Harrison Bros & Howson Carving Set Carbon Steel Sterling Stag Sheffield 1849-1910ish

9″ carving knife and fork with patented Harrison Bros & Howson guard/stand with forged carbon steel, sterling fittings and crown stag handles. 

Harrison Bros & Howson began as a typical mid sized Sheffield cutlery manufacturer who utilized both their own factory and independent outworkers (common to Thiers and Sheffield practices) and by 1900 had become one of Sheffield’s largest manufacturers. 

Harrison Bros & Howson exported to the United States with offices in San Francisco and New York in the 1890s even with the steep tariffs put in place by the US in 1891. Assuming the handles are original, this set was most likely part of the ones exported directly in the post 1891 period as they say simply “Sterling” without any British assay office stamps. 

While not marked ‘shear steel’ it most likely is. it shows a ‘puddle weld’ near the bolster at the beginning of the blade opposite side as markings, almost looking like a thumbprint, this is where hard shear steel is forge welded to the mild steel or iron bolster and tang. Forks were forged in a small mold and ground by hand and knife blade forged by hand to shape and then hand ground on a saddle grinder to finish the geometry being finished on smaller buffing wheels. Many of these process were in use for hundreds of years in Sheffield which really held its strength through the massive amount of low priced skilled labor available in Sheffield. 

Shear steel was a 19th and early 20th century steel that was made by case hardening bars of iron in ceramic boxes packed with charcoal, large numbers of these were heated for days on end at high temperatures and the resulting bars were broken up (it would break or shear rather than bend once carbon added hence ‘shear’ steel) and forged welded into a larger mass. This process was done twice on double shear steel creating a steel with a higher carbon content. 

Never put old carving knives in the dishwasher, they are held together with ‘cutler’s cement’ or ‘rozzil’ a mixture of brick dust, bees wax and rosin. Rozzil is hard at room temperature but soft and liquid when hot.