My wife and I both have tobacco pipe makers among our ancestors. My connection is with the BILTON family of Yorkshire (father Thomas, and sons Richard and Robert), who were working in Hull and Leeds in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. (There's a mystery about Richard - see thread on Yorkshire board entitled "Whatever happened to Richard BILTON?") My wife's connection is with the LAWRENCE family of Faversham, Kent (with an apprenticeship in London) in the early 18th century. We'd welcome any contact from others with similar interests, and are happy to share what we know.
As an update to the above, Richard BILTON has now been found - or at least there's a burial for him in Leeds in 1835. The details are in the thread on the Yorkshire board. Quite what happened to him and where he went in 1818-19 is still a mystery, but progress has been made.
There is a clip of the type of work that goes into making a pipe. Go to YouTube and put A Pipe Story - The art of briar tobacco pipe making into the search box. Cheers Guy
Hi Arthur and friends There is a very well known member of Nottinghamshire F.H.S. who is exceptionally knowlegeable in the subject of clay pipes and their making. I cannot provide his name without his permission but he is a very friendly, kind and helpful man. Regards Jack
Thanks, Jack. I think I've heard of him before, and may even have corresponded with him. For those interested, other sources of information that I've found include: Various British Archaeology Reports: 63 Hull Pipes - a Typology (1979) 239 The Archaeology of the Clay Tobacco Pipe (1994) 374 The Dynamics of Regionalisation and Trade: Yorkshire Clay Tobacco Pipes c1600-1800 (2004) Yorkshire Archaeological Journal Vol.45 Clay Tobacco Pipe Makers in West Yorkshire (1973) If you can't find the above four anywhere else, they are available from the British Library via inter-library loan; I've a feeling the BAR ones may also now be on the JSTOR website of academic journals etc. The BAR 374 article is also on the website of the Society for Clay Pipe Research (scpr.co), which has a lot more information and links, including other relevant BAR articles. Finally, Hull Museums provided me with a copy of Early Hull Tobacco Pipes and their Makers, by Thomas Sheppard (1902).
An addition to the above: The copy of the BAR 374 article on the SCPR website is Appendix 1 only, containing a list of Yorkshire pipe makers and their marks/initials. To see the whole article you need to look elsewhere.
Reading some of your correspondence,it brought me back to my Grandfather.He was almost 80yrs old when i was born.I used to visit his house and remember what i think were clay pipes hung over his fireplace.The head of pipes had faces on them.I was very young at the time and use to stare at these pipes in amazement.