Sheffield steel and the history of British knife making

Why did Sheffield become famous for knives?

Sheffield had everything a cutler needed. Five fast rivers, the Don, Sheaf, Porter, Rivelin and Loxley, drove hundreds of water wheels that turned grinding stones. The local sandstone made good grindstones, and there was iron and charcoal nearby. Cutlers are recorded in Sheffield from 1297, when "Robert the Cutler" appears in a tax roll. By the late 1300s Sheffield knives were known well enough for Chaucer to give one to the miller in The Reeve's Tale: "a Sheffeld thwitel baar he in his hose".

The Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire (1624)

In 1624 an Act of Parliament set up the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire, covering cutlers and other steel and iron workers in and around Sheffield. It kept a register of approved makers' marks, controlled apprenticeships (seven years was the minimum) and set standards of workmanship. The company is led by the Master Cutler, elected every year, and still meets at Cutlers' Hall, opposite Sheffield Cathedral.

Crucible steel: Benjamin Huntsman

Before the 1740s, the best steel available was uneven, with slag and soft spots. Benjamin Huntsman (1704–1776), a Doncaster clockmaker unhappy with the steel for his springs, moved to Handsworth near Sheffield in 1740 and, after years of trials, melted steel in clay crucibles to make a cast steel that was purer and more even than anything then in use.

Sheffield's cutlers first refused it as too hard to work, so Huntsman sold most of it to France. When French cutlery made from his steel began to compete, the Sheffield trade adopted it. Crucible steel made Sheffield the world centre for quality steel for over a century.

Stainless steel: Harry Brearley

Harry Brearley (1871–1948) was born in Sheffield, left school at twelve and worked his way up from bottle washer in a steelworks laboratory to head of the Brown Firth research laboratory. On 13 August 1913, looking for a steel for gun barrels that wouldn't erode, he made a steel with 12.8% chromium and 0.24% carbon that resisted rust.

His employers saw little use for it, so Brearley took it to a local cutler, R.F. Mosley & Co. at Portland Works. Its cutlery manager, Ernest Stuart, tested it in vinegar and suggested calling it "stainless" rather than "rustless". Table knife blades made there are thought to be the earliest stainless steel cutlery in the world; examples are kept at Cutlers' Hall.

Sheffield knife making today

Large-scale cutlery making has largely moved abroad, but Sheffield still has independent makers, many working in the tradition of the "little mesters", self-employed craftsmen who rented space in shared works. Portland Works, where stainless cutlery was first made, is now a community-owned building that houses makers and small businesses.

Timeline