Newcomen wasn't the only one to stumble on the basic principle driving his design. Thomas Savery had invented a device in 1698 that used a vacuum and atmospheric pressure to suck out water.

You are in: Devon > History > Famous Devonians > Newcomen's steam revolution Thomas Newcomen's Atmospheric Engine Inventor Thomas Newcomen (1663-1729) designed the world's first successful ...

An atmospheric steam engine built for Caprington Colliery, Ayshire, in 1811 to a design developed by Thomas Newcomen a century earlier. This was less efficient than James Watt's steam engine ...