Thomas Mottram & Sons Table Knife Set Stag Shear Steel Sheffield 1839-1852

Early 19th century style stick tang table knife and two tined fork with domed iron buttcaps (a quintessential Sheffield style) marked Thomas Mottram & Sons a hot stamp with forged carbon steel blade and old style small two tined fork handled also in stag.

While not specified this knife likely uses a shear steel in the blade, and like other Sheffield made table knives of its time it shows a 'puddle weld' near the bolster at the beginning of the blade opposite side as markings, almost looking like a thumbprint, this is where the hard shear steel is forge welded to the mild steel or iron bolster and tang. Forks were forged in a small mold and ground by hand and knife blade forged by hand to shape and then hand ground on a saddle grinder to finish the geometry being finished on smaller buffing wheels. Many of these process were in use for hundreds of years in Sheffield which really held its strength through the massive amount of low priced skilled labor available in Sheffield. 

Shear steel was a 19th and early 20th century steel that was made by case hardening bars of iron in ceramic boxes packed with charcoal, large numbers of these were heated for days on end at high temperatures and the resulting bars were broken up (it would break or shear rather than bend once carbon added hence 'shear' steel) and forged welded into a larger mass. This process was done twice on double shear steel creating a steel with a higher carbon content. 

knife 9.75", fork 6.5" overall