The firm was notably the first press to publish Ludwig van Beethoven's Hammerklavier in an edition authorized by the composer in September 1819.
Founded as Regent's Harmonic Institution in London in 1818, the organization was a joint-stock company created for the express purpose of raising funds to finance the reconstruction of the Argyll Rooms, the home of the Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS).
Spearheaded by Regent Street architect John Nash and the board of the RPS, the firm was made up of several composer members who invested money into the organization as well as agreeing to publish their music through the firm.
[1] Several successful 19th century English composers were investing members of the RHI and published their music through the RHI; including Thomas Attwood, William Beale, James Calkin, Johann Baptist Cramer, George Eugene Griffin, William Hawes, Charles Neate, Thomas Augustus Rawlings, Ferdinand Ries (who was German), George Thomas Smart, Thomas Forbes Walmisley, Thomas Welsh, and Samuel Wesley.
Eventually internal struggles led many of the investing composers as well as the RPS to divest of their interests in the firm, at which point Thomas Welsh and William Hawes became the controlling members of the organization and it was renamed Welsh and Hawes at the Royal Harmonic Institution or simply Welsh and Hawes in September 1825.