Tea in Wartime and Modern Trends

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Plus, get a free Blackstone six piece stainless steel griddle kit when you buy a select Blackstone griddle, our best lineup It is here at Lows. Valid through six hundred and twenty four. Wh supplies last. seelection varies by location Hello your Dead to mee listeners, I'm Alice Loston and I'm Ben Henderson. We're big fans of your Dead Te, so we're really looking forward to the new series which is just around the corner. But before it arrives, we're delighted to be able to pop into this feed and tell you about our new history podcast, which I hope you'll like too It's called Here for the History, and each episode we find out about how stories from the past have shaped our lives in the present. Yes, we'll uncover the origin stories behind the traditions, stereotypes and beliefs that make up everyday life Why we speak the way we do, why football is our national sports, who came up with a package holiday? And in this episode, we're telling the story of how the humble cup of tea became so ingrained in British culture. It's a riveting tale. and if you want to hear more unusual origin stories, listen and subscribe to Hear for the History on BBC Sounds If you're outside the UK, you can listen on bmc. com or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also watch us on our YouTube channel Hello, I'm Ben Henderson and I'm Alice Loxon So Alice, obbviously I spend most of my free time with my nose in your best selling history book. Thank you. But I think the first time I came across you was when you posted a video online to your legions of followers about some black railings on the street in London, which looked slightly misshapen, am I right? Oh yes. People absolutely lo that video. really It really went viral There are these wonderful railings and they were actually used originally as stretchers in the Bitz in the Second World War. And people just love seeing you know the history behind these ordinary objects. Yeah, it's fascinating. I love that. And I saw it was even written up in the papers, you know? National news. Thank you Ben. Thanks for reading. You're a loyal supporter. you right Well, I've also seen your stuff. you've been making history programms for the BBC for years now And you have your own social videos about history too. I loved the video about the origins of the British stiff upper lip. I think that's the first one I saw of yours. And it was always something I just accepted, but never really questioned why. Well, it's funny you should say that Allas, because that's exactly what we're doing on our brand new podcast, isn't it? Here for the history. Exactly, Ben. I'm so excited We'll be uncovering the historical backstories that have shaped our lives. Yes. so we'll be finding out things like how English turned into the language we speak today and how the suit became every man's uniform and even where the weekend came from. And I've been really surprised by some of the things we' found already. Some of it's really weird, some of it's quite dark, and some of it's just hilarious. So I can't wait to reveal it all So to you listening, we're here for the history. Now let's crack on with the first episode, Alice Could you start by telling me your dream morning routinine Well, the first thing that I have every morning is a cup of tea as I did this morning and I'll get out of bed, try and wake up. and the first thing I do is put the kettle on. I'll have an English breakfast tea, I've got a special mug It's from the Durhin Cathedral Gift shhop, which I very historically bought a few years ago. And I'll have, I'd say a dash of milk Sy skid mil And it normally ends up being the color of a digestive biscuit So I'm very particular about that. But if I get it right, it does set me up for a perfect day. What about you? How much milk do you have Well, I don't want to ruin my popularity this early in the show, but I'm actually more of a coffee man. I know. I'll have tea in the evenings, but yeah, more of a coffee man. My mum is a tea addict though. good. so I've seen the addiction in action. Good yeah. a fellow tea obsessive. I love Your mother and I would get on, no doubt. Yeah, exactly. But I'm interested in how particular people are with their tea routines I've always been a bit of aager shove some milk in it But obviously, you know, I'm a southern living in the north in Manchester And if I go to make a round of tea for my colleagues at work And I put you know, just slightly too much milk in. They don't have a massive g at me like, Ohh, you're sthern soft. You can't make it uppperty. Look at me with contempt. I know peoplee have such strong feelings about it. Myself included and perhaps you deserve that contempt. But it is a big part of the British identity. And actually the anthropologist Kate Fox has written about this in her book, Watching The English. She said that the English feel or uncomfortable in a social situation. That is almost all the time they make . So totally relatable. How much does it say that you've got a cup of tea right there? Right, yeah. I am feeling myoney. And uncomfortable But the question is why is tea so important? Did you know? This is an amazing fact. Nxt to water, it's the most consumed beverage in the world. Yeah, that's pretty remarkable. So there's a lot of tea drinkers, there's a lot of us out there. But what about in Britain? How did something not native to Britain become intrinsically linked to British identity Well, Alice, the anticipation is brewing. Well, well done. Welcome everyone to our new show here for the History from BBC Sounds In the show, we'll be taking the stereotypes and traditions that make up everyday life and find out their historical origin story Today, Alice is going to take us through the history of tea and pin down in her opinion How we Brits got so obsessed with it. Zo Alice, the kett's boiling and I'm here for the history T one, Royal Tam Now legend has it. F thousand years ago revered Chinese emperor and herbalist Senong was relaxing under a Camellia Sinensis tree. as his servants prepared some boiling water to be drunk As he did so A leaf of the tree drifts off the branch and lands in the pot of boiling water But instead of throwing it away Chenong takes a sip He tries this new concoction There we have it He is born are Unbelievable scenes and beautifully told. But this is, you, an underated moment in global history, surely. Thisge shappe the lives of millions of people. Now there are a few origin stories of how tea was invented, but this is probably the most famous of all But if we're going to be looking at the role that T played in Britain's history, it actually starts much later in the sixteen hundreds. So a time of civil wars, Puritans, ruffs, people wearing those big wide brimmed hats, the plagues, the Great Fire of London, that sort of thing And we're going to look at the year sixteen sixty two. The Portuguese princess, Catherine of Braganza, is sailing through storms and rolling seas. She's in an English fleet travelling from Portugal to England. For a pretty big moment in her life, she's going marry King Charles II of England, who, by the way, at this point, she's never actually met So re prettytty full on for her. The thing about Catherine though, she's only twenty three years old. She grew up next to a nunnery. She's basically had this life of seclusion and. strict religious studies. She's got this reputation for being pretty pious and quiet, kind of a mousey figure, you might say. So if she's you know quite a shy person naturally, this must have been a pretty daunting moment, I can imagine You know, got you've got to go over there, marry the King of England. that' really the butterflies, I imagine. Absolutely. And she's this diplomatic pawn in this great tangled web of European politics. The marriage is a great strategic alliance arranged by her father, King John IV of Portugal. And this is quite a common thing at the time for royal families to use marriage as a way to forge these partnerships Nonetheless, she lands in Portsmouth on the fourteenth of may, sixteen sixty two. It's been a terrible journey. She's been thrown around, tossed about in the sea by the storms, but finally she steps off the boat, no doubt hugely relieved And what is the first thing she asks for on dry land Catch youres A pine had the local weather space? not quite Catherine of Braanza asks for T Unfortunately, much to her disappointment they don't have one to give her. So though T had actually already arrived in the UK by this point in the sixteen fifties, and we know this because of the famous diarist Samuel Pepes It wasn't actually popular yet. so the prrincess on arrival was offered, you're right, Ben, a small ale instead. Oh, well, my historical instincts have kicked in there. You laughed. There we go. She'd love it an Airport sppoons, I'm sure Now a week later, Charles II comes down to Portsmouth and on this day, he meets Catherine of Braganza for the first time and they get married. No, really. So it's not the know big fancy royal wedding we're used to. No offendense to Portsmouth not the most glamorous location in the world. Well, it's quite low key, I suppose, you might say, but they do go to London later on and they process into London You know, that's a great celebration. Of course, Charles is quite an extravagant man. Yeah. well, just to paint a picture of Charles II then for listeners. So he's often portrayed in portraits with a big shaggy dark wig going down past his shoulders. And he's known as a bit of a lad, isn't it? He famously reopens the taverns after the Puritans had tried to clamp down fun off the Civil War But for the purposes of this marriage, his temperament's not great, is it? Be Him and Catherine don't raise any surviving children, do they? and he has quite a lot of illegitimate kids with various mistresses, doesn't he? he's not the best behav. He's got a lot of mistresses and he is known as the king of partying. So they are quite a kind of strange couple in some ways, this mousey girl from Portugal, but nonetheless The key thing is that Catherine of Braganza, she is the new wife of Charles II and she joins the English court And In one sense, she's this great outsider because she's remained a Catholic while the English courts religion is Protestantism. And she dresses in the Portuguese style. She has some quite funny habits, which do actually catch on. She brings the fork in, which is you know a useful implement. She introduced marmalade, again, very grateful for that. but most importantly popularizes Yeah, it's a pretty remarkable influence for one woman, isn't it? Yeah She's like a Yeah Early more than Alice Loxton. Great influencer. Yeah, We're very similar in many ways Now, as part of her dowry, Portugal provided a chest of tea. And this was already a very popular drink in the Portuguese court. This is partly because Portugal had established trade routes with the Far East and importantly China, which is where the tea leaves come from She serves this tea to her ladies in waiting and the ladies at court. So this sets a trend in England for the elites drinking tea And we know that she would go and visit aristocratic families and drink tea at their houses, places like Ham House, which is on the outskirts of London on the River Thames, which is a beautiful house. How have you been there? I have been there, and I've actually been to the cafe and drank tea in the cafe. So, you know, repeating Catherine Bricanta's experiences. Oh, very good. Fh research, Alice, I. Of course, of course I do my best. Okay. So this tea as well, this would be tea coming from China, presumably because that's where it's produced. And so it would have been green tea rather than the kind of black tea with milk that we'd later adopt in Britain as the centuries go by Fascinating, but I'm interested to know How to then spread from know this elite circle revolving around Catherine of Braganza to wider society. So let me know how that happenens Yes, well, a big moment in the history of tea in Britain comes in seventeen oh six because we get our first shop. Oh An exciting moment. and it opened on the Strand, which is where many of the London elites were living after the Great fire of London. and it was opened by a man called Thomas. of Twining's tea fame. Lly. Actually the shop still exists today, which is rather wonderful. But the key thing about the eighteenth century is that tea at this point was insanely expensive. Right. So this is because it had to be transported from China. That's the only place producing it at the time and there were these massive taxes on importing it. Okay, so how much are we paying for a cup of tea Okay, so by seventeen oh seven Three and a half ounces Wining's gunpowder tea. It was called gunpowder tea because they had these tightly rolled leaves that looked like grains of gunpowder. This was sold at a price which would work out today as one hundred and sixty pounds. Okay, that sounds enormously expensive, but I don't really know actually how much three and a half ounces is. What is three and a half ounces in tea? Okay, so o, so three and a half ounces is the same as one hundred grams. It's about the same weight as four AA batteries or two medium eggs, if that's helpful. Okay, yeah, yeah A hundred paper clips, canan you envisage what that looks like? That's. It's helpful. What a tree frog. It's the same weight as a tree frog. Oh well, now it's clear to tree frogs these days J. I'm always using tree frogs to measure out the flour. But yeah, so it's one hundred paper cllips worth of tea. threeree and a half ounces costs one hundred and sixty pounds So What does that tell you? it's just very, very expensive? Yeah, so ordinary people surely aren't able to access this kind of thing. No. And of course, because it's taxed so highly and because there's such a big demand for it People go outside the system and it creates this market for something that I know you'll love then. smugglers. Absolutely. Well I found this particularly interesting. You're a pirate at heart, I know.'s often said. Yeah, in the tea story, this is fascinating though, because it really demonstrates that demand for tea isn't just located among the aristocrats at the top with Catherine, it's you know dispersed through society. So pirates are bringing the tea over from Holland and Portugal because there was far lower taxes over there than there was over here And there's a lot of violence involved in this smuggling But I find it really funny. It's not always the people you'd expect, you know, the pirates, villains in society There were teachers involved in the smuggling trade. there was members of the clergy.es, there' all sorts. Clergy, men, you can never trust them. I've always said it. So no, you're right. Well it draws at the point that because of these high taxes, there was a huge amounts of smuggling. and to try and stamp down on that, the tax was slashed in seventeen eighty four Fascinating. Okay, so we get the picture. Catherine has popularized tea at the elite level and it's slowly trtling down through the classes and growing in popularity But I get the feeling, Alice, that things are about to take a much darker turn. They are indeed Every story is a technology story in one way or another. And on the interface, we decode the tech that's rewiring your weak and world On this week's episode, we look at the UK's teen social media ban and ask what happens next Why are AI companies so interested in nuclear fusion energy? And will the new iPhone AI update mean that Siri will finally be good? Listen on bbC dot com or wherever you get your podcasts Chapter two The T walls Now I'm taking us forward into the eighteen hundreds when tea had become so popular that Britain was willing to go to war for it. At this point, China is still the only country that produces tea. And of course, the British Empire is at its height, so it's a time of expansionism, trade, globalism all happening apace. And there's this company that's been set up. It's called the East India Company. and there are a few of these, but in this instance we're talking about the British one It started out as a merchant company, but over time it basically became an extension of the British state. Yes. And the East India Company plays a huge role in this story, doesn't it? Absolutely. in order to meet British demand for tea, the East India compomany was determined to try and buy some more But there was a problem. Because the Chinese would only accept silver in exchange for tea and the East India compomany did not have enough silver. And the way that they dealt with this problem is rather looked down on today, shall we say, to put it politely, becausecause what they did was they took opium, which was being produced in parts of East India an area of the world that they controlled at that time and they amped up production massively. So opium comes from poppies. It's massively addictive. Yeah, a very dangerous drug that can ruin lives and has done many people. So the East India compompany then sold this opium illegally to Chinese merchants in exchange for silver which then allowed them to buy more tea to bring back Britain And this did lead to a huge problem in China of opium addiction which You can understand the emperor wasn't very happy about. Yeah. And this is what leads to what's known as the opium Wars, isn't it The opium wars, indeed. So the emperor even writes to Queen Victoria in eighteen thirty nine, he please for this trade of opium to cease. He's met with silence And next he takes action. he seizes twenty thousand chests of opium and dumps it in the sea. and the East India Company retaliates with great force We obviously know it as a company, but they actually have the Royal Navy, don't they to support them in going to war here Absolutely. So the Royal Navy send in these warships, their' steamships towing gunboats that smash through China's river and coastal defences. China is forced to capitulate. It's a great humiliation for them. They end up having to pay for the loss of the opium, they ced Hong Kong to Britain. They're forced to open up more ports to trade to Britain. And the eventual result of all of this is that tea starts to flow more easily and enable trade with Britain Gosh, we're flooding their country with drugs causing laders of addiction and going to war for tea Now Following this The Brits not only had they forced China to trade in this way, but they also wanted to take it a step further. inststead of having to rely on China to trade the tea, they wanted to shortcut this and grow the tea themselves. And so in India they set up tea gardens and plantations. The great problem was that they were lacking in some pretty key parts of this the knowledge, the know how of how to grow the tea, but also the plants to do it. There have been all of these attempts which just totally failed, and this is where we introduce a new character to the story. Get comfortable because this is quite a story. So let me introduce you to Robert Fortune He is a Scottish botanist, a explorer In eighteen for eight, he was instructed by the East India Company to in an infamous episode of Corporate Eespionage. Travel to China in secret and do something pretty daring. gather the tea seeds, the plants and the understanding which would enable the British to grow tea. Now this is a pretty devious move to put it kindly Chun disguises himself in traditional Chinese clothing and hairstyle He sneaks into areas of China, which are completely forbidden to foreigners, and he goes to the factories and he sees how tea is made. I can't believe that a Scottish man can fit in in nineteenth century China like that, but yeah, very impressive. An impressive disguise So he brought back twenty thousand live plants. and convinced a small number of workers to travel to a northern province, as he called it to grow the tea. And this was in fact, British controlled India in what we would now know as dire jaling. And that is why we have d. Dar jaling tea. as. Do. Now it's really interesting to read about fortunes on the whole affair. He wrote this book about it and he talks about it like this amazing adventure. He was the first to see these secrets. He wrote I often look back upon those days with feelings of unoyed pleasure. And of course, the interesting thing is he might have had a great time, but for China, they see this very, very differently. Yeah, absolutely. He's a bit of a national villain there, isn't he? Yeah, absolutely. And the point is, he's seriously unpopular in China today. They view him as this terrible figure. They see it as trickery He single handedly kneecaapped the economy. and part of that great century of humiliation, which they still talk about today. and they call it the great Te Heist. That's how it's remembered. So yeah. And but fortune and the opium trade echoes down the centuries. Absolutely. So it's quite a big change at this point. They've exploited opium and employed some pretty brutal military tactics There's been a sprinkling of espionage And all of this broke China's monopoly on tea production and began to satisfy this raging demand for tea in Britain Chapter three Look for the Bare necessas Okay, so as the openan Wars and tea espionage are playing out in the far East, What's happening back in Britain? Well, the industrial revolution is well underway and this is playing quite a big part in the demand for tea. Can you tell me a bit about the indndustrial Revolution, Ben? I know it's your great favorite topic. well, I'll try my best. So it's obviously a massive period of technological change. Britain turns from being a largely kind of agrarian country where most people live in the countryside to being a heavily urbanized country based on factory work Okay And so what is life like for those factory workers? Well, they work terrible hours. they have terrible diets.. And the thing is, if only they had something warm and sustaining to keep them going through those long hours. I can't imagine what that possibly could be. So Charles Dickinens, the great nineteenth century novelist, paints quite a vivid picture of the Industrial Revolution in many of his books, but also mentions T quite a lot within that And what's interesting is it was used across classes at this point and it's really seen as this regular homely drink. It's part of this comforting ritual and actually tea is seen as a rejuvenating drink in the way that you might think about coffee today. So I've got a few bits from Dickens that I thought we could have a look at One of the mentions is in Great Epectations and we follow the character Pit Mr. Pumblechook and I breakfasted at eight o'clock in the parlour behind the shop. where the shopman took his mug of tea and hunch of bread and butter on a sack of peas in the front premises Well I mean, I like the mentures of tea there feel nice and homely, but who has bread and butter on a sack of peas? that I think he's sitting on a sack of peas Ib wouldiously that's an unconventional unconvegetable breakfast. Anyway, weird habits of the past. But there we go. So he's having bread and butter and a mug of tea, whichich seems, you know, I'd be up for that And so there's lots of mentions of tea throughout Dickens's books, and it's basically accepted among historians that in this industrial period, tea is broadened out to be not just something for the elite ese kind of lovely delicate cups of tea, but actually it's for the masses too. And it becomes increasingly important for industrial workers. So by eighteen thirty four, there's a lot of mills and factories where they're giving workers particular moments in the day which are specified as tea breaks. Okay, so tea's being worked into the regime now becoming part of the fabric of society Absolutely. And during these grueling shifts of long hours in the mills in the factories They see tea as this great stimulant. It's really sugary. So it's like the modern day or the nineteenth century energy drink. It's an energy. People are using it not just for the taste, but very much as a stimulant to help people get through the day. And we heard from Charles Dickens, but the British food historian Pen Vogler, she has also written about this and she says that interestingly The way that Dickens writes about it, there is a bit of a divide between coffee and tea and that manifests as The baddies, the evil characters drinking coffee And the goodies, the good people in the books drinking tea. Outrageous I was always a Dickens fan. I can't believe he'd say that. Although I'd have to say, you know, there are some pretty evil you know matcha drinkers and things like that. Anyone who asks for one of those really obscure ones in the shishi coffee shops, you know, It takes ages to make. I can sympathize with Dickens there. Yeah. well, you know I think in this situation it would mean that you played the baddie and I was the good character. So I'm all for it all for Pent Voglist theory. But the crucial point is that the Industrial Revolution seems to cement tea as this warm and sustaining drink that's good for our health. But I suppose the key point here is that in the Industrial Revolution, tea is cemented as not just a kind of warm and cozy drink, but actually one that's really integral for our health And we actually spoke to a tea expert, Jane Petigrew. and her theory is that Britain's success during the Industrial Revolution could be credited to the importance of tea Just the simple point that the water had to be boiling. that made it safer to drink Or the fact you've got milk for protein and sugar for energy, all of this was fueling a workforce of healthy workers. Fascinating. So I think this is really kind of at the heart of why Britain becomes so associated with tea, isn't it? Because the industrial revolution happenens earliest and fastest in Britain. It utterly transformed our society more than any other And therefore tea, which is basically the sustaining juice that's following the industrial Revolution, is naturally going to be become part of our national identity And this era is also the era, you know, the Victorians they' are washed with moral panics and all that sort of stuff. And industrialisation has brought, I mentioned some of the poverty earlier. There's a lot of problems with alcoholism. So they see tea as a great solution to that too because you know, get them off the booze, get them on the tea. Absolutely. The temperance movement thinkolute described. And Florence Nightingale, who was the founder of modern nursing, she recommended it. So she said that it was certain that there is nothing yet discovered, which is a substitute to the English patient for his cup of tea. He can take it when he can take nothing else and he often can't take anything else if he has. not, which is a bit convolated way of just saying that they would often give tea to the patients and she thought that was a great morale boost. Well fascinating. I love that. So it's both a healthy product, but it's also useful foring fueling the workers. So at this point, tea is really embedded in British society. a great moment is in the eighteen hundreds when the first tea room opens in Glasgow, which I know you would have been very excited about, then. the first one queueing off outside, Well, I've actually not had great experiences with tea rooms. So I went on holiday to bath ye. and I know there's a very famous tea room there. and they just didn't let me in. I think apparently got a bookious characters. I know exactly. They saw me as a coffee drink.ait you got barred from the tea room. Pretty much ye. But anyway, then I thought my luck had changed because I think it was my girlfriend's birthday and her brother had bought her a voucher for this specific tea room all the way over in Leed. So it' like it's a big drive to get there. So I'm thinking, wow, this must be you know pretty high status. And we get there and it was just You know, there was no one in there, but from one guy on his own. who'd gone for his own little birthday tea. So this is why you don't like tea. Yeah and I just I wasn't a fan. My favourite tea room, it's in a village called Chalton in Hampshire. which is where Jane Austen lived and wrote her books. And there's a tea room opposite and it's Full of Jane Austin fans and it's got teaacups all across the ceiling. like there are teac cups dangling from the ceilings, and I will take you and you will enjoy it. I'm sure. Well fantastic. looking forward to it. There we go. Apologies for that So tea rooms are in, which is exciting, maybe not for Ben, but moving on Throughout the twentieth century, the love of tea continues and in the Second World War it plays again an integral part is this is a good stat. So Five purchases, the top five purchases of the government in the Second World War Oh Bllets, artillery shells, bombs, explosives and I love that that's so British. It's absolutely caught to the war effort. It's rationed, it's provided for soldiers. It's more important than clothes, you know, fairly key things to get into existence. What would you rather I'd rather yeah, yeah. Yeah, well this I'd rather people be naked than drink tea than basically I love that. But yeah,ough T definitely is part of the war effort, isn't it? And you get those iconic images that come out in old news reels of bombed out homes during the Bitz. But then these women emerge and they're still there handing out the tea and everyone's kind of smiling. and it becomes that symbol of national resilence, doesn't it? Absolutely, and you can see for the last two hundred years, three hundred years perhaps tea has actually been really integral to British history. Today it's grown all around the world, places like Africa and across Asia. and actually you can get tea in Britain. There are, would you believe this, more than fifty tea growers in Scotland alone, I don't know how they do that considering the climate, but fair play to the Scots for being excellent gardeners, I suppose But I suppose the big question is what is the future of tea? I mean, you're a coffee drinker I know. Well, it's an interesting story how coffee seems to have well I think actually risen above tea among many Brits these days. There was a bit of research that was published a few years ago, which said more Brits now regularly drink coffee than tea. And I think it's a lot to do with, you there's been au this huge amount of marketing around coffee isn't there? Plus, we've got the infiltration of American culture Um, which really drives that that kind of like That centered, the artis and coffee house, all that kind of stuff and all the different rituals around coffee, I think are partly what elevates it, particularly among people, you know, you and my age. Yeah. I mean, I do think fee is the sexier drink say, you know, it's a bit cooler where tea is so associated. I mean, I'd still definitely have if I was going to a cathedral cafe or