Hounslow Sword Factory

[Jim McDougall]

To give an idea of the complete apathy toward swords in general history references, the book "Dealing in Death:The Arms Trade and the British Civil Wars, 1638-52", Peter Edwards, 2000 (enticing title).......the meticulously detailed study describes everything BUT swords.
Guns, powder, bandoliers, and all manner of ordnance to equip armies are described even down to the unit cost etc................but swords?

NOT A WORD, even going through index, the word sword exists only to describe a person with that surname; cutler? not a word; blades, no.
So it would be presumed that swords were not important? Then why do we know of thousands being ordered? but this 'study of arms' dismisses the sword entirely.

Yet the theme of the book concerns the fact that the Netherlands were a global clearing house for arms for the armies of many nations.


For a remarkable, beautifully illustrated, and detailed reference on the swords of this period I recommend highly,
"British Military Swords 1600-1660" (Stuart Mowbray, 2013). While the detailed analysis of Hounslow & Shotley are not focused upon greatly, the basic details are well placed in the contexts of the period, and the illustrated sword examples are so clear it is as if holding the actual example in hand. For any serious study of the arms of the English civil wars a must.
The Thirty Years war (1618-48) had depleted the production capacity of Germany, primarily Solingen of course, which would seem to have been a mitigating factor for Charles I to bring over German swordsmiths to Hounslow (this was from OTHER sources) . These smiths were found in Holland. It has often been thought these smiths were fleeing Solingen because of religious persecution...............in essence yes.........but it was the WAR, and lack of ability to work that was a primary factor.

Pages 9-17 in "Swords and Sword Makers of England and Scotland" (Richard Bezdek, 2003) has a COMPREHENSIVE study of Hounslow is laid out in the chapter : THE SWORD AND BLADE MAKING CENTER OF HOUNSLOW HEATH".
It would seem that virtually all the questions asked here are remarkably well covered.

The blades inscribed are well noted in the text, and actually the names of presumably all the makers known are listed.
The use of the ME FECIT HOUNSLOW etc. is an inscribing convention taken from the well known Solingen phrase ME FECIT SOLINGEN. Often the word ANNO and date also occur (meaning made in date).
Naturally the smiths used their own manner of marking etc......Hounslow was a center of private shops, independent and there was no regulatory control, pattern books etc. so it would be presumed that they would mark their work as they wished.

Regarding the variance of hilts and blades, in "The Hounslow Swordsmiths" by John Tofts White(Hounslow Chronicle, Vol. 1, #2, 1978, pp21-24), the author notes at least two examples he is aware of ANTE dating the 1629 start of Hounslow. The blade is inscribed to William Hurst, by JOHN KINNDT HOUNSL 1634.....on a crab claw hilt likely Italian from the previous century.

The other with blade ION HOPPIE HONSLO ME FECIT HONSLO, on an English swept hilt of c. 1610.
Naturally this does not suggest Hounslow began prior to 1629, but that the blades of Hounslow were often refitted on other hilts, whether older or newer depending on circumstances.

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[Triarii]

Yes, Dealing in Death is disappointing in that respect. I was looking through it last night to find the 'Dutch blades' source. I need to create an index of topics as it took me a while to find where I'd buried my copies of the Mungeam papers for the parliamentarian munition orders for 1645/6. I finally found some hand written notes...

You know what, I'd forgotten Bezdek covered Hounslow. Tend to only look at it wrt looking up specific makers rather than actually read it cover to cover.

I really like Stuart Mowbray's book - I had some comms with him about his riding sword that is pictured there. I was getting a functioning repro made of it as I like the style of the hilt with the big flat loops.

I also acquired the 'AVB Norman type 87' hilted sword-rapier that's featured, though didn't realise when I was bidding on it. Very pleased to acquire that as an identical example was used by a Colonel Francis Billingsley who was killed at Bridgenorth in 1646 and hung on his tomb there until it disappeared in 2000.

Do you have a source for the Solingen smiths which were brought to Hounslow being found in the Low Countries please? Being displaced from Solingen due to the TYW is a good point and makes lots of sense.


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[urbanspaceman]

All the smiths not from London who arrived in 1629 came over from Holland. Sir John Heyden was sent to commandeer them.
This brings me to an issue that I have struggled with over the years, was there production foundaries in Holland or simply furbisheurs; both would obviously staffed by Solingen smiths and workers.
They had set up in Wira Bruk for the Swedish king so why not in Holland where they were supplying the UK.
Of course, Rotterdam, where Heyden got the Hounslow workers, was also the direct route from Solingen to England so maybe he simply met them there.
I think they were already working there, although the lists in Bezdek's book of German swordmakers doesn't imply this.

[Jim McDougall]

I agree Keith, there had to have been locations in Holland where there were numbers of swords assembled, and the VOC swords were one of the prime examples. It seems I was told at some point that VOC blades were effectively German and from locations in Holland, implying Solingen smiths were working there.
We know that Solingen smiths went to Sweden, Russia, France, probably Holland and of course to England. It seems to me the religious persecution card has been overplayed as far as the exodus from Birmingham. The movement of German smiths to other places to work seems to have been acceptable given the number of instances of Solingen smiths were worked in Toledo while retaining connections in Solingen.

With England, the number of blades entering both Hounslow and later Shotley were via families in Solingen with connections to the workers who had gone to England. The fact that the original 'recruiting' was from smiths in Holland suggests that they had relocated there voluntarily and without issues with the Solingen guilds.

As I have understood in reading passim, it was suggested that the Thirty Years War had impeded resources (including Swedish steel) to supply the blade making industry in Solingen. There were dramatic restrictions as to numbers of blades allowed for each smith, impairing their ability to make a living, so they moved accordingly. I was a bit surprised at this as I thought that iron deposits in Germany provided the required ore needed, but since the Swedish steel was already processed into ingots it would be more commercially viable.

With Rotterdam, while Amsterdam was of course the seat of power in Holland for the VOC and key trade port, the problems were traffic and weather as well as navigation. Some of the larger ships could not get through many smaller entering, and often these clustered around an island in the harbor. In cases where these large jams of ships remained outside the relative safety of the harbor, they were fair game for the weather, in some notable cases of over a hundred ships destroyed in one storm.

Rotterdam was far more favorable and easier access to avoid all the VOC traffic for the more specific trade commerce to England.

[Hotspur]

Some of the imported blade trade information can be tracked through ship manifests, aboard inbound ships. London port records go way back. Unfortunately, they don't detail the receiving merchants as much the simple numbers of barrels of blades, point of origin, etc.

Was it 1490 or 1590 when the English ruler was angry at floods of Flemish quality steel goods and demanding/ruling there be better English steel? I forget but used to https://www.british-history.ac.uk/ my old shelf there seems to be gone.

[Jim McDougall]

Thanks Glen!
The issue with English armor and weapons and poor quality was a problem well beyond this period, in fact through the 17th century into the 18th. Henry VIII who took reign in 1509 was the first to establish the Greenwich armories . He brought in German, Italian and Flemish artisans from 1515 until death in 1547.

the 2nd period 1547-1605 maintained the armories, with the Stuarts continuing through the English Civil Wars.
As the armouries/primary focus from beginning had been on armor, the sword element was pretty much incidental, and when Charles I brought in German swordsmiths to Hounslow, it was very much in line with a long established tradition of bringing in foreign workers to avoid having to import arms.

It was not as far as I know an issue with steel, as there were resources for steel in England, it is the matter of the acquiring of raw material, smelting and processing, then properly forging it. It had long been a practice in centers in Europe of acquiring steel ingots, typically from Sweden, that provided for production.
Most of the blades brought into Hounslow as well as Shotley, were raw forged blades, which were then ground and finished, though there were numbers of fully completed blades and often swords.

It has been suggested that there is the possibility of Solingen even adding the Hounslow name, etc. on blades in the manner of their convention of 'branding' such as with the ANDREA FERARA; SAHAGUM; Spanish motto; and others TOMAS AILA etc .
With Shotley, not as much so, where it is believed the running FOX was likely contrived as a parody of the famed running wolf of Passau/Solingen. In the York castle references it is even described as a running horse!

With the manifests etc. it seems there was a great deal of smuggling which went on through the 17th into 18th c. which was again a considerable issue.
Even when blade makers began to flourish in the mid 18th c. (there had been only 3 or 4 recognized in the UK) the 'importing' and smuggling continued.

[Triarii]

What I've read so far on the German smiths at Hounslow is that they didn't let the English workers there into the secrets of their craft. A number of mills are mentioned and are described as being for grinding, polishing and forging, and some of the German smiths were definitely blade forgers or smiths. That indicates that some blades were made from scratch and would be the key activity that the German smiths kept secret.