Writing about Brighton’s earliest occupations last week, I wondered if the vast number of boot and shoemakers in town could constitute a manufactory.

There were 160 in the early 1820s, attracted here perhaps by its rising popularity but found the work from the poor residents insufficient. I do recall reading that the Prince of Wales supported the cause of shoemakers when they opposed the move to replace shoe buckles with shoe laces. Perhaps someone has the details.

Their numbers fell to the 120s/130s then rising to 150 in the 1880s and peaking at 290 in the early 1890s. By then the Continent were exporting shoes and Pocock Bros opened as ‘importers of foreign shoes’ and Framptons offered French boots and shoes. All were still making them to order but some had ‘stocks in hand’. One was still making clogs. They would have needed many apprentices for the numerous processes and if we took three as average (one in 1851 had ten) plus a family member, then that’s about 650 employed in the 1820s.

This industry would have required a vast amount of leather coming into the town. A tannery with its awful stench was a non-starter in Brighton under its strict ‘nuisance’ by-laws and for similar reasons I cannot find that Lewes had one. The little town of Steyning, however, did. It was in Tanyard Lane and run from the 1820s to 1940, producing, I would think, far more than the town required. Transporting by wagon was simple and after 1860 it could come by rail.

One family business survived from its establishment in 1804 to about 1912 when it carried on under a new proprietor. Carter Thunder set up the business at 2 Castle Square. He was followed by his son Edwin, who had held a Royal Warrant under William IV (first picture). By 1910 it was H Thunder (seconf picture) still displaying the Royal Warrant but about 1912 it passed out of the family to J Norman (third picture) who continued with displaying their Warrant, now defunct, for 99 years. I will be writing in full on this fascinating family at a later date.

Laurie Keen