A feature in the conduct of Messrs. Allsopp & Sons’ business is the consideration shown to the employés, who, without counting clerks and the office staff, number 1,600. For their benefit the firm maintains a cricket ground, bowling green, a sick and funeral club, and a library managed by a scripture reader, who also visits the men and their families. Here and there about the breweries and maltings may be seen tottering old men, who seem out of place among so much life and {340} bustle. These are the pensioners, who work as much or as little as they like. We believe that Messrs. Allsopp and Sons rank third among the brewing firms of the United Kingdom, and the extent of their business may be inferred from the simple fact that they have an annual expenditure of £1,400 to £1,500 in postage stamps alone. In the busy periods of the year upwards of 20,000 casks pass weekly through their racking rooms. It would be presumption to attempt to criticise the malt liquor produced by this firm or, indeed, that of any of our leading brewers.
Early in the eighteenth century, as early indeed as the year 1710, if the Commercial List is correct, a building called the Anchor Brewery existed on the Surrey side of the Thames, in Southwark, owned by a Mr. Halsey, whose beer is mentioned in State papers of Queen Anne’s reign as being exported to Flanders for the use of the army. This gentleman having amassed a large fortune, and married his daughter to Lord Cobham, severed his connection with trade, and sold the business to Mr. Thrale, the member for the Borough of Southwark, and Sheriff for the County of Surrey. Mr. Thrale died in 1781, and was succeeded by his son, whose wife Hester was the intimate friend of the great Dr. Johnson.
Even at that time a great business was done by the firm, about 30,000 barrels of beer being produced annually. According to the Annual Register for 1759, Thrale’s was the fourth largest London brewery, Calvert’s, Whitbread’s and Truman’s coming before it. It is said that Thrale lost £130,000 by unfortunate speculations, but so profitable was the brewery that at the end of nine years he had saved a sum which enabled him to pay all the debts contracted by reason of his losses.
Dr. Johnson’s friendship with the Thrales commenced in 1765, and continued until the brewer’s death. The Doctor lived sometimes in a house near the brewery, and sometimes in the villa at Streatham. Up to 1832, when the brewery was destroyed by fire, a room near the entrance gate used to be shown, which was said to have been the Doctor’s study. In Boswell’s Life of Johnson are numerous letters and reports of conversations relating more or less to the Brewery. One of the last letters written by the Doctor was to Sir Joshua Reynolds, and contained proposals for the establishment of a convivial club, as The Club was getting overweighted with Bishops. The Doctor scoffed at the idea that persons, however learned, could meet habitually merely for the purpose of discussing philosophy or the sciences without material refreshment, and he gravely warned Mrs. Thrale that if she forbade {341} card-tables in her drawing room, she must at least give her guests plenty of sweatmeats, else nobody would come to see her. But the Doctor, and not the bonbons or card-tables, must have been the loadstone which filled Mrs. Thrale’s reception rooms. At Thrale’s death Dr. Johnson, Mrs. Thrale, and three gentlemen, named Cator, Smith and Crutchley, found themselves appointed Executors, and determined to carry on the business; but Dr. Johnson, who by nature could not help taking the lead in whatever he was concerned, was not born to be a brewer, and the undertaking was not a success. Mrs. Thrale, in Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson, has left a very lively account of these amateur brewers’ proceedings. In June, 1781, when the Executors had made the resolve to sell the business, she wrote: “Dear Dr. Johnson was somewhat unwilling—but not much at last—to give up a trade by which in some years £15,000 or £16,000 had undoubtedly been got, but by which in some years its possessor had suffered agonies of terror and tottered twice upon the verge of bankruptcy . . . adieu to brewing and borough wintering; adieu to trade and tradesmen’s frigid approbation. May virtue and wisdom sanctify our contract, and make buyer and seller happy in the bargain!”
When the brewery was offered for sale, Dr. Johnson appeared bustling about with his ink-horn and pen in his buttonhole, like any excise man. On being asked what he really considered to be the value of the property, he spoke the celebrated words: “We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond the dream of avarice.” The brewery was finally sold by private contract for £135,000 to Messrs. Robert Barclay and John Perkins, who were associated in the transaction with Mr. David Barclay, junr., and Mr. Sylvanus Bevan, of the banking firm of Barclay, Bevan & Co. Mr. Robert Barclay was succeeded by his son Charles, who represented Southwark in Parliament, and his sons and grandsons. In 1827, the last year of the old Beer-tax, Barclays’ headed the list of London firms, having brewed 341,331 barrels of beer.
The present brewery and its belongings adjoin Bankside, extend from the land arches of Southwark Bridge nearly half the distance to London Bridge, and cover about twelve acres. Within the brewery is said to be the site of the old Globe Theatre. In an account of the neighbourhood, dated 1795, it is stated that “the passage which led to the Globe Tavern, of which the playhouse formed a part, was till within these few years known by the name of Globe Alley, and upon its site now stands a large storehouse for porter.” {342}
In the Globe Theatre, which was built by Henslowe and his son-in-law Alleyn, the founder of Dulwich College, Shakspere produced and acted in several of his plays. It is curious that with Barclay and Perkins’ brewery should be associated the names of our greatest poet and perhaps our most brilliant conversationalist—Dr. Johnson—who did so much to revive the popularity of his predecessor.
A rather amusing anecdote used to be told of Madame Malibran, who, like many singers, knew the beneficial effects of stout on the voice, and whose favourite evening’s repast after the Opera consisted of oysters and bottled stout. Once hearing the name of the Honourable Craven Berkeley announced in company, she tripped up to him, and, with great animation, said, “Ah, Mr. Barclay and Perkins, I do owe you so much!” This reminds us of another anecdote, told of Madame Pasta. When in England she was asked by a literary lady of high distinction whether she drank as much stout as usual. “No, mia cara,” was the reply “prendo half and half adessa.”
Messrs. Barclay, Perkins and Co.’s brewery ranks among the sights of London, and is visited by thousands of foreigners during the year. The present brewhouse is nearly as large as Westminster Hall, and each of the three malt bins could, if required, contain an ordinary three-storied house. The vats number a hundred and fifty, with capacities varying from one hundred to three thousand five hundred barrels; the largest of these weigh when full no less than 500 tons. The full capacity of the mash tuns is 690 quarters. The water used in brewing is drawn from an artesian well 623 feet deep, and the firm give employment to over six hundred men.
Among the collection of Hearne’s Letters, in the Bodleian Library, is one from Saml. Catherall, dated “Luscom, near Bath, Nov. 2, 1729.” It contains a few semi-humorous verses on the death of two mutual friends, named Whiteside and Craster, and ends thus:—