James Barlow & Co was a scissors partnership, which included James Barlow, Henry Longden, and Sarah Barlow.  In 1786, the latter withdrew.  In 1787, the Sheffield directory listed James Barlow & Co, fine scissors maker, at Meadow Street, using the trade mark ‘BARLOW’.  (Barlow, Longden & Co, scissorsmiths, was also listed at Scotland Street.) These firms disappeared.  In 1788, Barlows & Deakin was launched as a scissorsmith at Green Lane.  The chronology might suggest a connection with the previous Barlow enterprise, though that is uncertain.  The partners in Barlows & Deakin were Samuel Barlow, John Barlow, and William Deakin.  The original partnership had included John Barlow and William Deakin (besides William Marsden and James Barlow, who were the assignees of another scissorsmith in Meadow Street, John Corker.  Information on the Barlows is sparse, but they may have come from Attercliffe (like the Deakins).  William Deakin (1740-1815) was a butcher and yeoman, whose son, George, was apprenticed to scissorsmith Samuel Barlow.  In the 1790s, William and George Deakin, alongside John and James Barlow (scissorsmiths), had an interest in the Slack grinding wheels on the River Loxley (Ball et al, 2006¹).  Barlow & Deakins – under John and James Barlow and William and George Deakin, with the ‘BARLOW’ mark – operated at Green Lane.  In 1812, this partnership was dissolved, though George Deakin continued to trade as a scissors maker in Green Lane.  James Barlow may have formed J. & T. Barlow & Co.

^1. Ball, Christine, Crossley, David, and Flavell, Neville (eds), Water Power on the Sheffield Rivers (Sheffield, 2nd revised edition, 2006)