“In 1970 I started a project which was to occupy all my spare time for the next 45 years. I have researched and constructed in miniature the important steam engines which were built in the eighteenth century.”

These engines paved the way for the industrial revolution in the British Isles and which spread to many other countries throughout the world. These eighteenth century engines are usually grouped together and called steam engines, however, they were not steam engines. Steam was used as a means of creating a vacuum against which the earth’s pressure could act. The correct terminology is that they were atmospheric engines.

Exhibitions Now Open!

Our latest Exhibition bringing to life the adventurous and disturbing story of the Mayflower Pilgrim Separatists and their suffering before settling in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620…

The King’s Room has a fine collection of ship models, paintings and drawings relating to the town’s maritime history. There is a time sequence of ship models round the walls of the room…

This room is a time capsule evoking the atmosphere of a typical late Victorian study representing the life and works of a most extraordinary man, William Cumming Henley (1860-1919). Henley, an ironmonger, embodied the Victorian thirst for knowledge and self-improvement.

This room is themed on the social and physical development of the town. It is named after the leading family of the town who provided the Mayor and Member of Parliament during much of the 19th Century…

Dartmouth’s importance during the 1939-45 war mostly centres on D-Day preparations and covert cross-channel activities. The Dartmouth at War alcove in the Holdsworth Room, made up to represent a war-time shelter with a unique film featuring rare footage taken during the preparations…

The Jesse Room is part of the Museum but remote from it, being the main room of the westernmost house of the Butterwalk. This is where the archives are held and worked upon. It is called the Jesse Room because of its extraordinary unique ceiling of plaster imagery in high relief, displaying the Tree of Jesse…

Explore the wonderous Archives in the Dartmouth Museum Collection.