noble family, 1860-1924
Physical description: 11 SERIES
Access conditions:

(access subject to the depositor's consent)
Immediate source of acquisition:

Accession 2925, 3242
Subjects:
  • Noble, Sir Andrew, 1831-1915
  • Military equipment
Administrative / biographical background:

Sir Andrew Noble (1831-1915) served as secretary to committees formed to investigate the new rifled breech-loading field gun advocated by W G (later Lord) Armstrong in 1858. In 1860 Armstrong recruited him to be joint manager of the Ordnance Works at Elswick with George Rendel. Noble went on in the Company to become chairman of Armstrong Whitworth on the death of Lord Armstrong in 1900 and worked there until his death in 1915. He had residences at Jesmond Dene House, Newcastle and at Chillingham Castle, Belford. He was created 1st Baronet in 1902.

 

Most of the correspondents here are employees of Armstrong Whitworth & Co Ltd. Lord Armstrong of Cragside (1810-1900) being the head of the company. George Wightwick Rendel (1833-1902) was Armstrong's partner in the Elswick Ordnance Works from 1859 and went on to manage the company jointly with Noble. His brother Stuart Rendel (1831-1913) also worked in the company becoming manager of the London arm in the early 1860s, and later sitting on the board.

 

John Meade Falkner (1858-1932) began his association with Andrew Noble in 1883 when he was engaged as a tutor to his children. Falkner went on to become Noble's private secretary, secretary to Armstrong Whitworth and Co and finally Chairman of the company on the death of Andrew Noble in 1915. Falkner was also a novelist writing The Lost Stradivarius (1893), Moonfleet (1898), and The Nebuly Coat (1903). Sir John Henry Lefroy (1817-1890) acted as an advisor to Armstrong Whitworth on artillery, he was the Governor General of Bermuda and Tasmania, became Director General of Ordnance in 1863 and wrote The handbook of field artillery for the use of officers in 1854.
Link to NRA Record:

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