The company was created as John Stokes & Sons in 1908 by Mr John Stokes. At this time the company produced hames and items of cart gear. A pair of hames were attached to the horses collar, placed around the horses neck allowing chains or cart gear to be fixed enabling connection between horse and cart.

In 1938 the Jennings family purchased a substantial holding in the company and during World War II installed and operated forging plant producing componentry for the admiralty.

The remaining Stokes family members retired in 1947 and their interest was acquired by the Jennings. A decision was made to target the expanding automotive market and to meet the growing demand a policy of hammer installation and modernisation was effected.
Change in vehicle steering and suspension design in the 1970s dictated need to move manufacture to high speed mechanical forging presses, another fundamental change to forging supply development.

In the early 1990s a second site was acquired in Brierley Hill, Dudley, initially specialising in suspension arms for Rover and Honda, the site grew to include our precision forge operation and additional hot forge capacity.

In 2000 a share of the company was bought by GR Investments Inc and investment continued in site improvements, new IT systems and additional plant and equipment.

The company was relaunched as Stokes Forgings Limited - retaining the Stokes name and restating the core business of forgings.

July 2002 - another well known name in the Midlands, Dudley Die Forgings Ltd (formerly Dudley Drop Forgings Ltd or DDF) became available and was acquired by the Stokes Forgings Group. This business now operates as Stokes Forgings Dudley Limited and specialises in larger, more complicated and frequently lower volume parts on the range of double-acting hammers. Being directly adjacent to our existing Brierley Hill operation resources are able to be shared.

Business growth required the continued expansion of the Walsall site with two additional press lines installed in 2003.

In 2004 GR Investments Inc consolidated their interests to focus on the USA and their share of the company was bought back by the Jennings family returning to 100% ownership.

In 2005 one press line was refurbished and additional machining facilities purchased to support a major suspension arm contract.

In December 2005, Stokes Forgings Dudley Ltd acquired the assets for Molbro Forgings in Cradley Heath (formerly Maurice Darby Ltd and Newbay Engineering) This acquisition strategically adds a more diverse range of non-automotive parts to our product range and widens our customer base. Stokes own all of the dies and tools to manufacture these parts and has existing stock of certain items.

January 2006. Mahindra and Mahindra purchased a large shareholding of Stokes Forgings Ltd and Stokes Forgings Dudley Ltd. See Press release