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Faith in Numbers: Quantifying Gin and Sin in Eighteenth-Century England

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 December 2012

Jessica Warner
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Journal of British Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 1 , January 2011 , pp. 76 - 99
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Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 2011

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References

1 From 5 shillings a gallon to 20 shillings. I use the term “gin” in the sense contemporaries used it: to denote cheap spirits distilled from domestic grain.

2 The Excise Scheme is the subject of several outstanding studies, including Turner, Raymond, “The Excise Scheme of 1733,” English Historical Review 42 (1927), 34–57Google Scholar; Langford, Paul, The Excise Crisis: Society and Politics in the Age of Walpole (Oxford, 1975)Google Scholar; Hausman, William J. and Neufeld, John L., “Excise Anatomized: The Political Economy of Walpole's 1733 Tax Scheme,” Journal of European Economic History 10, no. 1 (1981): 131–43Google Scholar; and Price, Jacob M., “The Excise Crisis Revisited: The Administrative and Colonial Dimensions of a Parliamentary Crisis,” in England's Rise to Greatness, 1660–1763, ed. Stephen B. Baxter (Berkeley, 1983), 257–321Google Scholar.

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4 As in Clark, Peter, “The ‘Mother Gin’ Controversy in the Early Eighteenth Century,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 38 (1988): 63–84Google Scholar; and Lee Davison, “Experiments in the Social Regulation of Industry: Gin Legislation, 1729–1751,” in Stilling the Grumbling Hive: The Response to Social and Economic Problems in England, 1689–1750, ed. Lee Davison, Timothy V. Hitchcock, Tim Keirn, and Robert B. Shoemaker (New York, 1992), 25–48.

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16 The Case of the Distillers of London (London[?], 1714).

17 The Case of the Distillers Company, and Proposals for the Better Regulating of the Trade (London[?], 1736), 2.

18 A Modest Plea for the British Distillery (London, 1726), 18. Defoe, Daniel gives the same figure in A Brief Case of the Distillers, and of the Distilling Trade in England (London, 1726), 3.Google Scholar

19 The Case of the Master, Wardens and Company of Distillers of London (London[?], 1729), 2; An Impartial Enquiry into the Present State of the British Distillery (London, 1736), 16.

20 A quarter was the equivalent of eight bushels.

21 Defoe, Brief Case of the Distillers, 19.

22 Case of the Distillers Company, no pagination.

23 The Case of the Malt Distillers, &c (London[?], 1736), no pagination.

24 The Consequences of Laying an Additional Duty on Spirituous Liquors, Candidly Considered (London, 1751), 3.

25 Defoe, Daniel, “Self Murder: Royal Gin Recommended. A Satire,” in Daniel Defoe: His Life, and Recently Discovered Writings, ed. William Lee (New York, 1969), 450–52, and The History and Remarkable Life of the Truly Honourable Col. Jacque, ed. Monk, Samuel Holt (Oxford, 1989), 240Google Scholar.

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29 Or so one may infer from the publication, in 1729, of Sanbourn’s Oppression Exposed, or, Liberty and Property Maintained: Being an Enquiry into the Several Mismanagements of Persons Concerned in the Revenues of Customs and Excise in Scotland. In 1727, Sabourn, then a solicitor in the Court of Exchequer, had made similar claims about the collection of the apprentice duties, without, however, offering any evidence. His request to head up an investigation was turned down (Redington, Joseph, ed., Calendar of Treasury Papers [London, 1889], 438)Google Scholar.

30 Warner, Jessica, Ivis, Frank, and Demers, Andree, “A Predatory Social Structure: Informers in Westminster, 1737–1741,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 33, no. 4 (2000): 617–34Google Scholar; Warner, Jessica and Ivis, Frank, “Informers and Their Social Networks in Eighteenth-Century London: A Comparison of Two Communities,” Social Science History 25, no.4 (2001): 563–87Google Scholar; and Warner, Craze, 144–46, 152, 161–62, 171.

31 The company did, however, also pay for printed copies of the solicitations and accounts it submitted to Parliament, as noted in its journal entry for 9 July 1751.

32 Linnell, C. L. S., ed., The Diaries of Thomas Wilson, D.D. 1731–37 and 1750 (London, 1964), 11 December 1735Google Scholar.

33 Linnell, Diaries of Thomas Wilson, 1 November 1736.

34 Keble, John, Life of the Right Reverend Father in God, Thomas Wilson (Oxford, 1863), 2:906.Google Scholar

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36 A Proper Reply to a Scandalous Libel, Intituled, The Trial of the Spirits (London, 1736).

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40 Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004), 36:80.

41 Josiah Tucker, “Of the Pernicious Nature and Tendency of Methodism,” Gentleman's Magazine, May 1739, 238–43.

42 For the senior Wilson's involvement in the SPCK, see Keble, Life of the Right Reverend Father in God, Thomas Wilson, 2:576, 589.

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46 Clark, “‘Mother Gin’ Controversy,” 74–76; Allan and Schofield, Stephen Hales, chap. 6.

47 Croker, John Wilson, ed., Memoirs of the Reign of King George the Second(London, 1848), 1: 373–75, 2:139Google Scholar. This is also noted in Sedgwick, Romney, ed., The History of Parliament: The House of Commons, 1715–1745 (New York, 1970), 174–76Google Scholar.

48 Linnell, Diaries of Thomas Wilson, 11.

49 Holden, Adam, The Trial of the Spirits (London, 1736),2Google Scholar.

50 This is evidenced in the frequent mentions of Hales in Wilson's diaries, including of a visit to Hales's home in Teddington in October of 1733.

51 Thomas, Keith, “Numeracy in Early Modern England,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 37 (1987): 109Google Scholar; Arbuthnot, John, An Essay on the Usefulness of Mathematical Learning (Oxford, 1701), 50Google Scholar.

52 Linnell, Diaries of Thomas Wilson, 14 December 1750; Maddox, Isaac, Epistle to the Right Honourable the Lord-Mayor, Aldermen and Common-Council, of the City of London, and Governors of the Several Hospitals, 2nd ed. (London, 1751), 6Google Scholar.

53 Innes, “Power and Happiness,” 121, 123–24.

54 Jeffrey M. N. Boss, “A Collection of Some Observations on Bills of Mortality & Parish Registers: An Unpublished Manuscript by Stephen Hales, F.R.S. (1677–1761),” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London 32, no. 2 (1978): 133.

55 A Dissertation upon Drunkenness (London, 1727), 8; “Considerations on Distilling, Husbandry, Trade, & c.,” as quoted in Gentleman's Magazine, February 1732, 603; Gentleman's Magazine, October 1736, 594; Daily Gazetteer, 18 September 1736, 2; Wilson, Thomas, Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation, 2nd ed. (London, 1736), 16Google Scholar.

56 In 1736, e.g., the justices of Middlesex arranged for their report to be published in the Daily Advertiser and the London Evening News, as noted in their sessions books for that January. Several other periodicals then ran the report, including the Norwich Mercury, the Daily Gazetteer, Read's Weekly Journal, the Old Whig, and the London Magazine.

57 Mathias, Peter, The Brewing Industry in England, 1700-1830 (Cambridge, 1959), 357, 373Google Scholar.

58 Brewer, Sinews of Power, 226; Innes, “Power and Happiness,” 129.

59 Cobbett, William, ed. The Parliamentary History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803 (London, 1811), 9:1043Google Scholar; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Diary of the First Earl of Egmont (Viscount Percival) (London, 1923), 2:257; Journals of the House of Commons (London, 1803), 23:158; Journals of the House of Lords, 26:211–12; Gentleman's Magazine, November 1743, 563; Journals of the House of Commons (London, 1803), 25:322; National Archives, CUST 48/14 (1751–59), 354; General Out-Letters of the Treasury (1751–59), T 27/27, 9; Read's Weekly Journal, 16 March 1751, 4.

60 Brewer, Sinews of Power, 81.

61 Linnell, Diaries of Thomas Wilson, 16 January 1736; 20 January 1736.

62 London Metropolitan Archives, Journal of the Court of the London Company of Distillers, 30 May 1729, 1 November 1736, 7 April 1747; London Evening-Post, 16–19 March 1751, 1.

63 Wilson, Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation, 44.

64 This is the observation of the anonymous author of An Impartial Enquiry into the Present State of the British Distillery, 39.

65 Maitland, William, The History and Survey of London from its Foundation to the Present Time, 3rd ed., vol. 2 (London, 1760), bk. 3Google Scholar.

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67 Brewer, Sinews of Power, 244.

68 Elizabeth Crittall, ed., The Justicing Book of William Hunt, 1744–1749 (Stoke-on-Trent, 1982), 2; Landau, Norma, The Justices of the Peace, 1679–1760 (Berkeley, 1986), 209Google Scholar.

69 Most notably the notorious trading justice Thomas De Veil, who for two years, from 1736 until 1738, plied London's newspapers with the names of the gin sellers he convicted.

70 This is consistent with a sharp falling off in the social standing of the metropolis's constables, as noted by Beattie, John in Policing and Punishment in London, 1660–1750: Urban Crime and the Limits of Terror (Oxford, 2001), 149–50Google Scholar. Alehouse keepers were allowed to serve as constables up until 1823, for which see Clark, Peter, The English Alehouse: A Social History, 1200–1830 (New York, 1983), 259Google Scholar. Additional background is available in Shoemaker, Robert, Prosecution and Punishment: Petty Crime and the Law in London and Rural Middlesex, c. 1660–1725 (Cambridge, 1991), 221–23Google Scholar.

71 London Metropolitan Archives, Middlesex Sessions Books & Orders of Court Calendar (1735–38), 5.

72 This is based on complaints in the City's repertories (in the London Metropolitan Archives) for 1735, 28–83, 313–14.

73 Linnell, Diaries of Thomas Wilson, 19 January 1736.

74 Croker, Memoirs of the Reign of King George II, 1:373–74.

75 Thomas Wilson, preface to Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation.

76 The most notable being Cheyne's, George hugely popular Essay of Health and Long Life (London, 1724)Google Scholar. Background is provided in Porter, Roy, “The Drinking Man's Disease: The ‘Pre-history' of Alcoholism in Georgian Britain,” British Journal of Addiction 80, no. 4 (1985): 385–96Google Scholar.

77 Wilson, Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation, x.

78 Davenant, Charles, An Essay on Ways and Means of Supplying the War, 3rd ed. (London, 1701), 133–34Google Scholar.

79 Wilson, Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation, 15–16, 21. In the preface to the second edition, Wilson conceded, if only obliquely, that the actual number may have been half as much. The original number of 400,000 nonetheless repeats in the body of the text. The fraction of two-thirds is based on E. Anthony Wrigley's estimate that greater London had approximately 675,000 inhabitants by 1750 (from “A Simple Model of London's Importance in Changing English Society and Economy 1650–1750,” in Towns in Societies: Essays in Economic History and Historical Sociology, ed. Philip Abrams and E. Anthony Wrigley [Cambridge, 1978], 215).

80 Wilson, Distilled Spirituous Liquors the Bane of the Nation, 21.

81 This is from the excise revenue accounts tabulated by Ashton, T. S., An Economic History of England: The 18th Century (London, 1961), 243Google Scholar.

82 This is from the Windsor series tabulated by Ashton, T. S., Economic Fluctuations in England, 1700–1800 (Oxford, 1959), 181Google Scholar.

83 Anonymous, Impartial Enquiry into the Present State of the British Distillery, 44.

84 Ibid., 7–8.

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86 This is variously noted by Andrew, Donna T., Philanthropy and Police: London Charity in the Eighteenth Century (Princeton, NJ, 1989), 54–55Google Scholar; Langford, Polite and Commercial People, chap. 3; and Harris, Politics and the Nation, chap. 3.

87 Jeffrey M. N. Boss, “A Collection of Some Observations on Bills of Mortality & Parish Registers: An Unpublished Manuscript by Stephen Hales, F. R. S. (1677–1761),” Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London 32, no. 2 (1978): 131–47.

88 Maitland’s abhorrence of gin is on display in his History and Survey of London, most notably when he writes about the year 1736: “At this Time the drinking of Spirituous Liquors was become so excessive among the inferior Sort of People in this City and Suburbs, that many thereof not only destroyed themselves thereby, but the Constitution and Health of others were so debilitated, as to endanger the Loss of a great Part of the Human Species” (1:567).

89 Morris, Corbyn, Observations on the Past Growth and Present State of the City of London (London, 1751), 25Google Scholar.

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91 Isaac Maddox, The Expediency of Preventive Wisdom (London, 1750), xxviii.

92 Maddox, Epistle to the Right Honourable the Lord-Mayor, 9, 26.

93 London Magazine, February 1751, 91. It was also sold at a discount (of a half-guinea for twenty-five copies, as noted in Harris, Politics and the Nation, 297–98.

94 London Magazine, February 1751, 92.

95 Journals of the House of Commons, 26:55, 77, 84–85, 106–7, 117; London Metropolitan Archives, Calendar of Sessions Books, nos. 1049–1090, and Orders of Court, January 1747–48 to December 1751, 137–38; Minchinton, W. E., ed., Politics and the Port of Bristol in the Eighteenth Century: The Petitions of the Society of Merchant Venturers, 1698–1803 (Bristol, 1963), 77–78Google Scholar; Norfolk Record Office, Folio Book of Proceedings of the Municipal Assembly, 1745–77, folio 40, recto.

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98 Glass, David V., Numbering the People: The Eighteenth-Century Population Controversy and the Development of Census and Vital Statistics in Britain (Farnborough, 1973), 16Google Scholar; Hald, Anders, A History of Probability and Statistics and Their Application before 1750 (New York, 2003), 89; Innes, “Power and Happiness,” 138Google Scholar.

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100 Maddox, Issac, Friendly Admonition to the Drinkers of Brandy, and Other Distilled Spirituous Liquors, 4th ed. (London, 1751), 43Google Scholar.

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103 Hoppit, Failed Legislation, 324.

104 Norwich Mercury, 16–23 February 1751, 1.

105 General Advertiser, 28 February 1751, 1; Gentleman's Magazine, February 1751, 89; Read's Weekly Journal, 2 March 1751, 3; Norwich Mercury, 23 February to 2 March 1751, 1, 2–9 March, 2; Old England, 9 March 1751, 2.

106 Maddox, Epistle to the Right Honourable the Lord-Mayor, 8.

107 Anonymous, A Supplement to the Impartial Enquiry into the Present State of the British Distillery, 4.

108 This was noted by Hoppit in “Contexts and Contours,” 95–96.

109 Porter, Theodore, Trust in Numbers: The Pursuit of Objectivity in Science and Public Life (Princeton, NJ, 1995), ixGoogle Scholar.

110 Kittredge, Jonathan, Address on the Effects of Ardent Spirits: Originally Delivered in Lyme, New Hampshire, 1828 (New York, 1850[?]), 7Google Scholar.

111 Cobbett, ed., Parliamentary History of England, 9:254.

112 Sutherland, Lucy, “The City of London in Eighteenth-Century Politics,” in Essays Presented to Sir Lewis Namier, ed. Pares, Richard and Taylor, A. J. P. (London, 1956), 49–74Google Scholar; Rogers, Nicholas, “The Urban Opposition to Whig Oligarchy, 1720–60,” in The Origins of Anglo-American Radicalism, ed. Jacob, Margaret and Jacob, James (London, 1984), 132–48Google Scholar, and Whigs and Cities: Popular Politics in the Age of Walpole and Pitt (Oxford, 1989).

113 Ashton, Economic Fluctuations, 181.