1858 Bradford sweets poisoning

Mass arsenic poisoning in England July 2024 July 2024 1858 Bradford sweets poisoning The Great Lozenge-Maker A Hint to Paterfamilias.jpg A skeleton is dressed as a sweetmaker, surrounded by tubs and boxes labelled "plaster of Paris", "arsenic", etc. Cartoon in Punch, November 1858 no Bradford, England yes 1858 10 30 Arsenic poisoning 200+ 20 or 21Figures on the number of deaths vary, with either twentyJones 2000 or twenty-one people dead.Whorton 2010 163 deaths In 1858 a batch of sweets in Bradford, England, was accidentally adulterated with poisonous arsenic trioxide. About 5 lbs 0 on of sweets were sold to the public, leading to around 20 deaths and over 200 people suffering arsenic poisoning. The adulteration of food had been practised in Britain since before the Middle Ages, but in the nineteenth century, with increasing urbanisation and the rise in shop-purchased food, adulterants became a growing problem. With the cost of sugar high, replacing it with substitutes was common. For the sweets produced in Bradford, the confectioner was supposed to purchase powdered gypsum, but a mistake at the wholesale chemist meant arsenic was purchased instead. Three men were arrested—the chemist who sold the arsenic, his assistant and the sweet maker—but all three were acquitted after the judge decided it was all accidental and there was no case for any of them to answer. The deaths led to the Adulteration of Food or Drink Act 1860, although the legislation was criticised for being too ambiguous and the penalties for breaching it too low to act as a deterrent. The deaths were also a factor in the passage of the Pharmacy Act 1868. Background The adulteration of food had been practised in Britain since before the Middle Ages, but in the nineteenth century, with increasing urbanisation and the rise in shop-purchased food, adulterants became a growing problem.Otter 2020 103 Whorton 2010 141 Cost was the reason adulterants were used; sugar, for example, cost 6½d per pound; the adulterant cost ½d per pound.Emsley 2005 1006½d in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 0.065 1858 2 £; ½d in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 0.005 1858 2 £ in UK, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.Clark 2023 The adulteration fell into three categories: firstly were harmless additions, such as chicory in coffee, adding flour to mustard and watering down milk. More serious were the addition of indigestible ingredients, including introducing alum, gypsum or chalk into white bread or tree or shrub leaves into tea leaves. Finally, dangerous additions to foods included salts of copper and red lead glaze used as colourants, mercury salts added to cheese, and the use of arsenic, sulphuric acid and nitric acid.Otter 2020 103 Whorton 2010 142–143 Wilson 2008 163–164 Monier-Williams 1951 363–364 The chemist Arthur Hill Hassall was prominent in the field of food analysis as an analytical microscopist who established levels of adulteration.Price 2018 Between 1850 and 1856 he examined 3,000 samples of food and found 65 per cent of them contained adulterants.Monier-Williams 1951 363 Those involved in adulterating foodstuff used nicknames to hide the practice. These included "daff", "duck", "duff", "derby", "multum", "flash" and "stuff".Whorton 2010 161Jones 2000 One local name used in Bradford—an industrial town in the West Riding of Yorkshire—was "daft".Jones 2000 thumb|upright=1.1|alt=A pile of small white crystals|Arsenic trioxide in crystallised form In the Victorian era, arsenic was an ingredient in several household products, including medicines (for external and internal use), candles, wallpaper, soft furnishings and colourants for foods.Bartrip 1994 895 It was also used as a poison for murder. So many people died of arsenic poisoning—both deliberate and accidental—that legislation in the form of the Arsenic Act 1851 was introduced; it was the first piece of UK legislation to attempt to control the sale of a poisonous substance.Foxcroft 2007 103 It stated that arsenic should only be sold to adults, the sale recorded in a book—signed by both seller and buyer—and that there should be a witness to the sale if the buyer was unknown to the seller. Any arsenic not to be used for medicinal purposes was to be coloured with soot or indigo to differentiate it from other white powders on sale.Jones 2000Holloway 1995 94 There was no restriction on who could sell arsenic; no licence was required and any trader was able to sell it as long as they kept a record of the sale.Jones 2000 Although the act controlled the method of sale, it did not bring an end to arsenic-related problems or the widespread use of arsenic in household goods. In 1860 an article in The Lancet asked: How to convict of arsenical poisoning when ladies use arsenical cosmetics; when confectioners sell arsenical sweetmeats; when paperhangers clothe our walls with arsenical hangings, and impregnate all the air with fine arsenical dust; above all, when chemists sell arsenic for a toothpowder and label it mercury?"Arsenic for the Million". The Lancet 592 thumb|upright=1.2|alt=Map of Bradford, showing the proximity of two locations|Map of part of Bradford, 1863, showing the locations of Stone Street and Greenmarket"Greenmarket" is given in some sources as "Greenmarket"Cunningham 2016 46–47 and as "Green Market" in others.Sheeran 1992 14 Arsenic trioxide—also known as white arsenic—is an industrially produced inorganic compound with the formula As 2 O 3. It is white and is commonly found in either powdered or crystal form—the latter resembling sugar or sand. It is used as a wood preservative and a pesticide.Cooper 1996 177Tiekink 2010 295 As a solid it is tasteless, but when in solution, it is described as "very faint, at first sweetish, afterward very slightly metallic".Witthaus1919 112 William Hardaker, known to locals as "Humbug Billy", sold sweets from a stall in the Greenmarket in central Bradford. Hardaker purchased his confectionery from Joseph Neal, who made the sweets in Stone Street a few hundred yards to the north.Cunningham 2016 7, 46Davis 2009 487 The sweets were peppermint lozenges, made by mixing peppermint oil into a base of sugar, water and gum, which was made into a paste, then dried on boards before being cut into lozenge shapes. As the sugar was relatively expensive, Neal would substitute some of the sugar with powdered gypsum; he later justified his actions by saying "where I use a pound of it, there are people who will use a ton of it".Sheeran 1992 13 Outbreak West Yorkshire 280 right Bradford and Shipley, West Yorkshire Map of part of northern England right Bradford bottom 53.792 N 1.754 W Shipley top 53.833 -1.777 In the week before the regular Saturday market, Neal was due to make a batch of lozenges for Hardaker but had run out of "daft". Neal asked his lodger, James Archer, to visit a druggist in the town of Shipley, 5 miles 0 on by road, to purchase the gypsum.Jones 2000Cunningham 2016 47 The druggist, Charles Hodgson, was ill in bed; his assistant, William Goddard, was on duty and had been told the daft was in a barrel in the attic.Sheeran 1992 13–14 Goddard had only been working for Hodgson for a few weeks, hoping for an apprenticeship.Holloway 1991 227 When Archer asked for the daft, Goddard went to the attic and took 12 lbs 0 on of powder from a cask. Goddard did not realise that there were two identical barrels and he had taken powder from a barrel of arsenic trioxide; the barrel was only labelled as such on the base.Whorton 2010 140 Neal employed James Appleton—an experienced sweetmaker—to manufacture the lozenges. Both men thought the new batch of sweets was different from normal: Appleton thought the mixture was more free-flowing and smoother than normal, and both considered the end product was a darker shade than they were used to. Appleton, working closely with the arsenic, fell ill and suffered from fits of vomiting; Neal, who occasionally tasted the lozenges to check the quality, also began vomiting. Neither man connected their sickness to the lozenges.Jones 2000Sheeran 1992 14 When Hardaker collected the sweets from Neal on 30 October 1858 he also noted the different colour from the normal batches. He negotiated the lower price of 7 1 2d per pound for 40 lb 0 on, a discount of 1 2d per pound on his usual price.Whorton 2010 161London 2014 3267½d in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 0.075 1858 -1 £ in UK, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.Clark 2023 Hardaker sold the sweets for 2 oz 0 on for 1 1 2d.Emsley 2005 1001½d in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 0.015 1858 2 £ in UK, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.Clark 2023 He ate some of the sweets and by 5:30 pm he became ill; he went home and left his assistant to look after the stall until it closed at 11:30 pm, by which point about a thousand sweets had been sold.Whorton 2010 162Sheeran 1992 16 Investigation, arrests and court case On the Sunday morning the local police were informed of the deaths of a man named Elijah Wright and two boys, aged 9 and 14, the sons of John Scott; it was thought that the cause of the deaths was cholera.Sheeran 1992 16–18 Emsley 2005 101"Wholesale Poisoning at Bradford". The Times. 2 November 1858 The misdiagnosis of cholera instead of arsenic poisoning was a common mistake, as the symptoms for both—vomiting, abdominal pain and diarrhoea—were similar and England was affected by an ongoing cholera pandemic.Cullen Reimer 2017 87, 192 Whorton 2010 64Potts 2023 When more deaths were reported during the course of Sunday, Police Constable Campbell was sent to investigate; he made the connection between the sweets and the deaths, and visited Hardaker, seizing the remaining stock, which was just under 36 lbs 0 on. Campbell then went to Neal's premises and seized 6 oz 0 on of fragments of the sweets. A detective, William Burniston, went to Shipley with Archer to visit Hodgson, the druggist. When Archer indicated the cask from which the powder had been dispensed, Hodgson immediately identified it as containing arsenic. Burniston arrested Goddard, the assistant.Sheeran 1992 18–19, 23 thumb|upright|alt=Bell, sitting in three-quarter pose|John Henry Bell, one of the local doctors who treated those poisoned The chief constable, William Leveratt, had been kept abreast of developments, and deployed men to local inns and alehouses to spread warnings about the lozenges. He sent out bellmen to announce the warnings across the town and, at 11 pm, he had warning notices printed up and posted overnight for people to see in the morning.Sheeran 1992 19 A local doctor, John Henry Bell, hypothesised the poisonings of his patients were caused by arsenic; he gave the lozenges from one patient to an analytical chemist, who confirmed his theory. Bell treated sixty patients for the poisoning.Sheeran 1992 17"John Henry Bell, MD, MRCS". British Medical Journal By midday on the Monday—1 November—the number of dead had risen to twelve, with seventy-eight people seriously ill.Whorton 2010 162 Police visited Neal for a second time and searched his premises more thoroughly, finding hundreds of fragments still on the drying boards used when preparing the lozenges. Neal's wife also admitted that she had found other fragments and thrown them onto the fire; she had also been to their own sweetshop and brought back some bags of mixed sweets that contained lozenges or lozenge fragments. While the police were there, Neal ran off and was pursued; he was found sitting in his kitchen at home.Sheeran 1992 19–20 Goddard was brought in front of the magistrates on the Monday; he was remanded in custody. An inquest was opened the following day. The magistrates also met and decided that Hodgson should also be arrested and remanded.Sheeran 1992 23"Wholesale Poisoning by Arsenic at Bradford". The Pharmaceutical Journal On Wednesday the magistrates also decided that Neal should also be arrested, although he was released on bail. They heard from an analytical chemist, Felix Rimmington, who estimated that each sweet contained 9 gr mg on in of arsenic; he added that four and a half grains were sufficient to kill an adult male. Rimmington later made an analysis of the lozenges which showed each contained between 11 and 16 gr mg in."Wholesale Poisoning by Arsenic at Bradford". The Pharmaceutical Journal"Awful Calamity At Bradford". The Times. 4 November 1858 By the end of Wednesday, fifteen people had been reported dead, eleven of whom were children; thirteen more were listed as "dangerously ill", and another hundred and fifty were ill but not in danger."The Wholesale Poisoning At Bradford". The Times. 5 November 1858 The magistrates met again on the Friday and determined that the three men in custody should be sent to the next York assizes for trial on a charge of manslaughter by negligence. Bail for Hodgson and Neal was set at £200; that for Goddard was set at £100. The number of dead had risen to seventeen, with 196 people ill."The Poisonings by Arsenic at Bradford". The Times. 6 November 1858£200 in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 200 1858 -2 c £; £100 in 1858 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 100 1858 -2 c £ in UK, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.Clark 2023 Eventually up to twenty-one people died and over two hundred were sick; figures on the number of deaths vary, with either twentyJones 2000 or twenty-one people dead.Whorton 2010 163 The assizes opened on 9 December 1858; the judge was Mr Baron Warren. In his opening remarks he said that there was no case for Neal to answer as he was not present when the arsenic was purchased or when the lozenges were made, and dismissed the case against him. Goddard, Warren said, was only following the instructions of his master and so also had no case to answer; his case was also dismissed. Warren said the case against Hodgson should stand and that he would be tried later in the month.Sheeran 1992 25"County Assizes". The Sheffield Daily Telegraph. 10 December 1858 Hodgson's trial opened on 21 December 1858 for the manslaughter of Elizabeth Mary Midgley, a seven-year-old girl. If he was found guilty of the charge, others would follow. After hearing some of the evidence, the judge stopped the proceedings and said there was no case for Hodgson to answer; he instructed the jury to record a verdict of not guilty, which they did.Sheeran 1992 25"The Bradford Poisonings". The Daily Telegraph. 23 December 1858 Legacy The deaths led to calls for legislation to stop similar events occurring, and the Adulteration of Food or Drink Act 1860 was passed into law, "on a wave of public revulsion" against the event at Bradford, according to the microbiologist John Postgate.London 2014 327Postgate 2001 46 According to the legal scholar Jillian London, "Although the Bradford incident was far from solely responsible for the passage of the 1860 Act, it was instrumental in heightening public awareness of and outrage towards adulteration".London 2014 327 The Act stated that penalties would be applied to: Every person who shall sell any article of food or drink with which, to the knowledge of such person, any ingredient or material injurious to the health of persons eating or drinking such article has been mixed, and every person who shall sell as pure or unadulterated any article of food or drink which is adulterated or not pure ...Rioux 2019 69–70 The political economist Sébastien Rioux observes that the law only applied when adulterated food was being passed off as pure, so the protection was only on misrepresenting what was being sold, rather than ensuring the purity of all food.Rioux 2019 70 The medical historian James C. Whorton considers the Act "was next to useless" as its provisions were too ambiguous and the penalties for breaching it—at £5—were too low to act as a deterrent.Whorton 2010 166£5 in 1860 is approximately equivalent to £GBP 5 1860 -1 £ in UK, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.Clark 2023 The events at Bradford were still felt ten years later when the Pharmacy Act 1868 was passed. Legislation on pharmacies was considered from 1859 onwards, although the Royal Pharmaceutical Society opposed a Poison Bill in 1859.Whorton 2010 166Berridge 1999 113–114 See also 1900 English beer poisoning Notes and references Notes References Sources Books Berridge Virginia Opium and the People: Opiate Use and Drug Control Policy in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century England 1999 Free Association Books London 978-1-8534-3413-6 Cooper Andre R. Cooper's Toxic Exposures Desk Reference 1996 CRC Press Boca Raton, Florida 978-1-5667-0220-1 https://books.google.com/books?id=EHG7O0Pte8EC&pg=PP1 Cullen William R. Reimer Kenneth J. Arsenic is Everywhere: Cause for Concern? 2017 Royal Society of Chemistry Cambridge 978-1-7826-2314-4 Davis Mark Bradford Through Time 2009 Amberley Publishing Stroud 978-1-4456-0330-8 Kindle Emsley John John Emsley The Elements of Murder: A History of Poison 2005 Oxford University Press Oxford 978-0-1928-0599-7 10.1093/oso/9780192805997.001.0001 Foxcroft Louise The Making of Addiction: The 'Use and Abuse' of Opium in Nineteenth-Century Britain 2007 Ashgate Farnham, Surrey 978-0-7546-5633-3 Holloway S. W. F. Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, 1841–1991: A Political and Social History 1991 The Pharmaceutical Press London 978-0-8536-9244-7 https://archive.org/details/royalpharmaceuti0000holl Holloway S. W. F. 77–96 The Regulation of the Supply of Drugs in Britain Before 1868 Porter Roy Teich Mikuláš Roy Porter Mikuláš Teich Drugs and Narcotics in History 1995 Cambridge University Press Cambridge 978-0-5214-3163-7 https://archive.org/details/drugsnarcoticsin0000unse 10.1017/CBO9780511599675.005 Otter Chris Diet for a Large Planet: Industrial Britain, Food Systems, and World Ecology 2020 The University of Chicago Press Chicago, Illinois 978-0-2267-0596-5 10.7208/chicago/9780226705965.001.0001 Postgate John John Postgate (microbiologist) Lethal Lozenges and Tainted Tea: A Biography of John Postgate (1820-1881) 2001 Brewin Books Studley, Warwickshire 978-1-8585-8178-1 https://archive.org/details/lethallozengesta0000post Sheeran George The Bradford Poisoning of 1858 Halifax Ryburn 1992 978-1-8533-1033-1 Tiekink Edward R. T. Sun Hongzhe Biological Chemistry of Arsenic, Antimony and Bismuth 2010 John Wiley & Sons Chichester, West Sussex 978-0-4709-7622-7 293–310 https://books.google.com/books?id=nrKXcXQF0QAC Anticancer Activity of Molecular Compounds of Arsenic, Antimony and Bismuth 10.1002/9780470975503.ch12 Whorton James C. The Arsenic Century: How Victorian Britain was Poisoned at Home, Work and Play 2010 Oxford University Press Oxford 978-0-1995-7470-4 Wilson Bee Swindled: The Dark History of Food Fraud, from Poisoned Candy to Counterfeit Coffee 2008 Princeton University Press Princeton, New Jersey 978-0-6911-3820-6 https://archive.org/details/swindleddarkhist0000wils 10.1515/9780691214085 Witthaus Rudolph August Rudolph August Witthaus Text-book of Chemistry, Inorganic and organic, with Toxicology 1919 William Wood & Co New York 263036066 https://archive.org/details/textbookofchemis00wittuoft Journals and magazines Arsenic for the Million The Lancet December 1860 76 1946 592 10.1016/S0140-6736(02)57363-3 "Arsenic for the Million". The Lancet Bartrip P. W. J. How Green Was My Valance?: Environmental Arsenic Poisoning and the Victorian Domestic Ideal The English Historical Review 1994 109 433 891–913 10.1093/ehr/CXI.433.891 574537 0013-8266 Cunningham Harry The Bradford Sweets Poisoning History Today May 2016 66 5 46–47 https://www.historytoday.com/archive/bradford-sweets-poisoning John Henry Bell, MD, MRCS British Medical Journal 22 September 1906 2 2386 735–236 10.1136/bmj.2.2386.735 "John Henry Bell, MD, MRCS". British Medical Journal Jones Ian F. Arsenic and the Bradford Poisonings of 1858 The Pharmaceutical Journal December 2000 265 7128 938–939 https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/news-and-analysis/features/arsenic-and-the-bradford-poisonings-of-1858/20003896.article?firstPass=false https://web.archive.org/web/20201202100843/https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/news-and-analysis/features/arsenic-and-the-bradford-poisonings-of-1858/20003896.article?firstPass=false 2 December 2020 London Jillian Tragedy, Transformation, and Triumph: Comparing the Factors and Forces That Led to the Adoption of the 1860 Adulteration Act in England and the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act in the United States Food and Drug Law Journal 2014 69 2 315–342 25163213 Monier-Williams G. W. Historical Aspects of the Pure Food Laws British Journal of Nutrition December 1951 5 3 363–367 10.1079/BJN19510049 14895827 Rioux Sébastien Capitalist Food Production and the Rise of Legal Adulteration: Regulating Food Standards in 19th-Century Britain Journal of Agrarian Change January 2019 19 1 64–81 10.1111/joac.12265 2019JAgrC..19...64R Wholesale Poisoning by Arsenic at Bradford The Pharmaceutical Journal 1 December 1858 18 6 340–342 https://archive.org/details/s1317id1378031/page/340/mode/2up "Wholesale Poisoning by Arsenic at Bradford". The Pharmaceutical Journal News Awful Calamity At Bradford The Times 4 November 1858 5 "Awful Calamity At Bradford". The Times. 4 November 1858 County Assizes The Sheffield Daily Telegraph 10 December 1858 3 "County Assizes". The Sheffield Daily Telegraph. 10 December 1858 The Bradford Poisonings The Daily Telegraph 23 December 1858 3 "The Bradford Poisonings". The Daily Telegraph. 23 December 1858 The Poisonings by Arsenic at Bradford The Times 6 November 1858 12 "The Poisonings by Arsenic at Bradford". The Times. 6 November 1858 Potts Lauren The Halloween Sweets That Poisoned Bradford https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-67067171 17 July 2024 BBC News 31 October 2023 The Wholesale Poisoning At Bradford The Times 5 November 1858 4 "The Wholesale Poisoning At Bradford". The Times. 5 November 1858 Wholesale Poisoning at Bradford The Times 2 November 1858 5 "Wholesale Poisoning at Bradford". The Times. 2 November 1858 Websites Clark Gregory The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series) https://www.measuringworth.com/ukearncpi/ 22 February 2023 MeasuringWorth 2023 James H. Price Hassall, Arthur Hill (1817–1894) 2018 10.1093/ref:odnb/63790 History England 53 47 42 N 1 45 18 W type:event_region:GB-BRD title Category:1850s disasters in the United Kingdom Category:1858 disasters Bradford Category:1858 in health Category:19th-century health disasters Category:19th century in Yorkshire Category:Adulteration Category:Arsenic poisoning incidents Category:Disasters in Yorkshire Category:Food safety incidents in the United Kingdom Category:History of Bradford Category:History of forensic science Category:Mass poisonings Category:October 1858 Category:Poisoned candy Category:Poisoning by drugs, medicaments and biological substances 1858 Bradford sweets poisoning