[Bell Historians] Can anyone help with a likely founder for this bell?

[David Cawley]

I thought of Warner when looking at the images which Peter said, and CJP has 
obviously had it cross his mind. To me it doesn't look like a product of 
either "old" John Warner or "Victorian" John Warner. The canons look to be 
the wrong shape for the latter, and for a bell of this size I think that in 
general Mears, Warners or Taylors in say 1850 would have cast their very 
small bells with a "tang", "peg" or handbell type argent; and, again in 
general, by this time only Mears was using rounded canons. As to the pattern 
numbers, as CJP says, they are normally incuse, so that if these are in 
relief it suggests the practice of a brassfounder whose output consisted of 
general artefacts including small bells.

There were of course other bellfounders and so far as brassfounders were 
concerned plenty of other firms, not least in Norwich, capable of doing 
small castings who sadly did not usually hand their names down to posterity 
by means of an inscription. That is why research in the accounts for 
building the places where such bells hang can be rewarding - where they have 
survived.

And indeed, Norfolk had its own very remarkable 19th century bell foundry 
(which would probably not have countenanced such a bell) and equally 
remarkable 19th century bell hangers.

DLC