This branch of the Fox family came from Attercliffe, where its members were involved in cutlery and fork manufacture.  Several generations of Fox cutlers – usually named John – can be traced in the apprenticeship records of the Company of Cutlers.  John, a cutler at Attercliffe, was granted his Freedom in 1732.  His son was apparently John Fox (c.1735-1820), who was probably the Attercliffe fork maker who appeared in the Sheffield directory of 1787.  His son was also named John Fox (1763-1825).  He was apprenticed to his father in 1778 and ten years later became a Freeman.  In 1797, John Sen. and John Jun. were listed as fork manufacturers at Attercliffe.  John Fox (probably Jun.), of Attercliffe, became a partner in Keeton, Fox & Co.  It included William Keeton, William Addy, and Samuel Mappin, but was dissolved in 1807.  Fox next partnered John Hutchinson as a table fork manufacturer at Pinstone Street, until the latter’s death in 1815.  By 1816, John Fox was listed as a fork manufacturer in Cheney Square (St Paul’s Church).  By 1821, he had moved to New Church Street.  

Leader (1905-06)¹ speculated that John Fox, the Master Cutler in 1818, was a fork maker in Cheney Square.  If Leader was correct, then the evidence presented here suggests that it was John Fox Jun. who held the office.  Leader added: ‘His service on the Company extended through the trying times from 1803 to 1821’.  John Fox Sen., ‘late of Attercliffe’, died at his son’s house, Cheney Square, on 22 July 1820 (aged 85).  He was buried at Attercliffe cemetery.  John Jun. continued the business at New Church Street until his death on 12 March 1825, aged 61.  He was ‘greatly lamented … a truly worthy and most useful member of society.  During a long illness he manifested pious resignation’ (Sheffield Independent, 19 March 1825).  His burial was at Upper Chapel, Norfolk Street.  He left £50 to Sheffield Infirmary and £20 to the Lancasterian School.  His widow, Hannah, died on 18 July 1829, aged 73, and was also buried at Upper Chapel (Sheffield Independent, 25 July 1829).  

His son, Charles (1798-1854), succeeded to the New Church Street fork business.  He was briefly in partnership with George Hibbert, when the firm was described as a manufacturers of steel and German silver forks and spoons, shoe, butcher, and cooks’ knives.  This arrangement was dissolved in 1834.  Charles Fox then traded alone.  In 1835, he advertised as the sole agent for the ‘Improved Table Steels’ of Harcourt Bros, Birmingham (Sheffield Independent, 5 December 1835).  Fox once gave a ‘substantial dinner for upwards of fifty of his workpeople’, following a good run of trade.  The local press noted, approvingly, that Fox’s long-serving workmen were the best in the trade:

It was highly gratifying to notice the expressions of good feeling which should exist, and evidently does exist, between Mr Fox and his workmen.  Mr Fox, assisted by a few of his friends, presided, and the evening was spent most agreeably.  The manner in which the whole of the workmen conducted themselves was highly creditable to them, and we doubt but that the occasion will be long remembered by all present (Sheffield Independent, 30 December 1843).

In the following year, a different impression of Fox’s relationship with labour was conveyed in the same newspaper.  Fox had advertised a price list of his forks.  Fox bragged that he only employed the best workmen, served most of the best table knife manufacturers, paid wages in money (and not, like some masters, in ‘stuff’ – i.e.  goods), and would match any forks sold at a lower price (Sheffield Independent, 10 February 1844).  The newly-formed trade union body, the Committee of Fork Makers & Grinders, attacked Fox for his ‘disgusting egotism’ and ‘pretended liberality towards workmen’, whilst accusing him of undercutting those in the country trade (Sheffield Independent, 24 February 1844).   Fox dismissed the charges as ‘unworthy of notice’; the trade union again argued that his supposed generosity to labour was inspired by ‘sordid and selfish considerations’ (Sheffield Independent, 2, 9 March 1844).

In the 1840s, Fox advertised as an agent for Winfield’s iron bedsteads.  He died on 18 September 1854, aged 56, at his residence West Cliff, Fulwood Road, after an illness of three days (Sheffield Independent, 23 September 1854).   His son, Charles James (1831-1899), was an assistant to his father, but decided to relinquish the enterprise.  The warehouse and workshops at New Church Street were offered ‘To Let’ as suitable for the table knife business or other Sheffield trades: ‘well-lighted, and eligibly situated, having a frontage of 50 feet, a large yard, etc., etc.   Also a small warehouse and cottage in the Yard’ (Sheffield Independent, 9 May 1857).

^1. Leader, R E, History of the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire in the County of York (Sheffield, 1905-6)