John Webster, a Birmingham ironmonger, married an heiress in 1718 and went into bar iron and wire at Perry Barr; the firm dates its wire-making from 1720. His son Joseph took the lease of Penns Mill at Walmley, near Sutton Coldfield, and became the first British maker to draw wire from crucible steel. Websters’ piano wire dominated the home market by the Napoleonic wars.
In the 1850s James Horsfall, a Birmingham wire-drawer, threatened them with a new heat-treated wire, patented in 1853. Rather than compete, Joseph Webster arranged a partnership between Horsfall and his son Baron Dickinson Webster in 1855. In 1859 production moved from Penns to Hay Mills, on the River Cole, with steel from the firm’s own works at Killamarsh in Derbyshire. When Baron Webster died in 1860, the business passed to Horsfall.
In May 1864 Webster & Horsfall won the contract for 1,600 tons of armouring wire for the Atlantic telegraph cable, the largest order in its history. That cable failed in 1865, partly through broken wire, but the firm supplied the wire for 1866 too, and both cables were completed that year.
Later the firm turned to wire rope, through its associate Latch & Batchelor (merged 1895, separated 1955), and to spring wire. It made fuse-spring wire and cables in the First World War, and its works was bombed in the Second. Horsfall’s descendants still controlled it in the 1990s, and Webster & Horsfall still draws wire at Hay Mills.
On the map
One place connected with Webster & Horsfall. 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.
Key dates
- 1859 — Webster and Horsfall move to Hay MillsFour years after James Horsfall’s partnership with Baron Dickinson Webster, wire production moves from the Websters’ Penns Mill near Sutton Coldfield to Horsfall’s works at Hay Mills.
- 9 May 1864 — Hay Mills wins the Atlantic cable wire contractJames Horsfall signs a contract to supply 1,600 tons of armouring wire for the Atlantic telegraph cable, the biggest order in Webster & Horsfall’s history. About 250 workers at Hay Mills draw some 30,000 miles of wire.
- 1866 — The Atlantic cables are completedThe Great Eastern lays a new Atlantic telegraph cable armoured with wire from Hay Mills, then recovers and completes the cable lost in 1865. On Christmas Eve, Horsfall’s workers present him with a case of cable samples.
- 1873–74 — St Cyprian’s Church built at Hay MillsJames Horsfall pays for St Cyprian’s Church beside his wire works, designed by Frank Barlow Osborn and built partly over the old mill race, with his workers’ chapel of 1863 as its chancel.
Sources and further reading
- Summary report on the records of Webster & Horsfall Ltd, spring steel wire manufacturers, Birmingham (GB-800819-Webster) — Historical Manuscripts Commission (N. James), Historical Manuscripts Commission, 1991
- 1865 & 1866 Atlantic Cables — Bill Burns (ed.)
- Webster and Horsfall History — atlantic-cable.com (from company material)
- About — The Webster and Horsfall History — Webster & Horsfall
- Webster and Horsfall — Grace's Guide
- The Atlantic Telegraph Cable story: the Birmingham factory that made history — BBC Birmingham, BBC, 2003
