Shotley Bridge swordmakers

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by Mel H

Thank you Ibrahiim another nice mark for my collection, I collected together a picture of every Shotley Bridge name stamping or fox of any type that I saw, in the flesh, as it were, or from books or catalogues, for more than twenty years. I had over sixty different ones and unfortunately lost them all in a hard disc crash a couple of years since. No ones fault but my own, we all know the risks we take in not backing up. I've started again and will keep at it.
I had pictures that showed only the words, sometimes full spellings, sometimes abbreviated and occasionally, together with straight line 'wolf'. they tended to be earlier swords. I can not remember seeing a named one that had a bushy tailed fox. Maybe they wanted to show a sign of quality without giving away the name of the place that they had taken refuge.
One of the things that I remember was that the SH in the Harvey ones was not always in the same place within the body of the fox, which would indicate that the fox may have been stamped onto the blade first then the letters added. It has to be considered that his blades may have been made at Shotley Bridge and stamped there with the trademark together with the additional SH letters, as part of the contract.
Just food for thought.
Having said all of that I'm sure that over the time they were operating there they must have produced a large amount which would mean that they are not as rare as we think they are, we just simply don't recognise them because many were never marked.
Mel.

Mel...Maybe the running Fox never appeared on Shotley swords. Notwithstanding the name given in some quarters ...and reiterated by me ...and noted by Kieth...The Guild of the Running Fox:
.....Wilkinson Sword – the crossed swords logo of that company is believed to have come from the emblem of the “Guild of the Running Fox” – the Shotley Bridge sword makers' guild. The few remaining clues left are the Crown and Crossed Swords pub (originally owned by the Oleys), Cutlers Hall (the guild meeting place, now a private house) and the crossed swords on the old logo of the Shotley Bridge Hospital.
It never stated and I believe never meant to associate bushey fox tails on blades by this guild...but fits in with the Wilkinson crown and crossed swords of course...

But was this a guild that placed bushy tail foxes on blades...? I suspect not...and since none have been found ? What did that mean? Did it perhaps mean that the so called running fox of Shotley was in fact the wolf of Passau...? and that the running Fox wasn't being used at Shotley... but the Passau Wolf was...because the sword makers were all Solingen people...When Birmingham kicked in they used the Bushey tail Fox.... often if not all done by SH Samuel Harvey in Birmingham. Birmingham is much nearer Stratford than Shotley Bridge is... and it was W. Shakespeare who noted the Fox sword in his plays...and where did he live? Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon ...but anyway he had a house in London as well. Surely if Shotley had been turning out bushey tailed fox swords there would be loads of them about... There aren't any... I think I have only seen one probably spuriously applied..