Crowden

CROWDEN 1898 - 1901
Charles T. Crowden, Leamington Spa, Warwickshire.

Charles Crowden had been works manager of the Great Horseless Carriage Company in Coventry. his own vehicles were largely experimental, and none was produced commercially, although he did sell a few fire engines which were conversions of horse drawn appliances to steam power. His cars included a steam brake and a 10hp petrol engined dog-cart, which he built to test the merits of thetwo power systems. In 1900 he built another petrol car, with a 5hp single-cylinder horizontal engine and three speeds by belt and pulley drive. This car still exists in the Museum of British Road Transport in Coventry. Crowden supplied a steam fire engine to the Norwich Union Fire Insurance Company at Worcester, and a petrol-engined fire engine to his local fire brigade at Leaminton Spa in 1902. After 1904 Crowden retired to Ramsgate in Kent.