The Archives

T. Hessin & Co. was founded in Birmingham in 1870. These are the price lists, labels and photographs the Charles family kept.

Price list

The list of 1896

T. Hessin & Co.’s price list for 1896, issued from 68 Broad Street, Birmingham.

The Edinburgh Pen is on page twelve and the Magnetic Series on page seventeen. Both names are in the collection today.

Detail of the 1896 cover: a double-headed eagle over a shield, with the words Justus esto et non metue and Registered Trade Mark — The registered trade mark. Justus esto et non metue: be just and fear not.

Page 12 of the 1896 price list: engravings of twelve steel nibs with their numbers and prices, including No. 221 Edinburgh Pen, No. 296 Thames Pen and No. 303 Mercantile Pen — Page 12Twelve best-selling patterns, with the Edinburgh Pen at No. 221.The Edinburgh Collection

Top half of page 17 of the 1896 price list, headed Magnetic Series: engravings of eight steel nibs, from No. 520 Magnetic Electric Pen to No. 722 Spark Pen — Page 17The Magnetic Series.The Magnetic Series

Engraved label with scrollwork corners and a fan motif, reading This box contains 12 pens each of the following 12 favourite patterns, and listing twelve pens from No. 220 Glide to No. 569 Thunder — The Accommodation BoxA sample box: twelve pens each of twelve patterns.

Box labels

By the box

Steel pens were sold by the box: a gross in the large ones, three dozen in the small. These are some of the labels.

Gold, blue and white box label reading T. Hessin and Co., Birmingham, 1 gross Mercantile Pen No. 303, with a double-headed eagle trade mark — Mercantile Pen, No. 303Box label.

Gold, black and red box label reading T. Hessin and Co., Birmingham, The Magnetic Electric Pen, Magnetic Series No. 520, 3 dozen, with a globe lamp on a stand — Magnetic Electric Pen, No. 520Box label.The Magnetic Series

Red, blue and cream box label reading T. Hessin and Co., Birmingham, Edinburgh Pen No. 221, box of 3 dozen, with a double-headed eagle trade mark — Edinburgh Pen, No. 221Box label.The Edinburgh Collection

Blue, white and gold label artwork for the T. Hessin and Co. Thames Pen, with a double-headed eagle, the motto Justus esto et non metue and a Sydney Exhibition medal — Thames Pen, No. 296

Colour label in red, yellow and pale blue: an engraved view of exhibition halls beside a river, with banners reading Paris 1878 and Exhibition Pen — Exhibition PenParis, 1878.

Colour label with a red and black tartan ground and a pale blue banner reading Scotchman Pen, 1 Gross, No. 01657 M — Scotchman Pen

Colour label with a red and black tartan border: a dancing figure in a red jacket and green kilt in front of a loch and hills

Black and white photograph of a four-storey brick factory on a cobbled street, with T. Hessin and Co. Ltd painted across the front — T. Hessin & Co. Ltd.

Birmingham

The works

In 1930 T. Hessin & Co. was in Wheeleys Lane, Birmingham. Arthur Charles put the output at ten to fifteen thousand gross a week: between 1.4 and 2.2 million pens.

The family

The Charles family

Andrew Charles founded T. Hessin & Co. in 1870 and gave it his grandmother’s maiden name. A year later he gave the name to his son, Thomas Hessin Charles.

Victorian studio photograph of five people: two women and a man standing, a woman and an older man seated — Andrew Charles, 1832–1910Standing, centre.

Page from a family photograph album: a man and a woman seated on a garden bench, captioned by hand Daddy and Mammie 1923 — Family album, 1923

Highley, 1983

The Steel Pen Trade

Arthur Charles, Tom’s son, joined T. Hessin & Co. in 1930, when Birmingham was making pens to suit the handwriting of different countries. In 1983 he wrote the trade’s story down.

“The World was our market and the number of patterns ran into many hundreds”

A. A. S. Charles, The Steel Pen Trade 1930–80

Two names from the list of 1896

The Edinburgh Collection The Magnetic Series The Tom Hessin story