Happy New year everyone and Welcome all the new posters. Fred got me thinking some more on these hard to pin down London marked saws that continually pop up. The Gregg saw I have watched with interest the responses and can only think it is a cut down saw but I don't necessarily think a new handle but who knows. I have searched some of the London directories for any info on this Green saw I have had for a while. I took it off the wall to look at the stamp and thought that the handle looked really familiar. I then realized I had posted a picture of a Drabble and Sanderson saw in Oct of 2010 a post that lui had started with the same handle. Not as spectacular as some of the early saws in the previous posts but "stylish". So... we have two hand saws, a 24" Drabble and Sanderson and a 26" Green (London). Very similar metal and identical handles in a style I have not seen anywhere else. I took pictures of the handles over top of each other to show how identical they are. The grip is even the same. They look like early 1900 saws and so I went to the London directories of 1884 and 1908 hoping for some help. The only two that I thought might be close was an Isaac Green, Tool wharehouse at 11 Sutherland ter Pimlico Sw or a Henry Greene and Co, general wholesaler, iron monger and Steel merchant, maker and dealer at 218 Upper Thames and Lambeth. The problem being that the Green stamp on the saw is missing an "e". Does anyone know if Green was a "London" line that Drabble and Sanderson produced to get into that area since they were Sheffield based early on? It has been mentioned that there are no early Drabble and Sanderson catalogues to verify any of this. Here are some of the pics. Joe S
Hello Joe, Sorry that I can be of little help on this, but I think that it may be one of those intracable problems that will not be resolved. I personally find this "London" thing annoying and confusing. London Spring is obviously OK but just London is neither here nor there. I think that at the date that your saw probably is (1880+ seems about right to me), I don't know how many saw manufacturers there actually were in London at this time and how many essentially retailers had saws outsourced but with their name on them and "London" added as a place I am sure that Simon will correct me on this but I have assumed that, with a few exceptions "London" as a quality marker died out after about 1860 - ish. Anyway less WAG -ing and whingeing and back to the handles. Excuse the quality of the pictures but they are taken indoors. The top saw is an I Sorby which must be 1880+ and whose handle is a good match for yours except for the same sized nuts. The bottom one is a Hill late Howell (definitely London and possibly of a similar date) which is not as good a match, (the lamb's tongue does not have such a pronounced curvature and there is less of a curvature where the front of the cheek returns towards the handle) but it does have the smaller nut at the top. I had a brief fling with handles on one of my earliest posts and I think that we came to the conclusion that a handle maker would make said handles for a number of sawmakers. (There is a list of about 6 handle makers in one of the Sheffield 1862 directories). Thus possibly not a good maker identification feature as I Sorby (Joseph Turner later Turner Naylor+Marples) are definitely separate from Drabble and Sanderson. It looks as though your Isaac Green may be a good bet if "Green" is a retailer and not Alfred Green (1858 to 1867) of Pond Street Sheffield (the only HSMOB Green that is anywhere near in date). Now this is interesting as Trademarks links an Alfred Green to George Barnsley and Sons (1860 to 1919) who they list as Cutlers but which Whites 1901 (p412) list additionally as merchants and manufacturers of , amongst other things, saws. So the plot may be thickening. You may have Alfred Green or a George Barnsley badged as "Green" with "London" as a sign of quality and which could be anywhere between 1860 -ish and 1919 - at least the dates fit. But then it may be none of the above. Once again it all gets too complicated. Anyway, look at the pictures. I love the Hill late Howel as a saw. Just under 3 teeth to the inch. I would not like to be a piece of wood facing up to that. And the I Sorby is 7 1/2 inches from the shoulder to the edge of the toothline. Fred PS I've put the bold type in so that those of you who get bored with my ramblings can cut straight to the rather sparse meat of the matter.
Hey Fred et al You may be on to something with the Alfred Green and the Barnsley relationship but who knows. The "london" thing is an enigma and if you watch our favourite online auction site more examples continue to appear even as we write this and yet have little or no references. You may have been onto something with that brief handle thing and the identification of saws by handle. We maybe should look at it as a particularly good handle maker and his ability to influence design and form. I find that in reality there are really only small nuance changes for a long period of time in the design of handles and makers continued to follow the trends because it worked and looked good. Later design changes must have been based on the simplicity of manufacture because it certainly isn't based on comfort. If in this case it was a specific handle maker, he must have been good at sales to convince a lot of the companies to buy his style of handle. It certainly wouldn't distinguish your particular saw brand from the rest of the makers out there other than by a blade stamp because none of these saws have medallions. Cheaper manufacture but at a cost of lost "branding"? Maybe reading into it too much. Great pics and great saws. I'm sure the are lots more out there if we came up with four that quickly' Joe S
Hi Joe, I have tried to marshall my thoughts on handles, but the wider topic is perhaps for another time. I have a particular liking though for "London flats", and they have stood the test of time. (I think that someone posted a catalogue with a London flat handle being made in 1938). To my mind they are elegant, functional and probably cheaper to make than a bottom horn. I suspect that most of the handsaws that have them and which were made after 1830 - ish are less than premium quality saws, perhaps descending to Simon's nth degree (complete rubbish) category. This could be why there are a fair few still around from the 1860/1880+ period. Many would have been made as not everyone wanted or could afford a premium quality saw, and being used on a non-regular basis they may not have had the wear/tear that a joiner's saw would. I don't know whether it would be possible to ascribe tentative dates by the features within the London pattern itself. I have always thought that the very shallow curvature of the shoulder down to the cheek tended to indicate an earlier saw, as this was definitely the pattern of the early handles. But I am sure that there will be endless examples of where this was used post 1860-ish. A bit like my Hill late Howel above although with perhaps an even less acute radius. I suspect that there may have been an answer of sorts (at one stage) to the questions that you pose, but it may have been lost in the mists of time. Unless, of course someone can reconstruct it. But alas that person is not me. And on about people with answers, I suspect (hope) that light will be shed on your Green if/when Simon looks at it. If he doesn't know already, I am sure that he will try to find out. Fred
Green (London) Interesting thoughts again. I have two backsaws marked Green/Pimlico, which I've dated at c1880, but the only entry (as a saw maker, or rather "saw maker") for him is the 1868 directory, at 11 Sutherland Terrace, Pimlico. I've not seen a handsaw by him (or, I suspect, made for him) but I'd judge Fred's as a pretty typical London retailer's handsaw of the period 1860-1890 or even 1910 - three screws, London pattern handle, struck mark Maker or retailer, and the single word London. There are dozens of this sort of thing at the Collections in Kelham Island Museum, Sheffield (Ken Hawley's and mine). Where and by whom they were made is supposition, I reckon. From research (unpublished so far) by Jeff Warner on JVHill (the late Howel man) it begins to seem as though he was a true saw maker, and may (underlined) have made for London retailers. On the other hand the Sheffield makers were in full flow at that time, and I'm sure could have turned them out by the hundreds and thousands. Certainly I would not go down the road of thinking that there would be (in Sheffield, anyway) many handle makers who could set trends etc. Their trade was strictly controlled by agreements between manufacturers and tradesmen, with exactly (exactly underlined) what was included in the making of four types of handle - for best Cast steel saws, German steel saws, Lupton saws (don't ask) and common saws, each attracting more money depending on how much work was specified. The 1891 price agreement, called a Statement, runs to 13 pages. These were men working to keep bread in their families' mouths in a cut-throat competitive market, and everything in their work would be geared to getting out the handles as fast as possible (they were paid so much per dozen, for instance for the very best London Spring Handles, full pattern, viz, - 2 beads, 2 peaks - 7 shillings a dozen - and a man would need to make at least 3 dozen a week to stay alive). The best quality handles had crooked lower horns, although 24 and 26inch rip saws could be specified with straight horns; the catalogues always seem to show German steel handsaws with straight lower horns. I know that patterns changed gradually over time, but very little, and over a long time! I wouldn't give much weight to the Green/Barnsley line, as Geo Barnsley's main manufactures were shoe knives (huge trade), and their saws were factored. No sign of Green as a second quality line in their catalogues. And Drabble & S were always Sheffield makers, never London, although they did put D&S London on some saws, which I think (supposition here) was only a con, as London Spring saws were usually labelled as such, and London was added in many cases to pretend a London address (even on 4th or 5th quality items like Joseph Tyzack's Bowdon and Fitzwilliam lines).