Charles Barnard (1804–1871) set up as ‘Ironmonger, Oil and Colourman’ in 1826. He early on saw the market for wire netting, at first producing it by hand, but in 1844 turning to his first hand-operated machine. John Bishop, an ironfounder from St Ives, Huntingdonshire, joined as partner in 1846. In 1850 the firm, now Barnard & Bishop, developed a galvanising process and in 1851 began producing ornamental ironwork, exhibiting a doorknocker and a prize-winning wrought-iron hinge at that year’s Great Exhibition. In 1859, two of Barnard’s sons joined, and the firm became Barnard, Bishop and Barnards. The firm traded as Barnards Ltd from 1908, and in 1955 became a member of the Tinsley Wire Industries of Sheffield. Barnard, Bishop and Barnards’ work includes several pieces designed by the architect Thomas Jeckyll (1827–1881), including a set of ornamental gates, shown at the 1862 International Exhibition in South Kensington, presented by the City of Norwich in the following year to the Prince and Princess of Wales, and subsequently erected as the Norwich Gates on the Sandringham Estate, and the Pagoda, shown at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition and the 1878 Paris Exposition, also purchased by the City of Norwich, and erected in Chapelfield Gardens (demolished in 1949; fragments survive in Heigham Park, Norwich).
Bibliography: R. Cocke, Public Sculpture of Norfolk and Suffolk, Liverpool, 2013, pp. ix, xvi, xx, 22, 37, 45–46, 65, 97, 139–41, 277; J. Gurney-Read, ‘Industries of Norwich Scrapbooks’, deposited at the Norwich Heritage Library; J.B. Waring, Masterpieces of Industrial Art & Sculpture at the International Exhibition 1862, London, 1863 (3 vols), Vol. 2, pl. 193.
Richard Cocke, 2013; revised, Terry Cavanagh, April 2025