Charles Richardson (cement merchant)

Charles Richardson (born 16 February 1817 at Woodford, Essex, United Kingdom: died 30 January 1890 at Newton Abbot, Devon) was the founder of the family Brick and Cement Firm A & WT Richardson Ltd, which lasted over 100 years. On 18 October 1840 he married Selina Ellis at Lambeth. The couple had one daughter, Selina Richardson born March 1842 and four sons - Alexander R Richardson born 1847, Walter T Richardson born 1849, Frederick Charles Richardson born 1851 and George Canning Richardson born March 1855.

The business was founded by Charles Richardson in 1850 with wharves and offices at Vauxhall, (Brunswick Lodge) and Paddington. These premises being the London points of distribution for the and red facing bricks manufactured at Teynham in Kent and at Wood Lane, Shepherd's Bush. Portland cement and Roman cement manufactured at Conyers Quay near Sittingbourne were also handled here.

Charles Richardson commenced business immediately after the repeal of the brick tax which lasted from 1784–1850 and following the demand created for the then "new" Portland Cement first discovered in 1824 by William Aspdin a bricklayer of Leeds. The White City at Shepherds Bush now occupies the old site of the Wood Lane Brickworks.

More than a million stock bricks were supplied for the foundations of the Albert Memorial. Later, the Company also supplied the bricks used in the foundation of Eros, when that statue by Alfred Gilbert was replaced in Piccadilly Circus.

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