was passed – the Bill of Rights –
protecting freedom of speech and limiting
the powers of the sovereign monarchy.
Unfortunately for William, he would be
better remembered for influencing the
events that would lead to 60 years of
juniper scented social degeneration.
Enter ‘Mothers Ruin’.
William III began his reign by imposing
high taxes on the import of many luxury
foreign goods while banning the popular
French brandy outright as it represented
his lifelong enemy King Louis XIV. At
the heart of William’s decision lay an
attempt to increase the sale of national
produce. The same produce from which
most ardent spirits were distilled. It could
be argued that while it appeared that
William’s prime focus was economic
growth, he was actually helping line the
pockets of many members of the House
of Lords who had helped him ascend the
throne and who also happened to be the
landlords for a number of farms which
produced the nation’s corn and wheat.
One of the first major flaws in William’s
plan appeared with the Distillers Act of
1690 which disbanded the role of the
Worshipful Company of Distillers and with
it the regulatory systems they advocated.
Furthermore, the Act allowed for private
citizens to start distilling their own spirits
(from English produce) with no limit on
volume or licence controls, merely by
displaying a notice of intent for ten days
prior to manufacture. As a result, by the
end of the 1692 national gin production
had rocketed to 500,000 gallons a year;
and that was only what was known about.
bloodletting as they were with the ‘short
back and sides’.
The spirit we know today as ‘gin’ isn’t
found in recorded history until a century
and a half after this period, in a political
study entitled The Fable of the Bees,
or Private Vices, Publick Benefits by
Bernard Mandeville. In his satirical work
Mandeville writes, “Nothing is more
destructive, either in regard to the health
or the vigilance and industry of the poor,
than the infamous liquor, the name of
which, derived from Juniper in Dutch […]
shrunk into a monosyllable, intoxicating
Gin”. Mandeville continues on, claiming
that:
“[gin] charms the unactive, the
desperate and crazy of either
sex, and makes the starving sot
behold his rags and nakedness
with stupid indolence. It is a
fiery lake that sets the brain in
flame, burns up the entrails,
and scorches every part within;
and, at the same time, a Lethe
of oblivion, in which the wretch
immersed drowns”.
50
Mandeville’s observations, while rich in
vitriol, were written at the beginning of
an era in England known today as ‘The
Gin Craze’. An era which would prove
Mandeville’s acrimonious assessment to
be an all too accurate reality.
From its lofty position alongside brandy
as the preferred beverage of the English
aristocracy, genever, or simply ‘Holland’s
Gin’, would suddenly and severely
dive to the darkest depths of societal
destitution; becoming an icon of the poor,
the weak and the depraved. Affectionately
personified by the moniker ‘Madam
Genever’, the beverage came to be more
commonly referred to by one of many
dysphemism’s such as ‘Mothers Ruin’,
‘Ladies Delight’, ‘Cuckold’s Comfort’ and
‘Strip M e Naked’; to name but a few.
Gin’s sudden and headlong plunge from
the elegant coffee houses and private
domiciles of the elite to the most wretched
slums of London can somewhat unfairly
fall to the culpability of one man. William
III or ‘King Billy’ as he was known by the
Scots and the Irish, ascended the throne
of England in 1689 becoming Regent and
joint monarch alongside his bride Queen
Mary II. That same year one of England’s
most important constitutional documents
William’s second major miscalculation
became apparent with the passing of
the Bank of England Act in 1694 which
raised duties and taxes imposed on the
production of beer, ale and other alcohols
(excluding gin) under the pretence of
supporting the war against France. As
a consequence, fortified gin become
cheaper by volume than beer. By 1721,
English Excise and Revenue records
noted that approximately one quarter of
London’s residents were employed in
the production of gin; generating almost
2 million gallons (9.1 million litres) of
tax free spirit a year. Over the following
decade, gin consumption doubled
again. London’s inebriant half a million
population were able to purchase a dram
of overproof gin for little more than a
penny from a choice of more than 6000
gin shops (ironically referred to as ‘Gin
Palaces’). As a consequence London,
along with other major English cities,
began to fall into a well-documented
‘drunken stupor’.
A pamphlet published in 1736 by a
teetotal minority entitled Distilled Liquors:
The Bane of the Nation mentioned:
“In one place not far from