Here are a few random jottings about the history of Gammon & Son, Belmont Glassworks, Great Brook Street, Birmingham, that may prove of interest.
Although glassmaking in the West Midlands is mainly associated with the Stourbridge area, it was an important Birmingham industry as well. 18 glassworks were established in Birmingham in 18th and 19th centuries, mostly alongside canals, which were ideally suited to carry the bulky fuels and raw materials required by this industry and its bulky and fragile products.
In 1803 the Belmont site, alongside the Digbeth Branch Canal was owned by a china and earthenware manufacturer, and by 1806 cut glass was being made there. Pottery making ceased by 1807 but glassmaking continued. Three glass cones are shown on a site map of about 1855, by which time the works occupied both sides of the canal. One of the glassworks' boundary walls is still visible. Recent excavations have revealed part of one of the cones and remains of other glassworks buildings marked on the 1855 map, together with a circular brick structure which was probably an earlier glass cone, that had gone out of use before 1855.
In 1830s, in various gazetteers, William Gammon & Son, Belmont Glassworks, Great Brook street, Birmingham.
In 1880s & 1890s, adverts in Pottery Gazette for W.[illiam] Gammon & Son.
Thomas Gammon was formerly the partner of George Bacchus.
There are five Thomas Gammon design registrations between 1849 and 1852
59584; 18 April 1849 Parcel 1 corner design for glass dishes
60072; 22 May 1849 Parcel 2 pickle jar
62918; 12 October 1849 Parcel 6 tumbler, pickle jar
73334; 5 November 1850 Parcel 3 salt cellar &c
82737; 10 January 1852 Parcel 3 no subject
W. Gammon & Co., Belmont Glass Works, Birmingham
244491; 1 September 1870 for the bottom of a railway carriage lamp
In 1849, Thomas Gammon , glass manufacturer, Salford House, Slade Road, Erdington, Birmingham. Gammon & Sons, glass manufacturers, Belmont Glass Works, Gt Brook St, Birmingham. (Salford House has now disappeared but apparently now 20 Kegworth Road sits on the site).
Notice in London Gazette 1851:
NOTICE is hereby given, that the Partnership between us, Mary Gammon and Thomas Gammon, as Glass Manufacturers, at the Belmont Glassworks, Great Brook-street, in the borough of Birmingham, under the firm of Gammon and Son, has been dissolved by mutual consent. Debts due to and from the late firm will be received and paid by Thomas Gammon, - who will continue thebusiness on his own separate account.Dated this 22nd day of July 1851.
Mary Gammon.
Thos. Gammon.