HUDSON (WILLIAM HUDSON (& CO.))

c. 1889–1941

Manufacturer of bone china at the Alma Works and, from c.1892, the Sutherland Works, Longton. Formerly a partnership between Joseph H. Middleton and William Hudson (1870–1889) at the Alma Works, the partners separated and William Hudson continued on his own account moving to the Sutherland Works in c.1892. At some point, control of the Hudson business passed to his son-in-law George Edwin Barlow and (his brother?) Thomas George Barlow. In 1941 the business of J. H. Middleton & Co. (owned by the Barlow and Chapman families) was moved to the Sutherland Works of William Hudson under the wartime Concentration Scheme, and the principals combined the two businesses as Hudson & Middleton Ltd.

William Hudson & Co. manufactured good quality tea and tableware using the ‘Sutherland China’ trade name. The mark (from c.1936) was a lion rampant below the well known trade name 'Sutherland China'.

William Hudson & Co. tea trio

This trio carry an unusual ethnic motif of downward pointing arrows. The arrow motif was also used by other manufacturers, but I have been unable to identify its origin.

Probably from the 1920s.

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