Opium and 'Merry England'

[Geoffers]

In thinking of the lives of agricultural labourers in Norfolk, some of the difficulties faced are well known - low wages, high rents, high prices of food, harsh weather, disease. Another aspect, not so well publicised, was the taking of opium or laudanum. If you can find a copy, try browsing, 'Medicine in Wisbech and the Fens, 1700-1920' by Jane Arthur ISBN 0 94814700 8; a section of which deals with the eating of opium in fenland.

Children who were ill (or just to get them to sleep) were 'soothed' by Godfrey's Cordial - a mixture of alcohol, opium, treacle and water; and teething babies might be given chews laced with opium. Some parish registers refer to children dying in their sleep from the effects of Godfrey's cordial.

continued.......

[Geoffers]

The extent of opium taking in East Anglia is highlighted by the following etract from the East Suffolk, and Beccles and Bungay Weekly News, dated 1 Oct 1867 (I am grateful to Janelle Penney for bringing the article to my attention).

"Dr Hawkins, of King's Lynn, tells the readers of the Medical Journal that half of the opium imported into England is consumed in Lincolnshire and Norfolk.

One Lynn chemist sells 200 pounds (weight), another 140 pounds a year, of opium, besides five or six gallons of laudanum, and five or six gallons of 'Godfrey's Elixir' a week. People will be startled to hear of drawers full of half-drachm packets of opium, of which many customers take three a day........"
(a drachm is 60 grains or 1/8 ounce)

continued.....

[Geoffers]

"......The habit is no new one. The present writer can vouch for its existence in and around Spalding - and even across in Leicestershire a dozen years ago. The excueses would be obvious, deficient food with the poor, ague an rheumatiz needing an anodyne, with others. But it is a growing habit; and Dr Hawkins speaks very strongly of its pernicious effects in poisoning the blood. To it he attributes the excessive infant mortality in the district, and the miserable, feeble, brownish-yellow countenances so striking among many of the inhabitants......."

Parson James Woodforde of Weston longville kept a diary (published) in which he refers to the taking of laudanum

13 Mar 1784 - "Nancy brave today (tho' this day is the day for the intermitting fever to visit her) but the bark ha prevented its return" (the bark was quinine)
he continues by explaining a Doctor's method for treating the Ague and Fever......"If at the beginning of taking the bark it should happen to purge, put ten drops of Laudenaum into the Bark."

continued......

[Geoffers]

17 Sep 1790 - "The young woman Spincks (who lately had a bastard child by one Garthon of Norwich) called on me this morning to acquaint me that her child is dead, died last night, owing it is supposed to her given him a sleeping pill which she had of her neighbour Nobbs, whose husband is very ill and had some composing pills from Mt.Thornes, one of which Nobbs wife advised her to give her child to put him to sleep whilst she was out. The Child slept for about 5 hours, then, waked and fell into convulsion fits wch. continued for 4 hours and half and then died in great agonies."

The 'sleeping pill' was likely to have been laced with laudanum.

Geoffers

[Guy Etchells]

Yes it is strange to think that Britain fought with China when they tried to stop us importing opium into Canton.
With the result that Hong Kong came under British rule until recently.
Cheers
Guy

[Colin Moretti]

From Pigot & Co, 1830 Directory, Combined Edition
(Archive CD Books)

Winslow, Buckinghamshire

"Is a small market town, 48 miles from London… the land being very fertile, and the neighbourhood occupied by the agriculturist. … A speculation, in which two gentlemen of this town were engaged, is worthy of recording:- Messrs. Cowley and Staines, respectable surgeons here, in the year 1821 obtained a prize of 30 guineas, from the society for the encouragement of arts, manufactures and commerce, for cultivating the white poppy (papaver somniferum), and extracting 60lbs. of opium, the produce of four acres, equal to the best imported from Turkey. In the two following years these gentlemen prosecuted the like culture with superior success, and were similarly rewarded by the society: from 11 acres having produced 142 lbs. of opium, and the next year from 12 acres 196 lbs. weight. Some idea may be formed of the value of this discovery, when it is known that the price is seldom less than 25s. per lb. for Turkey opium, and during the occupation of Egypt by the French it fetched as high a price as eight guineas per lb."

[30 guineas is roughly the equivalent of about £2500 today, 25s about £100
Colin]

[Maria Cameron]

17 Sep 1790 - "The young woman Spincks (who lately had a bastard child by one Garthon of Norwich) called on me this morning to acquaint me that her child is dead, died last night, owing it is supposed to her given him a sleeping pill which she had of her neighbour Nobbs, whose husband is very ill and had some composing pills from Mt.Thornes, one of which Nobbs wife advised her to give her child to put him to sleep whilst she was out. The Child slept for about 5 hours, then, waked and fell into convulsion fits wch. continued for 4 hours and half and then died in great agonies."

The 'sleeping pill' was likely to have been laced with laudanum.

Geoffers

Dear Geoffers, The woman who gave a sleeping pill to the Spincks child in 1790 was Sarah Nobbs nee Adams, wife of Henry Nobbs, Henry died of a strange Wen at age 25 . they were my ggggg grandparents. The Spincks have a website and I have contacted them re this unfortunate event, of which they already knew of.I have two lines of Nobbs in my family. I have no idea of whom Henry,s parents were, and I do not have a date of a marriage for Sarah Adams and Henry Nobbs, but their child William Nobbs married Sophia Clark/e dau of John Clark/e and Jemina Nobbs. After Henry;s death the widow Sarah Nobbs married Joseph Bowles. area,s so far of interest are Norwich,Nth Elmham, Wymondham, Ringland and Weston Longville-Maria Cameron Australia

[Chasing Caseys]

My gtx2 was, according to his death notice 1877, an Opium addict. His last 1/2 oz of Laudanum was supposed to have been taken in two doses and diluted with water. Instead he diluted the whole lot in a glass of "Old Tom" at the bar of The Alliance Hotel resulting in his early demise (age 32).