W.E. Hill & Sons was the celebrated firm of violin dealers, makers, and restorers based at 140 New Bond Street, London. The firm grew out of the work of William Ebsworth Hill (1817 to 1895), a bow maker and violin craftsman who had worked for the Bond Street dealer Davis and who established his own business in the mid nineteenth century. His sons, William Henry, Arthur Frederick, Alfred Ebsworth, and Walter Edgar, joined the firm and carried its reputation into the twentieth century. Arthur Frederick Hill in particular became the most prominent public figure of the family, and Alfred Hill was a noted scholar and collaborator on later works. The Hills became the leading authorities on the violins of Antonio Stradivari and the Guarneri family, and their expertise made them the most trusted valuers and authenticators of string instruments in the English-speaking world. They handled many of the finest surviving instruments and advised major collectors, and their workshop was known for exceptional restoration and for bow making that set a standard for the trade. The Salabue Stradivari, published around 1891, is a short monograph on the 1716 Stradivari violin that had belonged to Count Cozio di Salabue and was later known as the Messiah. It drew on the Cozio documents and examined the instrument's history and its remarkable state of preservation. It was an early example of the firm's scholarly approach, which later produced their landmark volumes Antonio Stradivari: His Life and Work (1902), The Violin-Makers of the Guarneri Family (1931), and The Life and Work of Francesco Stradivari. The firm's publications remain foundational references in the study of the violin.
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