Eye - 1 September 2023
From Maltsters, manufacturers and merchants to Found in fiction
Maltsters, manufacturers and merchants
Given that many Quakers were involved in the temperance movement, Eye was surprised to hear about the connection between Friends and brewing (28 July). This has inspired readers to get in touch with even more connections.
Richard Pickvance, of Blackheath Meeting, turned the spotlight on Edward H Milligan’s Biographical Dictionary of British Quakers in Commerce and Industry 1775–1920 (published by Sessions in 2007).
Edward, also known as Ted, was the librarian and archivist of Meeting for Sufferings. Here, he includes entries for some 2,800 people. Richard writes: ‘He has entries for thirty-two brewers, but seems to have missed Sampson Hanbury…
‘The name of David Barclay is better known: he was one of the four investors who bought the Anchor Brewery previously owned by Samuel Johnson’s friend Henry Thrale, and his name survived through many mergers until it finally disappeared from the name of the successor business in 1970.
‘The sale of Thrale’s brewery occasioned a famous phrase from Johnson: “We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond the dreams of avarice.”
‘Milligan also lists thirty maltsters, four wine manufacturers and twenty-seven wine/spirit merchants.’
David Hickok, of Friends House Meeting in London, was inspired to share some family history: ‘A distant Quaker ancestor Anthony Morris made a beer. Not the only Quaker in Philadelphia to do so. But his was so fine George Washington told Anthony’s granddaughter by marriage, the Quaker Margaret Morris, it was the finest beer in the land. So fun to see what Quakers were getting up to. All in moderation.’
Penning a piece
The Friend has always been something we create with you, Friends, and we welcome your voice. Take a peek at the writing guide on our website to find out how you could be heard: https://thefriend.org/page/writing-guidelines.
Passion and fire
A romantic young Quaker from Ely
Fell in love with a beauty from Keighley
With passion and fire
He spoke his desire
Her only response was ‘O, really!’
Alec Davison
Experiencing the testimonies
A elder’s actions in one Meeting for Worship had an unexpected and lasting impact on a young Friend.
David L Saunders, of Wells-next-the-Sea Meeting, shared the encounter with Eye: ‘As a young teenager attending Winchmore Hill Meeting in North London in the 1950s I was given a first-hand lesson in Quaker testimony.
‘One Sunday the three children’s groups trooped in as usual for the last ten minutes of Meeting for Worship. I was the last to enter and the only seat I could see was on the elders’ bench.
‘I gingerly took my place next to Edgar Dunstan, a venerable and much loved member of the Meeting. Come the end of Meeting Edgar turned, not to the elder on his other side, but to me to shake hands. Embarrassed though I was at the time I subsequently realised this was Quaker testimony in action.’
Found in fiction
John Hall, of Clacton Meeting, got in touch to bring a fictional Friend to Eye’s attention: Derrick, the Quaker aboard a naval warship.
He explains: ‘Derrick appears in the early volumes of Richard Woodman’s Nathaniel Drinkwater series which, like the better-known C S Forrester Hornblower series and Patrick O’Brian Aubrey-Maturin series, are set on English warships during the Napoleonic wars. Pressed into service, he refuses to engage in warfare.
‘Surprisingly, Captain Drinkwater takes pity on him and makes him his secretary so he does not have to fight. When the ship goes into battle, Derrick acts as assistant to the ship’s surgeon, dealing with the hideous injuries caused by, among other things, very large wooden splinters.’
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