SHEFFIELD, an ancient, large, and flourishing markettown in the west riding of the county of York, 160 miles north-north-west from London. It derives its name from the river Sheaf, which here flows into the Don. These rivers descend from the boldly swelling hills west of the town, and form, with their mountain-tributaries, interesting features in that beautiful scenery for which the neighbourhood has always been noted. The town itself, which used formerly to be described as built upon a gentle hill, rising within an ample valley, has long since stretched over the ascending slopes on every side of its original site, particularly to the west, which is a large suburb of beautiful villas. The inequalities of the ground have not been compensated, either by the regularity of the streets, or by any thing like uniformity in the buildings. The town has been said to be black; and certainly the smoke emitted from upwards of one hundred steam-engine chimneys, and ten times that number of forges, workshops, &c., to say nothing of what issues from so many dwellings, in a place where coal is cheap, does occasionally form a considerable cloud; but the houses are not more dingy, and the streets generally much cleaner, than in other manufacturing towns of the same size. Few persons have approached the town in any direction, without being struck with the beauty of the surrounding neighbourhood, resembling, in many respects, the varied character of a nobleman’s park; and it would be difficult to find a single street from which a glimpse of the landscape cannot be obtained. Many of the neighbouring villas are built of a light-coloured stone, while those in the town are mostly of a dark-red brick. A great proportion of the latter, particularly in the newer streets, are small, being the residences of the artisans and working classes generally, almost every family living in a separate dwelling. This independent occupancy, added to the fact that in few cases are the labours of the workmen carried on at home, bespeaks a degree of comfort and cleanliness scarcely to be looked for in buildings where a single room serves at once as the workshop of the industrious man and the residence of his family.

Sheffield is the modern capital of a somewhat undefined district, which for ages has been called Hallamshire, the present Hallam, a hamlet west of the town, having been considered the site of the ancient capital, where stood the aula, or chief residence of the Saxon lord.

Since the sixteenth century, the records of the place show a singularly rapid increase of the population. In 1615 the town contained 2207 souls, in 1755 this number was multiplied sixfold, in 1796 the census was 29,013, in 1821 the population of the entire parish of Sheffield was 65,275, and in 1831 the inhabitants wore 91,692; at present they are estimated at 110,000. Of these, about 96,000 may be said to reside in the town and suburbs, the remainder in the out townships. A proportionate increase has taken place in the number of houses. These in 1831 were stated to be 19,700; they are now 25,000.

Sheffield has no municipal head, no stipendiary magistrate, or other paramount local governor. Some of the west-riding magistrates, generally those nearest, for none of them reside within the township, sit in the town-hall twice a week for the current disposal of offenders and other business. In the same building is held the manor court for the recovery of small debts; and here too are the offices of a night and day police. An attempt was made in 1838 to obtain a corporation, in conformity with the recent act of parliament; but a great majority of the inhabitants opposing the design, it was abandoned.

The vicinity of Sheffield abounds with the natural elements of prosperity; and of these the inhabitants were prompt to avail themselves, long before the means of a perfect intercommunication throughout the country had generalized these advantages. On every side of the town coal has been got, and actually within the town itself, the seams, although wrought for centuries, appearing in some places almost inexhaustible. With the coal is found ironstone, which is smelted in the neighbourhood; while clay, slate, and sandstone are abundant, and of excellent quality. A navigable canal, opened in 1819, completed a water-communication between Sheffield and the German Ocean; and in 1838, a railway to Rotherham (six miles) was finished. The line of a railway between Sheffield and Winchester is in progress, including a tunnel of three miles under the English Apennines. The number and rapid descent of the streams west of the town afford innumerable waterfalls, on which grinding establishments have been built, and in which, previous to the introduction of steam power, all the edgetools and cutlery made in the district were ground and polished.

Sheffield has long been celebrated, not only throughout Great Britain, but all over the world, for its cutlery manufactures. The origin of this celebrity dates as far back as the reign of Edward III., when “Sheffield whittles,” as certain common kinds of knives were then and afterwards called, appear to have been in repute. As early as the middle of the sixteenth century, the staple trade was fostered by the feudal lords of Hallamshire, there being still extant the various “acts and ordinances agreed upon by the whole fellowship of cutlers, and by the assent of George earl of Shrewsbury.” About a century afterwards, when, in consequence of the growing reputation of the various articles manufactured at Sheffield, and the insufficiency of the manor court to restrain the making and vending of spurious wares, the credit of the trade was likely to be endangered, an act of parliament was obtained, by which, under certain regulations, the cutlers of Sheffield were constituted a body corporate. This important act, which bears date April 1624, was designed “for the good order and government of the makers of knives, sickles, shears, scissors, and other cutlery wares in Hallamshire, in the county of York, and parts adjoining ;" the latter words having reference to a part of Derbyshire immediately south of Sheffield, where vast quantities of scythes and sickles have been made ever since the reign of Elizabeth.

The Cutlers’ Company consisted of a master elected annually, two warders, six searchers, twenty-four assistants, and the commonalty. Their duties were generally to register apprentices, grant corporate marks to be struck on the wares of the members, and by other means to maintain the integrity of the staple trades. This corporation continued in force, with a slight modification, until the year 1814, when, by an act (54th Geo. III.), the local manufac-[7:20:196] tures of Sheffield were placed on an entirely new footing; the liberty of engaging in any of the heretofore incorporated trades, either as masters or journeymen, being extended indifferently to all persons, whether freemen or strangers. The act which thus abolished the old corporation influence and jurisdiction still perpetuated its formal continuance, with power to grant marks, &c., the “master-cutler” being also the returning officer in the election of the two members of parliament for the borough of Sheffield, under the reform act. The corporation have a very handsome hall in Church Street.

Although the throwing open the old corporate trades to unrestrained competition had a considerable effect in multiplying manufacturers, yet the peculiar nature of the handicrafts generally limited in some degree the changes which, under other circumstances, might have resulted from the sudden rush of capital into a new channel. In the first place, a workmanlike expertness in any branch of cutlery cannot be acquired without a considerable period of probation. In the second place, the application of machinery could only be applied, except in the department of grinding, to a very limited extent; and, with this exception, manual labour can hardly be said to be superseded, but rather assisted, by water or steam power. There are other circumstances which have operated in the same direction, especially the division of labour in the production of a single article, which has given the artisans in one branch a control over the others. This has led the workmen generally to act in concert in all questions touching their respective departments of labour, as wages, apprentices, engagements with masters, &c. To maintain what they have considered their rights, or at least their interests, recourse has been had to various compacts formed under the designation of “Trades’ Unions,” frequently exhibiting all the melancholy results of illegal combinations. Nor has the mischief of these confederations been confined to portentous “strikes,” contests between the masters and the journeymen; but nonjuring or suspected individuals among the latter have sometimes become victims to the vigilance and the vengeance of their banded fellows. What has been the entire effect of this system upon the trade of the town generally, and upon the present condition of the parties, it is not very easy to say. It may have kept up wages, but it has more certainly broken down that good understanding which formerly existed between masters and workmen, and driven numerous customers to foreign markets. The number of persons employed in the cutlery workshops is about 10,000.

About 700 tons of Swedish iron are annually landed at the canal wharf, which are converted in the town into the steel which is used in the manufacture of knives, scissors, razors, files, saws, axes, and various other cutting instruments. Of this really “precious metal,” however, the greater part is exported to the United States in the form of tilted cast steel; that is, steel which, after carbonization in the original bars, is broken up and melted in a crucible, afterwards cast into a mould, and then reduced at the forges into rods of such sizes as the trade requires. Besides, three or four thousand tons of British iron are annually brought into the town, and some portion of it converted into steel for inferior purposes. There are several large establishments for the manufacture of the finer kinds of stoves, grates, and fenders. These articles are often executed in the most superb style, modellers and other artists being constantly employed in devising new patterns.

About a century ago, the art of plating upon copper with silver was discovered in Sheffield; and thus originated a trade of immense importance to the town. For many years past the quantity of wares executed in this beautiful and comparatively cheap material has been very great, including particularly urns, salvers, dishes, epergnes, candelabras, and indeed almost every article which had formerly been made of silver. The silver-plating establishments are among the most respectable in the town; their interests have also been the least fluctuating. These circumstances are due mainly to the fact, that in works of this kind a large capital must be sunk in stamps, dies, and other tools; added to which is the expense of creating new designs, and involving the consideration of taste as well as cost. Sheffield plate, for richness of design, the strength of its more precious material, and for excellence of workmanship, is everywhere in high estimation.

Manufactures in Britannia metal, which are likewise indigenous to the town, are carried on to a great extent, and to a singular degree of perfection. Nearly every one of the articles made in silver-plate are elegantly imitated in this cheap material; with the addition of vast quantities of spoons, which are first cast in metal moulds, and afterwards polished by brushing.

Latterly both the foregoing lucrative branches of trade have encountered some competition from the use of what has been terme<l German silver, a kind of brass, which combines the colour, lustre, and durability of silver, at a cost not greatly above that of manufactured copper.

Here are two or three large establishments for the manufacture of optical instruments, including especially curious works for the grinding of spectacle-glasses, the greater part of the trade throughout the country being supplied from Sheffield. Several of the manufacturers have show-rooms on their premises for the display of their brilliant wares, which are celebrated for the variety and beauty of the cutlery-goods which they contain; and visiters may here witness the various operations carried on in the workshops.

The town of Sheffield, in every branch of its productive industry, not only carries on a considerable home trade, but its leading wares find a market in every quarter of the globe. It is, however, to the United States of America that the largest and most constant consignments are made; and hence Sheffield participates very largely in every fluctuation which affects Transatlantic mercantile interests.

The inhabitants of Sheffield are largely provided with places for the promotion of religion, education, philanthropy, and intelligence. There are in the parish twelve churches, seven in the town and five in the rural townships, containing in all 15,160 sittings. Holy Trinity, or the parish church, is a noble Gothic structure, enclosing a parallelogram 240 feet in length by 130 feet in width. From near the centre rises a tower, containing ten very well-tuned bells, and surmounted by a lofty spire of handsome proportions. That part of the church now used for divine service was, in 1800, rebuilt from the foundation, and the interior fitted up in a solid, handsome, and commodious manner, so that the chancel alone presents any traces of antiquity.

The living is a vicarage, two parties presenting in turn, as representatives of the original grantees of the advowson in 1544. Independently of the vicarial patronage, three assistant ministers are appointed and maintained by the church burgesses.

In addition to the churches and chapels of the establishment, the Methodists, Independents, Baptists, Quakers, and Roman Catholics, have respectively large, handsome, and commodious places of worship, in the whole not fewer than twenty. Of these, six belong to the Wesleyans, and include some of the largest and most ornamental chapels in the connection.

Here is an old endowed grammar-school; a collegiate school, recently built by shareholders, at an expense of L.3000; and two charity schools, one for sixty boys, and the other for sixty girls, all conducted in conformity with the principles of the Church of England. The Wesleyan Methodists have just erected, outside the town, and at a cost of about L. 15,000, a splendid proprietary school, ca-[7:20:197] pable of boarding and educating three hundred boys. Besides these establishments, all the religious denominations have week-day and Sunday schools in different parts of the town. A literary and philosophical society was instituted in 1822; they have a museum in the music-hall, containing handsome cabinets of fossils, minerals, objects of natural history, apparatus, &c. and a capital full-length portrait of the poet Montgomery, who has long been regarded as one of the chief ornaments of the town.

There is a large theatre, erected in 1762; and under the same roof a commodious assembly-room; and adjacent, the music-hall, in which concerts and public lectures are usually delivered. A short distance outside the town, on the west, are the botanical gardens, comprising a well-enclosed plot of eighteen acres of ground, laid out in a style of elegance, and commanding an extensive prospect. The glazed conservatories present a frontage of 300 feet. On the opposite slope is a beautiful cemetery.

The general infirmary, which was opened in 1797 for “the sick and lame poor of any nation,” is a large and handsome edifice, on the north-west side of the town. A subscription of L.5000 has just been raised for the purpose of adding a fever-hospital to this noble institution. Sheffield has also a medical and anatomical school, a public dispensary, and a capital bath establishment. On a fine eminence, just outside the town, stands the Shrewsbury Hospital, a charity founded in 1673, and consisting of neat houses for eighteen men and eighteen women, the former receiving ten and the latter eight shillings a week, besides coals, coats, &c. Holliss’s Hospital, in the town, contains sixteen houses for poor cotters’ widows, who have each seven shillings a week. There are various other smaller charities.

From the earliest period of authentic history, the Lovetots, Furnivals, Talbots, and Howards, names of stirring interest in English annals, were successively chiefs of Hallamshire, the present Duke of Norfolk being lord of the manor of Sheffield. With the transactions of these illustrious families, the older records of their ample domain and its industrious inhabitants are so intimately mixed up, that it is hardly possible to give any history of the one without involving details concerning the other. One circumstance especially has given a universality of interest to this association, namely, the committal of the unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots to the custody of George the sixth earl of Shrewsbury, and the fact that she spent the greater part of fourteen years of her troubled life at Sheffield. The residence of the royal prisoner here was chiefly at the castle, a place of strength, formerly standing at the confluence of the rivers Sheaf and Don, at the northern angle of the town, but which was so utterly demolished after the civil wars, that its situation is at present only indicated by the historian, or by the ineffaceable names of adjacent localities. The Talbots had likewise a summer residence, called the “Manour,” built on a fine eminence in the ancient “Lark,” a mile east of the town: of this residence a shattered and far-conspicuous fragment remains. And here, too, the ill-fated Mary occasionally resided during her captivity; and the spot is often visited by curious or sympathizing individuals on that account. An enthusiastic admirer and apologist of Mary, Samuel Roberts, Esq. has recently erected, at an expense of several thousand pounds, and in a beautiful situation, in Sheffield Lark, a small castlc, of the most exquisite architecture, which he calls “Queen’s Tower.”

The inhabitants of Sheffield are indebted for an elegant and most elaborate history of the ancient and modern state of their town and neighbourhood, to the Reverend Joseph Hunter, a native of the place, who, in 1819, published his “Hallamshire," in one volume folio.

Sheffield, John, Duke of Buckinghamshire, an eminent writer of the seventeenth and eighteenth century, of great personal bravery, and an able minister of state, was born about 1650. He lost his father at nine years of age; and his mother having married Lord Ossulston, the care of his education was left entirely to a governor, who did not greatly improve him in his studies. Finding that he was deficient in many parts of literature, he resolved to devote a certain number of hours every day to his studies; and thereby improved himself to the degree of learning which he afterwards attained. Though possessed of a good estate, he did not abandon himself to pleasure and indolence, but entered as a volunteer in the second Dutch war, and was in that famous naval engagement where the Duke of York commanded as admiral; upon which occasion his lordship behaved so gallantly, that he was appointed commander of the Royal Catharine. He afterwards made a campaign in the French service under M. de Turenne. As Tangier was in danger of being taken by the Moors, he offered to head the forces which were sent to defend it, and accordingly was appointed to command them. He was then Earl of Mulgrave, and one of the lords of the bed-chamber to Charles II. The Moors retired on the approach of his majesty’s forces; and the result of the expedition was the blowing up of Tangier. He continued in several great posts during the short reign of James II. till that unfortunate prince was dethroned. Lord Mulgrave, though he paid his respects to King William before he was advanced to the throne, yet did not accept of any post in the government until some years afterwards. In the sixth year of William and Mary he was created Marquis of Normanby in the county of Lincoln. He was one of the most active and zealous opponents of the bill which took away Sir John Fenwick’s life; and exerted the utmost vigour in carrying through the Treason Bill, and the bill for Triennial Parliaments. He enjoyed some considerable posts under King William, and possessed much of his favour and confidence. In 1702 he was sworn lord privy-seal; and in the same year was appointed one of the commissioners to treat of an union between England and Scotland. In 1703 he was created Duke of Normanby, and soon after Duke of Buckinghamshire. In 1711 he was made steward of her majesty’s household, and president of the council. During Queen Anne’s reign he was but once out of employment; and then he voluntarily resigned, being attached to what were called the Tory Principles. Her majesty offered to make him lord chancellor, but he declined the office. He was instrumental in the change of the ministry in 1710. A circumstance that reflects the highest honour on him, is the vigour with which he acted in favour of the unhappy Catalans, who were afterwards so inhumanly sacrificed. He was survived by only one legitimate son, who died at Rome in 1735; but he left several natural children. He died in 1721. He was admired by the poets of his age; by Dryden, Prior, and Garth. His Essay on Poetry was applauded by Addison, and his Rehearsal is still read with pleasure. His writings were splendidly printed in 1723, in two volumes 4to, and have since been reprinted in 1729, in two volumes 8vo. The first contains his poems on various subjects; the second, his prose works, consisting of historical memoirs, speeches in parliament, characters, dialogues, critical observations, essays, and letters. It may be proper to observe, that the edition of 1729 is castrated; some particulars relating to the revolution having given offence.