This enterprise was apparently launched in 1820.  The founder was Francis Greaves (c. 1796-1844), who began table knife manufacture at 40 Scotland Street (he was also a shopkeeper and grocer at that address by 1828).  During the 1830s, Greaves relocated to Radford Street, where he concentrated on cutlery.  Besides table knives, Greaves also pressed horn for handles and in 1840 registered a patent for an improved method of fastening knife handles of horn and hoof.  Francis Greaves died on 27 April 1844, aged 48, and was buried in St Paul’s Churchyard.

Francis’s widow, Sarah Greaves (c.1802-1882), inherited the business.  In 1851, she told the Census that she was a cutlery manufacturer, employing ten men and a boy.  In the following year, the enterprise was listed as a ‘fast-handled’ table knife manufacturer and horn presser.  Francis and Sarah had two sons – Samuel Horrabin Greaves (1825-1876) and Frederick Greaves (1833-1900) – and they eventually assumed control.  By 1865 (when it was listed as a Bowie maker), the business was styled Francis Greaves & Sons.  Besides table and hunting knives, Greaves’ also made umbrella handles.

Samuel, like his father, had an inventive bent and registered patents in 1858, 1869, and 1879 relating to table blades, forks, spear-point knives, and daggers. Samuel established S. H. Greaves & Son at Eldon Street and River Sheaf Works, Heeley.  He was listed as a Bowie knife manufacturer in 1876.  However, on 26 July 1876 he died ‘very suddenly’ from heart failure at Palmerston Road, aged 51.  He left under £5,000.  The business continued under Samuel’s son, Frederick William Greaves.  At the end of 1877, the business moved entirely to Heeley, but within months the assets had been sold to a ‘successor’, William Hoyland, who traded at Chester Works, Trippet Lane.

Francis Greaves & Sons at Radford Works continued to expand under Frederick Greaves.  In 1881, the business employed 152 workers (91 men, 40 boys, and 21 girls).  His mother died on 13 October 1882, leaving £405.  Frederick died at Edenhurst, Northumberland Avenue, on 26 February 1900, aged 67, and was buried in Ecclesall.  He left £42,250.  The Radford Street business was now managed by Frederick’s son, Joseph Jonathan Greaves (1870-1953).  He led the firm in the interwar period.  J.J. Greaves, of The Palace Hotel, Buxton, died on 11 April 1953, aged 83, leaving £56,860.  By then the company address was Radford Works in Herries Road (presumably after the assets had been acquired by another firm) and it remained there into the 1970s.  In 1984, Gunhill Cutlers & Silversmiths (Pty) Ltd was formed in South Africa to distribute cutlery and tableware.  It acquired the name ‘Francis Greaves & Sons of Sheffield’ to stamp on silver- and gold-plated cutlery.  Greaves’s trade marks were the word ‘INCISE in an oval; a circled ‘G’; and a picture of figure in historical garb blowing a horn (above the words ‘HIGH TONED’).