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Organisation · c.1811–1921 (as Muntz family firm and successor company)

Muntz’s Metal Company

The business that made Muntz’s patent yellow metal for ships’ sheathing, bolts and nails, first in Water Street, Birmingham, then from 1842 at French Walls, Smethwick. Sold to Muntz’s Metal Co. Ltd in 1864.

A tall brick chimney and old brick industrial buildings beside a canal, with a towpath bridge in front.
Andrew Abbott, 13 September 2022. Geograph Britain and Ireland, via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0

Philip Frederick Muntz set up metal works in Water Street, Birmingham, and his son George Frederick Muntz took them over in 1811. After Muntz’s patents of 1832 the firm made his copper-zinc ‘yellow metal’ sheathing and bolts. In 1837 Muntz went into partnership with the Swansea copper smelters Pascoe Grenfell & Sons, and in 1842 he moved production to the French Walls works at Smethwick.

After Muntz’s death in 1857 his eldest son ran the business until 1864, when it was sold to the newly formed Muntz’s Metal Co. Ltd. Samuel Timmins reported in 1866 that more than £40,000 had been paid for the goodwill alone. The Victoria County History counts it among only two Birmingham firms converted into public companies by 1880. It was taken over in 1921 by a Birmingham non-ferrous metal company that became part of ICI in 1928, and metal-making at French Walls ended in 1932.

On the map

One place connected with Muntz’s Metal Company. Tap a number for directions — some sites are private homes or gardens, so each place’s page says what you can see from the street.

11. French Walls Works, Smethwick — Site redeveloped
Map © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL). Old map: Ordnance Survey six-inch, 1888–1913, reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland (CC BY 4.0). A dashed ring means the position is approximate; a shaded ring means only the general area is known.
  1. French Walls Works, Smethwick — Site redeveloped · Directions to French Walls Works, Smethwick (opens Google Maps)

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Key dates

  1. 1832 — Muntz patents his yellow metalGeorge Frederick Muntz patents a copper-zinc alloy for sheathing ships (No. 6325) and for ships’ bolts (No. 6347). Cheaper than copper and able to be rolled hot, ‘Muntz metal’ is replacing copper on British merchant ships by the 1840s.
  2. 1842 — Muntz moves to French Walls, SmethwickWith demand outgrowing his Water Street mill, Muntz buys the French Walls works on the Birmingham Canal opposite Soho Foundry and converts it to non-ferrous metals. It makes yellow metal there until 1932.

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Sources and further reading
  1. Smethwick: Economic history, in A History of the County of Stafford, vol. 17, pp. 107–118 — M. W. Greenslade (ed.), Victoria County History, 1976
  2. Muntz, George Frederick — Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 39 — Samuel Timmins, Smith, Elder & Co., 1894
  3. The Resources, Products, and Industrial History of Birmingham and the Midland Hardware District — Samuel Timmins (ed.), Robert Hardwicke, London, 1866. pp. 313–15
  4. Economic and Social History: Industry and Trade, 1500–1880, in A History of the County of Warwick, vol. 7, pp. 81–139 — W. B. Stephens (ed.), Victoria County History, 1964
  5. George Frederick Muntz — Grace’s Guide to British Industrial History

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