Messrs. Perkins, Bacon & Co was a printer of bank notes and postage stamps, most notable for printing the Penny Black, the first stamps, in 1840. The firm had its origin in 1819 with Jacob Perkins, who had emigrated to the United Kingdom from Boston, Massachusetts with a process for replicating line engravings involving the use of soft steel that was hardened before use. He and engravers Gideon Fairman and Charles Heath formed "Perkins, Fairman, and Heath", and they produced 1-pound notes for English banks. By 1822 it was known as "Perkins & Heath", then in 1829, after a complicated transaction in which Heath gave up his shares and J. B. Bacon bought in, as "Perkins & Bacon". Henry Petch joined in 1835, and thus the firm printing the first stamps was actually known as "Perkins, Bacon & Petch". When Petch died in 1852, the firm became just "Perkins, Bacon". In 1861 they (temporarily) lost the contract to print stamps as a punishment for giving copies of new issues away to friends of the management without permission from the governments involved. They completed their printing contract for the line-engraved stamps on 31 December, 1879, losing subsequent business to competitor De La Rue. In addition to British stamps, Perkins, Bacon printed for a number of the colonies, including the first stamps of the Cape of Good Hope, which were printed in 1853.
