The Middlemores and the leather trade.-Before 1730 Robert Middlemore, the fourth son of George Middlemore and Anne Culcheth, was engaged in the leather trade at Birmingham as a bridle cutter. His eldest son, George Middlemore, followed the same occupation, and removed to Walsall, then, as now, one of the principal centres of the saddlery trade, while his younger son Richard also settled in the same town, and acquired a fair fortune as a saddler's ironmonger. What success attended George Middlemore in his business is not known. His sons, John Middlemore and Robert Middlemore also engaged in the same occupation of bridle cutters. The former removed to Stratford-on-Avon, where his family was born, and ultimately went to London, but, according to family tradition, did not prosper. John's brother, Robert Middlemore, after being for a time at Walsall, settled in Birmingham, where he died in 1832, leaving some small property.
The fortunes of the family revived in the person of John Middlemore's eldest son, Richard Middlemore, who in 1801, when he was but twentythree years of age, founded in Fordrough Street, Birmingham, which premises he purchased in 1808, the leather business which now has lasted a hundred years. Thus six successive generations of the family have been engaged in the same trade. Some twenty years after Richard Middlemore appears in the local directory as a bridle cutter, accoutrement maker, and saddler's ironmonger, in Navigation Street. The business steadily grew, and about the year 1827 was removed to larger premises at Holloway Head; and he was able to retire in the year 1831, having previously been joined in the business by his sons William and James. The latter retired in 1841, leaving his brother sole proprietor. From 1868 William Middlemore, until he retired in 1882, was helped in the management of the business by his son, Thomas Middlemore, now of Hawkesley and Melsetter, who then acquired it ,and to whom the business premises were devized in 1887. 
The business which in its export trade and in its importance, was further increased by the addition of a factory at Coventry for the supply of cycle accessories , and was sold in 1896, when the Middlemores ceased to have any conncection with, or interest in, the business. It was afterwards converted into a public company under the style of "Middlemore and Lamplugh, Limited."