Lost Trades Nᵒ.14: Birmingham's Button Making

'Steel buttons', by William Humphrey, c. 1777.
Held at the V&A.

There were a variety of buttons produced in the eighteenth-century, for different purposes, and many had specific sites of manufacture. Dorset, for example, was famed for the Dorset button, which was was made with thread and usually used on women's clothing (below).

The buttons made in Birmingham were mostly those which were used on men's clothing to adorn coats, waistcoats and sleeves, as well as link buttons being produced for shirt sleeves. Sometimes, the positioning of men's buttons served little or no functional purpose, such as on coat sleeves, which at times over the century became very large and long, so to be folded back and buttoned into place (see top image). Decorative buttons were also worn by rich and poor, and the rich did not only purchase buttons in precious metals, but favoured new fashions in steel, fine brasses, mother-of-pearl, and a multitude of other materials too. Cut steel buttons, for example, became the height of fashion in the 1770s, and the image at the top of the page depicts a young man dazzling a lady with his fashionable steel buttons. These kinds of buttons were made in their thousands in Birmingham.

Birmingham Button Box: Billy and His Coat of Many Buttons

Billy Button (artist unknown), c. 1820-1830. Held at Birmingham Museums.

 A watercolour of "Billy Button" standing in front of the Town Hall. Billy was a local character known for his array of decorative buttons.

Walter Showell wrote of Billy that he was a: 

well-known but most inoffensive character, who died here May 3, 1838. His real name was never published, but he belonged to a good family, and early in life he had been an officer in the Navy (some of his biographers say "a commander"), but lost his senses when returning from a long voyage, on hearing of the sudden death of a young lady to whom he was to have been married, and he always answered to her name, Jessie. He went about singing, and the refrain to one of his favourite songs -

"Oysters, sir! Oysters, sir!

Oysters, sir, I cry;

They are the finest oysters, sir,

That ever you could buy."

was for years after [Billy's] death the nightly "cry" of more than one peripatetic shellfishmonger. [...] at his death [Billy's coat] was covered so thickly (and many buttons were of rare patterns), that it is said to have weighed over 30lbs.*

'Billy Button alias Jessy.—This rather singular character, who, for many years past, has been known in Birmingham and various towns in this county under the above names, died on Wednesday, in a lodging-house, in Thomas-street'. Birmingham Journal, 5 May 1838.

Notes

* Walter Showell, Dictionary of Birmingham (Oldbury: Walter Showell and Sons, 1885), pp. 61-62.

Birmingham Button Box: Country Life in Transfer Printed Enamel (c. 1760s)

Object Focus: Four buttons from what would have been a larger set of gentlemen's buttons depicting hunting scenes. Above a gentleman leans on his horse with his hunting dogs around, and below are images of the hunt.  

Birmingham Button Box: Joseph Green's Suit

Joseph Green in a formal jacket with smart buttons.
Copy held at V&A.

Several years ago I wrote about Portugal House, which was a grand house on New Street, built by Joseph Green. Green was a fashionable dandy, referred to as 'Beau Green', and I was recently informed that a suit of his formal clothes are held by the Victoria and Albert Museum, complete with a fine set of metal buttons, which were possibly made in Birmingham (see below). The suit was probably worn in the late 1770s, and looks very similar to the one Green is wearing in a portrait of him (above).

Detail of buttons, from Joseph Green's coat. V&A.

Front of Joseph Green's coat. To see more
details of the suit on the V&A site, click here.

Joseph Green had married an heiress, Elizabeth Cotton, in 1776, whose family were of Etwall Hall in Derbyshire (Etwall here).* Green was described as of 'St. Philip's Birmingham' and the couple moved to Birmingham after the marriage, where Green had recently built his fine town house, Portugal House. Green had made his own fortune selling Portugal wine, hence the name of his home, some of the business possibly being inherited from his uncle, another Joseph, who was a victualler (an early name for an alcohol seller).

Joseph and Elizabeth had five children, the eldest inheriting Etwall Hall.** Green went bankrupt in 1799, and he seems to have left Birmingham at this time, and moved to Derbyshire. He died 28 January 1810 and was flamboyant to the end with the unusual description of his funeral procession in his will:

It is my will & desire that my Body may be deposited in Etwall Church yard in a Vault, near to the Comunion [sic] opposite to the Gate that leads to the Village, & that a plain stone be placed within the Church to be engrav’d thereon the arms, as on my Gold Seal, with a few lines to my memory, & that my Body be carried to the Churchyard in a Hears [sic], & only one mourning coach, to be carried to be interd [sic], by six of the Poor men of the Hospital, in their Gounds [sic]

He bequeathed the gold seal mentioned to his eldest son, along with portraits of his parents and 'all the family writings'.* Green was buried in the vault he described, which was discovered by accident this year (2019) at St. Helen's church in Etwall (see BBC news site here).***

Elizabeth later applied so that her children could take the Cotton name, which she achieved in 1820. She died in 1833 and was probably buried in the same vault as her husband.

Portrait of Joseph Green, owned by the family.
With thanks to Sarah Kimbell.

You can also find out about some Green's role in Birmingham's Theatre Royal - here.

NOTES
**Elizabeth's older brother, William, was described as a 'lunatic' by Joseph Green in his will, which probably explains why his sister and her children inherited the estate. 
***Joseph Green's coffin, discovered by accident in 2019, states that he was born in 1737.
* Joseph Green and Elizabeth Cotton married 12 August 1776 at Mucklestone, Staffordshire; will of Joseph Green, 1767, Dioceses Of Lichfield And Coventry Wills And Probate 1521-1860; will of Joseph Green, 1810, Dioceses Of Lichfield And Coventry Wills And Probate 1521-1860; Rag Castle

Birmingham Button Box: Floral Enamel Buttons (c. 1745-c. 1765)

These enamel buttons were almost certainly produced in Birmingham between about 1745 and 1765, and were possibly made in the manufactory of John Talyor. Taylor ran, probably, the largest manufactory in Birmingham at this time, including making enamel toys and gilt buttons. These buttons have a painted enamel centre set in gilt metal. There were other button-makers and enamellers in the town, but the combining of the two makes Taylor's factory a likely candidate for their manufacture. If they were not the product of Taylor's manufactory then they were probably produced through collaboration, with one maker producing the enamel circles and another mounting them in gilt metal.