When William Briggs, a silver plater, died in 1878, the local press described a colourful life, which began as a young man in the militia.  He had served under the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo and received a musket ball through his hat.  Each year he celebrated the battle by inviting his friends to his shooting box at Fidler’s Green for a day’s sport (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 23 March 1878).  When he died, Briggs was described as one of the last survivors of the famous battle.  Other events in Briggs’ life – not mentioned in his obituaries – were equally colourful.

William Briggs was born on 15 September 1796 in Austerfield, near Doncaster.  By 1822, he had entered the silver-plate, Britannia metal, and table knife trades.  In 1823, he registered a silver mark from Button Lane.  During the 1820s, he operated in Carver Street/Carver Lane under his own name and under Briggs & Smith – a partnership with Charles Smith, which ended in 1830.  By 1840, after a fire in Carver Lane, Briggs had occupied Furnival Works, Furnival Street, after apparently buying the assets of Furniss, Poles & Turner.  He was joined by Samuel Roberts (Roberts & Belk), who became Briggs’ traveller and later partner.  Briggs lived in Nelson Place, Glossop Road, and had retired from active business by 1851.  By then, the firm was known as Roberts & Slater, which had registered a silver mark from Furnival Street in 1845.  Joseph Slater withdrew in 1858.  In the following year, Roberts & Briggs registered a silver mark from Furnival Works.  If this signalled the return of William Briggs to active business, his involvement did not last, because he withdrew in favour of Samuel Roberts and Charles Belk.  That was in 1863 – the year when he remarried.

Briggs’s personal history is intriguing.  In 1822, he married Sarah, the daughter of the late Samuel Moseley of Doncaster, a cabinet maker (Derby Mercury, 1 January 1823).  Sarah died at Nelson Place on 19 August 1861, aged 80.  Apparently, they had no children.  In 1863, William Briggs remarried: this time to Sarah Marriott, who had several children.  She had been born in 1827 at Bole, near Gainsborough, Nottinghamshire.  Nothing is known of her background, except that in about 1845 (when she was about 18) Sarah gave birth to a son, named William.  She moved to Little Wincobank, Sheffield.  The 1851 Census shows that Sarah had adopted the surname ‘Briggs’ and described herself as married (but with no husband enumerated).  She was living with her son, William (now aged five), and another young son and daughter.  By 1861, William was a ‘warehouse boy’, boarding with George Turner, a silversmith, in Furnival Street.  Sarah had returned to Nottinghamshire and was again describing herself as ‘Marriott’ and living with her five other children – all born in the 1850s in Sheffield and some baptised at St Peter’s Parish Church (the father, William, was described in the register as a ‘traveller’).  In 1863, William Briggs and Sarah Marriott married.  They lived at Victoria Villas, Brocco Bank.  In the 1871 Census, the household contained, inter alia, William Briggs (‘retired electro-plate manufacturer’, aged 74), Sarah (aged 44), and son William (aged 25).  The son’s name was William Marriott Briggs.  Sarah (Marriott) Briggs died at Brocco Bank on 24 December 1871, aged 44.  William Briggs Sen. died in Osborne Road, Cherry Tree, on 12 March 1878, aged 82.  He was buried in the General Cemetery with the remains of the two Sarahs!  He left under £4,000.