In History Hit’s new documentary, A Very Victorian Scandal: The Trials of Oscar Wilde, Dr Anthony Delaney investigates the trajectory of the famous playwright. Delaney argues that these three trials were about far more than a single fate: they were a reckoning for Victorian society, where public virtues hid private vices and the press fuelled a voracious demand for scandal.

Anthony explores key locations – from the luxurious Savoy Hotel, where Wilde’s recklessness peaked, to the grim walls of Bow Street Police Station – uncovering how Wilde’s persecution fundamentally changed the social landscape and achieved his status as a modern icon of rebellion and resilience.

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Art for art’s sake: the rise of a sensation

Late Victorian London was an imperial capital of immense outward confidence, and Oscar Wilde forged his reputation in this arena of ambition. The roots of his confidence lay in his brilliance: excelling at Oxford University, he embraced Aestheticism, a cultural movement that championed the supremacy of beauty over morality: “art for art’s sake”.

Wilde didn’t just advocate these ideals; he lived them. He meticulously curated his entire existence into an art form, from his signature fur coat and silk cravat to his razor-sharp wit. He summarised his approach with his now-famous quote:

“I treated art like the supreme reality, and life as a mere mode of fiction.”

By the early 1890s, Wilde’s career was soaring. His only novel, ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’, became a commercial success despite its scandalous themes, and his West End plays like The Importance of Being Earnest satirised polite society, making him a sensation. His celebrity status was cemented in America, where he instantly captured the nation’s attention, famously declaring at customs: “I have nothing to declare but my genius.”

Oscar Wilde (left) and ‘Bosie’ (right)

Image Credit: History Hit

The perfect storm: secrecy, vice, and the press

Despite the outward image of Victorian domesticity he maintained with his wife, Constance, and their two children, Oscar Wilde conducted many intimate relationships with other men, viewing these connections through the elevated lens of Greek philosophy.

Wilde’s private life began to unravel after he met Lord Alfred Douglas (‘Bosie’), a young, impulsive Oxford undergraduate. Bosie became an obsession, leading Wilde further into London’s underbelly – a world of covert meetings in bustling areas like Piccadilly Circus, where the anonymity of the expanding city allowed same-sex liaisons to flourish. Wilde confessed he deliberately “went to the depths in search for new sensation.”

However, the outward face of Victorian respectability masked deep anxieties about sexuality. As Professor Kate Williams explains, while society was outwardly moral, it hid a “really complex, seething world of sexualities, of crime and secret places.” Homosexuality, though common, was only tolerated if it was kept absolutely discreet.

Public attitudes were being rapidly shaped by a new, sensationalist popular press, explains historian Bob Nicholson. Literacy rates were soaring, and cheaper newspapers needed to attract millions of new readers. The successful papers knew their audiences didn’t want long reports on Parliament; they wanted “sensation and celebrity.”

Dr Anthony Delaney and Professor Kate Williams upstairs at The Savoy Hotel, London

Image Credit: History Hit

The law is weaponised

Adding to the perfect storm was a tightening of the law. The Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885 included the notorious Labouchere Amendment. Before 1885, prosecuting homosexual acts was notoriously difficult, requiring proof of penetration. The Labouchere Amendment changed everything: it criminalised any type of lewd activity, or “Gross Indecency,” between men. The ability to prove “fondling or fumbling” could now lead to imprisonment. This new, sweeping law became a devastating weapon against discretion.

Wilde’s celebrity made him the perfect target for a powerful adversary: Bosie’s furious father, the Marquess of Queensberry. In 1895, as Wilde prepared for his greatest success, The Importance of Being Earnest, Queensberry relentlessly pursued him. The Marquess left a notorious calling card for Wilde at the Albemarle Club he frequented, scribbling the accusation: “For Oscar Wilde, posing Somdemite.”

Wilde, compelled by honour and driven by Bosie, made a fatal miscalculation: he decided to prosecute Queensberry for libel.

One joke too many

The libel trial began in April 1895. Wilde, buoyed by his wit and social standing, believed he could win by outmanoeuvring Queensberry’s defence lawyer with his intellect. However, unbeknownst to him, Queensberry’s team had gathered witnesses – young working-class men who claimed they’d had liaisons with the playwright.

Although Wilde was the plaintiff, he was cross-examined as if he were the defendant. He was relentlessly interrogated, and attempted to turn the whole proceedings into a joke, giving flippant answers and defiant theatrics. Crucially, when asked if he had kissed a man called Granger, Wilde replied “Oh dear no, he was a peculiarly plain boy”. At this, Queensbury’s team zeroed in. The legal tables turned with devastating speed. 

As Wilde’s grandson, historian Merlin Holland, notes “One joke too many and he’s talked himself into prison”. As Anthony succinctly puts it, “From celebrated playwright to condemned man, Wilde walked into the courtroom a plaintiff, and left a fugitive”. 

The reckoning: a society on trial

Following his disastrous libel trial, Wilde was swiftly arrested for ‘gross indecency’. In the documentary, Anthony details the further trials Wilde faced, which ultimately led to his imprisonment.

The case quickly became bigger than Wilde himself, morphing into a public reckoning for the entire era. Professor Kate Williams argues that the trial epitomised all the late Victorian insecurities: “Oscar Wilde is a mirror held up to Victorian society, and what it shows is hypocrisy in all varieties.” 

The established aristocratic male identity was already under attack from labour strikes, colonial self-determination, and women demanding the vote. By condemning Wilde, society sought a scapegoat, believing that if they could just demonise and throw him out, the prevailing moral order would be safe. 

Anthony goes on to investigate the final trials that sealed Oscar’s fate and explores Wilde’s own profound reflections on his situation.

Historian Merlin Holland, who is also Oscar Wilde’s grandson.

Image Credit: History Hit

The legacy of resilience

The trials of Oscar Wilde were the culmination of a perfect storm, explains Anthony, “fuelled by press sensationalism, political anxiety, and buckling Victorian morality.” His conviction fundamentally changed the social landscape, making same-sex attraction a target of intense intolerance and fuelling a hostile environment for decades.

Nevertheless, Wilde’s defiance and maintenance of his integrity throughout his ordeal cemented his status as a modern icon. His grandson, Merlin Holland, explains that Wilde’s legacy endures today because he represents four essential qualities that inspire younger generations: Rebellion, Integrity, Individuality, and Sensuality.

Join Dr. Anthony Delaney as he investigates exactly what happened in each of the sensational 1895 trials of Oscar Wilde in A Very Victorian Scandal: The Trials of Oscar Wilde.

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In History Hit’s new documentary, Death in the Parsonage: The Brontës, Dr Madeleine Pelling and Dr Anthony Delaney investigate this extraordinary paradox. They explore the grim reality of life in 19th-century Haworth – where the average age of death rivalled London’s worst slums – and how this family, steeped in tragedy, created such enduring, vibrant art, finding their escape in their wild, gothic imaginations.

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A life lived with loss

Whilst a pretty place today, 200 years ago, Haworth was an industrial town where deadly diseases like cholera and typhus were rife, with tuberculosis (or ‘consumption’) being the most common killer. For the Brontë children, living cheek by jowl with death was their reality.

Nevertheless, on the edge of the town, the Brontё sisters could step out of the confines of Haworth. Surrounded by books and periodicals and treated as intellectual equals to their brother, this tightly-knit group of creative, intelligent siblings needed no company but their own. 

However, tragedy struck the family early and relentlessly. Little over a year after they arrived, their mother, Maria Brontë, died of cancer. The enduring longing for her, especially among the younger siblings who barely remembered her, is hauntingly captured in Charlotte Brontë’s idealised portrait of her mother – a ghost haunting the parsonage and the pages of their novels, which are full of motherless children yearning for family.

The loss intensified when Patrick Brontë sent his daughters to a new clergy daughters’ school at Cowen Bridge, which, unbeknownst to him, was a harrowing experience of harsh discipline and appalling hygiene. The unsanitary conditions led to devastating outbreaks of typhus and tuberculosis, claiming the lives of the two eldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, within weeks of each other. Patrick brought his remaining daughters home soon after. Charlotte later immortalised her harrowing time there in ‘Jane Eyre’, describing the school as a place that left her “physically stunted.” 

Imagination and rebellion

Faced with relentless death, the surviving Brontë children – Charlotte, Branwell, Emily, and Anne – found a powerful escape in their wild, gothic imaginations. Their home was rich with intellectual stimulus, and their father encouraged them to read widely from his private library, treating his daughters as intellectual equals.

To fill the void of their lost family members, the siblings created elaborate imaginary worlds, including their ‘Glass Town Confederacy’, ‘Angria’ and ‘Gondal’. In the documentary, Anthony talks to the Principal Curator of the Brontё Parsonage Museum, Ann Dinsdale, and explores the tiny, hand-stitched miniature books they created. Filled with microscopic script for secrecy, they were full of shocking content – murder, dark romance, and immoral heroes – and became the blueprint for their later, world-shaking novels.

Ann Dinsdale, Principal Curator of the Brontё Parsonage Museum, being filmed with the Brontё’s miniature hand-stitched books.

Image Credit: History Hit

The documentary shows how these creative worlds became a vital sanctuary. Their youthful tales, featuring burning beds and murderers driven mad by ghosts, became precursors to the potent gothic sensibility that would define their masterpieces, such as the fire set by Bertha in Jane Eyre.

Branwell’s downfall

Forced by financial necessity to find careers, historian Juliet Barker explains that the fiercely private sisters viewed education as essential for future independence, knowing they would have no income after their father’s death. While initial work as governesses proved miserable, Charlotte and Emily sought opportunity by traveling to Brussels to improve their teaching skills, hoping to eventually open their own school. However, their time abroad was cut short by the death of their aunt, and the costly venture ultimately failed, forcing them back to the parsonage.

While the sisters channelled their passion into their writing, their only brother, Branwell, struggled under the weight of expectation. After failed attempts as an artist and a railway clerk, he found work as a private tutor for the wealthy Robinson family. This job, meant to provide stability, instead led to a consuming and scandalous affair with the family’s mistress.

Dismissed and his romantic world shattered, Branwell spiralled into a devastating addiction to opiates and alcohol, which masked the real cause of his decline: consumption. Anthony visits the Brontë Parsonage Museum to see a recreation of Branwell’s chaotic room and a chilling sketch he drew in his final year, showing himself in bed with Death as a skeleton looming over him – a powerful, creative self-prophecy. Branwell died in his father’s arms in September 1848, having declared he had done “nothing either great or good.”

The power of the moors

Grief over his wife and children galvanised Patrick into action. Taking his role as a minister seriously, he successfully campaigned for an inspection of Haworth by the general board of health which produced the damning Babbage Report. Its shocking findings revealed the horrifying local reality: the average age of death was just 25.8 years old, rivalling London’s worst slums.

In the midst of their grief, the remaining sisters found solace in the raw, elemental landscape of the moors. For Emily, walks on the moors with her beloved dog ‘Keeper’ were a potent creative force. She began work on her singular masterpiece, ‘Wuthering Heights’, where the wild, untamed nature of the landscape becomes an active participant in the savage saga of doomed love and vengeance.

The moors near Haworth

Image Credit: History Hit

The landscape was littered with folklore that directly inspired their darkest novels. In the documentary, Madeleine explores local legends of the moors like the Gytrash (a spectral dog or horse that portended misfortune) and the “wailing woman” with folkloric historian Dr Ceri Houlbrook. She explains how such tales were passed down to the Brontës by their family servant, Tabitha Ackroyd. Such stories blurred the line between religion and folklore, reinforcing the gothic sensibility that defined the Brontë’s writing.

The Brontë sisters published their visionary novels under male pen-names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. Madeleine speaks to historian and Brontё expert, Dr Claire O’Callaghan to discuss how the Brontё’s imagination shaped their rebellious literature. Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre – quintessential gothic masterpieces – blended dark romance and supernatural elements that immediately shocked Victorian society, yet they were overwhelmingly successful.

But just as the world discovered Emily’s genius, she too fell victim to tuberculosis, dying on 19 December 1848 after stubbornly refusing medical aid. Anne followed her sister just months later on 28 May 1849, having spent her final months with her sister Charlotte and friend Ellen Nussey in her beloved Scarborough.

Presenter Dr Madeleine Pelling (left) with Director & Producer Laura McMillen (centre) and Shooting Assistant Producer, Shane Smith (right) – on location in Scarborough.

Image Credit: History Hit

An enduring legacy

Charlotte was now left alone, her life becoming, in her words, “a long, terrible dream”. However, as Dr Claire O’Callaghan tells Madeleine, her solitude led her to safeguard her sisters’ legacy, publishing their works and writing their biographies (and collections of poetry in ‘The Literary Remains of Acton and Ellis Bell’) to appease Victorian critics and which would become the foundation of the Brontë myth. Charlotte found a brief moment of unexpected happiness with her marriage to her father’s assistant curate, Arthur Bell Nichols, in June 1854, only to be cut short by illness (likely exacerbated by pregnancy and extreme morning sickness) less than a year later on 31 March 1855, aged 38.

As Madeleine points out, while the Brontës’ story is one of relentless tragedy, their enduring legacy lies in the literature they left behind. Their novels – exploring themes of madness, sex, and violence – were rebellious works that pierced the veneer of Victorian politeness.

As the documentary concludes, the Brontës were shaped by their unique environment: the close family life, the ambition of their father, the constant presence of death in Haworth – and the wild elemental landscape just outside their door. Their literature is a mirror reflecting the gritty truth of the volatile world they lived in, proving that you cannot have the Brontës without Haworth.

Watch Death in the Parsonage: The Brontës to discover how a family steeped in loss created a literary legacy that still speaks to human nature today.

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With nine children, it can probably be assumed that Queen Victoria was no stranger to the sheets, but what do we actually know about her love (and sex) life? Was she the stiff, reserved monarch history remembers, or did a passionate fire burn beneath her stern facade? 

To examine Victoria’s diaries, her passionate relationship and her society’s attitude to sex, Kate Lister is joined for a special episode of Betwixt The Sheets by Royal Historian Kate Williams and journalist Robert Hardman. Kate and Robert are cohosts of Queens, Kings and Dastardly Things, a podcast from the Daily Mail.

Here we take a look at some of the episode’s key themes:

Passion in the palace

Queen Victoria’s voluminous diaries, containing over 62 million words, offer an unprecedented glimpse into her innermost thoughts and affections. These writings reveal an outpouring of love for Prince Albert, a devotion forged in their early marriage after both had endured miserable childhoods.

In the episode, Kate Lister, Kate Williams and Robert Hardman explore how Victoria’s own words unveil a young woman deeply smitten. From admiring Albert’s “handsome white cashmere britches with nothing on underneath”, to her post-wedding night bliss, where she “didn’t think it would be possible to be so happy” and his delightful help with her stockings, their bond seemingly fulfilled her vision of a companionate marriage.

However, royal duty and the swift succession of pregnancies soon introduced unexpected frustrations. Victoria’s first child, Princess Victoria (“Vicky”), arrived just 9 months after the wedding. In the podcast, you’ll hear how upper-class taboos, combined with a lack of understanding about natural conception, contributed to a challenging period for Victoria. 

Betwixt The Sheets presenter Kate Lister (centre), with Robert Hardman (left) and Kate Williams (right) from The Daily Mail’s ‘Queens, Kings and Dastardly Things’ podcast

Image Credit: History Hit

The trials of royal childbirth

For Queen Victoria, pregnancy was far more than a personal journey – as a reigning queen, it was a battle for control. While ‘confinement’ physically restricted her, Professor Kate Williams discusses how these periods of pregnancy also saw ministers sideline the Queen, allowing Prince Albert to assert greater influence, igniting a subtle power struggle within their marriage.

Victoria was obligated to give birth in front of her ministers, separated only by a flimsy screen. This archaic practice weighed heavily on her, leading her, later in her pregnancies (specifically with Prince Leopold), to become the first monarch to use chloroform for pain relief during childbirth. The episode discusses why this was seen as a controversial choice.

Despite these struggles, Victoria’s devotion to Albert remained evident. Her diaries are filled with affectionate descriptions, showcasing a relationship that, while marked by power struggles between monarch and husband, maintained a profound intimacy until his death.

Victorian society and sexuality

Was wider Victorian society truly as puritanical as often portrayed, or did a more complex reality exist beneath the surface of their buttoned-up exteriors? Kate Lister challenges the myth of Victorian prudishness, arguing that changing social attitudes and taboos, particularly among the rising middle class, shaped their public morality.

Yet, this new facade didn’t suppress everything. The 19th century witnessed a surprising rise in pornographic materials, hinting at a thriving, discreet underworld. And while the British Empire exported a vision of “upright” behaviour, sex work simultaneously exploded, fuelled by rapid urbanisation and escalating poverty.

‘The “new woman” and her bicycle – there will be several varieties of her’ (1895) – F. Opper.

Image Credit: Frederick Burr Opper, / Library of Congress / Public Domain

Bikes, bodies, and royal myths

The Victorian era even unveiled unexpected avenues for social change and hidden eroticism. The bicycle, initially adopted by Queen Victoria herself, became a powerful symbol of women’s liberation, challenging restrictive fashion and sparking new (albeit sometimes medically alarmist) discussions around women’s bodies. This unexpectedly transformed the bicycle into a surprisingly “sexy object” of the era.

Finally, the podcast tackles persistent myths surrounding the royal couple. Did Prince Albert inspire a famous piercing? Was there truly a ‘sex button’ at Osborne House for royal intimacy? Kate, Robert and Kate delve into these intriguing questions and more. 

Don’t miss Royal Sex: Queen Victoria to explore Queen Victoria’s private world and uncover the surprising realities of Victorian society’s attitudes towards sex, along with the intriguing truths behind some of the era’s most enduring myths.

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Knox played an important role progressing the study of anatomy in Britain. Working out of 10 Surgeon Square, Knox and his practice’s immense demand for corpses also played an important part in the murderous saga of Scotland’s most famous body snatchers, Burke and Hare.

William Burke and William Hare’s 1828 murders are the subject of a History Hit film investigating the notorious serial killers, presented by the After Dark podcast’s Maddy Pelling and Anthony Delaney.

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“Doctor Robert Knox was the superstar anatomy teacher in Edinburgh in his day,” Cat Irving, Human Remains Conservator at Surgeons’ Hall Museums, explains in the documentary. Knox practised the Paris manner of dissection, which meant that students would dissect cadavers themselves, rather than observe a teacher.

“Everyone was enthusiastic about his teaching, they came away really knowing what they were doing inside the human body.”

Of course, independent anatomists like Knox, who were linked to but not part of the university, required a supply of bodies. As many as 90 cadavers were needed for a year of Robert Knox’s classes.

There was a legitimate supply for cadavers and these came from executed criminals. However, as a private anatomy school, “they’re not entitled to any of that legitimate supply, and the legitimate supply wasn’t enough for the medical schools at the time,” says Irving.

They still somehow secured cadavers: an advert for one of Robert Knox’s classes, includes the reassurance that “arrangements have been made to secure as usual an ample supply of Anatomical Subjects.”

The Edinburgh Murders: Burke and Hare

Image Credit: History Hit

“They’re definitely having to get more underhand methods of body supply,” says Irving. “We’re talking about the body snatchers. We’re talking about bribing people in hospitals, undertakers, things like that.”

These illicit corpses cost Knox dearly – seven or eight pounds sterling for one body.

Burke and Hare

Burke and Hare recognized the anatomists’ growing demand for bodies. Up to this point, they had dealt in the recently dead. Burke had sold a recently deceased lodger in his house to Knox for £7 and 10 shillings. Their opportunism then took a darker turn. Their subsequent murder rampage took the lives of 16 people, their bodies sold for the anatomist’s table.

After a media frenzy, forensic investigation, and trial, Hare walked free after serving as the state’s witness, while Burke was executed and publicly dissected. (His skeleton ended up displayed in Edinburgh Medical School.)

How aware was Robert Knox that his school’s demand for bodies was fuelling not just a clandestine but murderous trade in cadavers? “It seems very likely that he would have some inkling of what was going on,” says Irving. “But he escapes legal justice in that sense. He was never prosecuted.”

Though Burke signed a confession saying Knox had no knowledge of the murders, “the public certainly felt he was guilty,” says Irving. An enraged Edinburgh crowd hung an effigy of Knox and demanded he faced justice, but a committee cleared him of complicity.

Burke and Hare’s murder rampage through the streets of Edinburgh is explored in The Edinburgh Murders: Burke and Hare on History Hit.

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The Rise of a Performer

Julia Pastrana first emerged on the freak show circuit in the mid-19th century, captivating audiences with her distinct appearance. Often referred to as the “Bearded Lady” or the “Bear Woman” due to her condition, hypertrichosis, which caused excessive hair growth across her body and face, she became a sought-after attraction. Theodore Lent, a showman with an eye for profit, saw an opportunity in Julia and took control of her career, managing her performances across Europe.

By 1855, Lent married Julia, further solidifying his control over her life and finances. Together, they continued to tour, with Lent most likely taking all of the proceeds from her performances. But Julia Pastrana was more than just an object of curiosity. She was a multi-talented woman who defied the limitations society placed on her. John Woolf, a guest on Kate Lister’s Betwixt the Sheets, said

In 1855, he married her and they performed around Europe…he most likely took all the proceeds. She spoke numerous languages, could ride on horse back and was a great singer.

A Tragic End

In 1860, Julia Pastrana gave birth to a baby boy who inherited her condition. Tragically, both mother and child died shortly after the birth, cutting short the life of a woman who had endured so much. For most, the story would have ended there, but for Theodore Lent, Julia’s death marked a different kind of opportunity. Faced with the loss of his primary source of income, Lent made a chilling decision: he had his wife and child embalmed, turning them into a macabre exhibit.

Woolf tells Kate that

She gave birth to a boy who had the same condition as her. Heartbreakingly they both died and Lent saw his opportunity of income slipping away.

For years after their deaths, Theodore Lent continued to display Julia Pastrana and her son to audiences across Europe, refusing to let death be the end of the show. It was a disturbing chapter in an already grim story of exploitation, as Lent paraded their preserved bodies in front of paying crowds, further dehumanizing the woman he had once called his wife.

Poster showcasing Julia Patsrana at the show

Image Credit: wellcomeimages.org

The Legacy of Exploitation

Theodore Lent’s obsession with profiting from those he controlled did not end with Julia Pastrana. In the 1860s, he married another bearded woman named Marie Bartell, whom he presented as Julia’s sister. This was yet another attempt to capitalize on society’s fascination with physical difference, continuing his pattern of exploitation.

Julia Pastrana’s story serves as a stark reminder of the cruelty faced by many who were part of the freak show industry. Reduced to mere spectacles, their humanity was often ignored or dismissed in favor of profit. But in recent years, there has been a growing recognition of the injustices they endured.

In a symbolic act of redemption, Julia Pastrana’s remains were finally repatriated to her native Mexico in 2013. After more than 150 years of posthumous exploitation, she was laid to rest with dignity, allowing her story to come to a more peaceful conclusion.

A Life Remembered

Julia Pastrana’s life was one of resilience in the face of unimaginable challenges. Despite the cruelty she endured, she was a woman of talent, intelligence, and strength. Her story is a haunting reminder of the ways in which society can fail those who are different, but it also speaks to the enduring human spirit. Today, she is remembered not only as a figure in the history of freak shows but as a woman who deserves to be seen beyond the spectacle.

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Coca leaves had been a central feature of Incan cultural life centuries before Europeans adopted the substance in the late 19th century. But the key moment in the popularisation of the coca leaf in Britain came with the rise of competitive long-distance walker Edward Payson Weston.

Weston was an American participant in the spectator sport of pedestrianism who established his celebrity when he walked nearly 500 miles from Boston to Washington D.C. in 1861 in a little over 10 days.

“He came to dominate the world of this very strange Victorian sport, essentially competitive long-distance walking,” says Dr Douglas Small on Dan Snow’s History Hit podcast. “This sounds remarkable to us now but the Victorians absolutely went mad for this.”

Women gathering leaves of the coca plant (Erythroxylum coca) in Bolivia. Wood engraving, c. 1867.

Image Credit: Wellcome Collection / Public Domain

When he visited Britain in 1876, some 5,000 people watched him compete in a 24-hour championship race against Englishman William Perkins. After winning the race, Weston revealed that his doggedness had been fuelled, in part, by munching on coca leaves.

“That’s actually what really moves coca for British people from being something that’s occasionally discussed in travellers’ tales, something that’s mentioned every now and again in accounts of life in South America, to being something that people are really interested in,” explains Small, a historian and author of Cocaine, Literature, and Culture, 1876-1930.

“[It] almost becomes for a while like tea and coffee, something that people really want to use in their daily lives.”

By this point the use of steamships across the American continent and the Atlantic meant that the transport and supply of coca had become easier. With new demand, people began to acquire and use coca leaves in a way they hadn’t previously.

Pep in your step

As a result, Victorians started chewing coca leaves as the Andeans had been doing for centuries. Coca consumers even filled Mincing Lane, the centre of London’s 19th century tea and spice trade, looking to purchase what had so recently been a rarity.

“Very quickly after Weston popularises their use they catch on amongst all kinds of sportsmen,” says Small.

“They start being advertised for bicyclists, other pedestrians. There are accounts that are written in the British Medical Journal that talk about how great it is for shooting parties because they apparently help to stabilise your nerves and give you a bit more pep and confidence which people say makes them much better shots.”

Illustration from ‘The Sportsman’s Cyclopaedia’ by TB Johnson, 1848.

Image Credit: Wellcome Collection / Public Domain

They were even given to difficult race horses before races.

A boom emerged in chewing coca leaves in the 1870s and 1880s. Yet this was mere foreshadowing for the later prevalence of cocaine, which commenced a few years later in 1884 thanks to innovations in the European chemical industry.

Cocaine is stronger in its effects than raw coca leaves. Sigmund Freud was among its advocates for use as a stimulant and therapy for morphine addiction. But it found lasting use as an effective local anaesthetic, an essential in medical science for decades. A century later, cocaine is one of the most criminalised substances on earth.

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Here we explore the safety issues in 19th century shipping that Plimsoll wanted to address, his campaigning on maritime safety, and its ongoing impact. 

‘Coffin ships’

Enormous growth in world trade meant 19th century merchant shipping became increasingly competitive. Despite the ‘Lloyd’s Rule’, introduced by Lloyd’s Register in 1835, stipulating that classed vessels should have a distance from the waterline to the weather deck of 3 inches of freeboard for every foot of depth in the hold, many transatlantic ships were still overloaded by their unscrupulous owners in order to maximise profits, as the rule was only optional.

Often overinsured, many of these overloaded wooden sailing ships were also often unseaworthy, worth more to their owners sunk than afloat. Usually old and riddled with wood-rot, woodworm and shipworm, many were repainted, renamed and falsely stated to be new ships. 

The subsequent risks to crew members lives led to such ships being nicknamed ‘coffin ships’. Indeed at the time there had been over 2,000 cases of sailors who had signed on as crew being tried in court for refusing to board a ship upon seeing its condition, and in 1855 a group of sailors had even written to Queen Victoria complaining of being found guilty of desertion for complaining about going to sea in dangerous ships.

Samuel Plimsoll’s campaign

After leaving school early, Samuel Plimsoll became a clerk and later manager at Rawson’s Brewery. Yet having failed in his attempt to become a London coal merchant, Plimsoll was reduced to destitution in 1853 – an experience that helped him sympathise with the struggles of the poor. When his life picked up, he resolved to devote his time to improving their condition. After becoming a Liberal MP for Derby in 1867, Plimsoll investigated ship safety and was shocked upon discovering the scale of life lost at sea. 

Aware of growing widespread concerns about the unsafe loading of ships and the many thousands of lives and ships being lost, together with his wife Eliza Plimsoll (an equal partner in the cause), Samuel led a decades-long legal, social, and political battle for justice against ‘coffin ships’. He campaigned to pass a bill for the introduction of a mandatory safe load line on ships.

Left: Samuel Plimsoll. Right: Portrait of Samuel Plimsoll (1824-1898), painted by Reginald Henry Campbell

Image Credit: Left: Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain. Right: Wikimedia Commons / Reginald Henry Campbell / Royal Museums Greenwich / Public Domain

Plimsoll was unsuccessful due to opposition from merchants and the number of powerful ship-owning MPs in Parliament. Undeterred, he published a book in 1872 called Our Seamen which detailed evidence of reckless overloading, the poor condition of boat hulls and equipment, undermanning, filthy crew accommodation, the prevalence of over-insurance and the deliberate sinking of unsound and unprofitable ‘coffin ships’. 

Plimsoll’s book became nationally well-known, prompting a campaign that led to the appointment of a Royal Commission on Unseaworthy Ships in 1873, to assess evidence and recommend changes. While associated with Plimsoll, load lines had been used dating back to the 12th century in Venice, but it wasn’t until the 19th century that their use became more widespread.

In 1874 Lloyd’s Register made it a condition of their classification that a load line was painted on newly built awning deck steamers. This original load line was a diamond with a centre line and the letters ‘L’ and ‘R’ next to it, and aimed to show how low a ship could safely rest in water without the risk of sinking. However, this only applied to ships inspected by Lloyd’s Register, and other ships could do as they pleased. 

A plimsoll line – load line mark and lines on the hull of a ship

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Flickr by Brinki / cc-by-sa-2.0

In 1875 a government bill was introduced to address the problem, and although Plimsoll regarded it inadequate, resolved to accept it. However, after Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli later announced the bill would be dropped, Plimsoll called members of the House “villains” and shook his fist in the Speaker’s face. Disraeli called for him to be reprimanded, but after the matter was adjourned for a week, Plimsoll apologised.

Nevertheless, many people shared Plimsoll’s view that the bill had been stifled by the pressure of the shipowners. Ultimately, the power of public feeling forced the government to pass the Unseaworthy Ships Bill, eventually resulting in the The Merchant Shipping Act 1876.

The ‘Plimsoll line’

The Merchant Shipping Act 1876 required all foreign-going British vessels, coasting vessels over 80 tons and foreign ships using British ports to have compulsory deck lines and load lines marked on their hull to indicate the maximum depth to which the ship may be safely immersed when loaded with cargo. (This depth varies depending on the ship’s dimensions, cargo type, time of year, and water saltiness and densities it would encounter while at port and at sea. Once these factors have been accounted for, a ship’s captain can determine the appropriate ‘Plimsoll line’ needed for the voyage.)

Stringent powers of inspection were given to the Board of Trade to enforce this rule, however fierce opposition meant the act was misused by many as it was left to ship owners to decide where a load line was to be painted and to paint the lines themselves (with some even painting these on the ship’s funnel). To overcome this, data on vessels’ strength and construction was gathered by Lloyd’s Register surveyors, and used to draw up the UK’s Board of Trade Load Line Tables in 1886 to ensure the fixing of the position of the Load Line on all ships by law in 1890 – this line became known as the ‘Plimsoll Line’ in Britain. 

Despite being re-elected at 1880 general election by a great majority, Samuel Plimsoll gave up his seat to William Vernon Harcourt, believing that Harcourt, as Home Secretary, could advance sailors’ interests more effectively. Having then been offered a seat by 30 constituencies, Plimsoll unsuccessfully stood in Sheffield Central in 1885, but later became estranged from the Liberal leaders, regarding them as having neglected the question of shipping reform. Nevertheless, thanks to Plimsoll’s campaigning, countless lives and ships have since been saved.

International solutions

By the early 1900s, many countries had adopted their own loading regulations, yet in 1906, foreign ships were required to carry a load line if they visited British ports. In 1930, the first International Convention on Load Lines established an international solution. Later, in 1966, the International Maritime Organization (IMO), a UN agency responsible for ship safety, adopted a new Convention ensuring ships had enough reserve buoyancy and covering, allowing freeboard for a ship in different climate zones and seasons via a load line zone map: 

Load line and Freeboard conference from the Lloyd’s Register publication, 100A1, 100A1, 1959

Image Credit: Lloyd’s Register Foundation

The original ‘Plimsoll line’ was a circle with a horizontal line through it to show the maximum draft of a ship. Additional marks have been added over the years, allowing for different water densities and expected sea conditions. Letters may also appear to the sides of the mark indicating the classification society that surveyed the vessel’s load line.

Load Line Mark and Lines and Timber Load Line Mark and Lines for power driven merchant vessels. (TF – Tropical Fresh Water, F – Fresh Water, T – Tropical Seawater, S – Summer Temperate Seawater (NB – The ‘Plimsoll Line’ and the ‘Summer Line’ are the same thing – all the other lines take their positions from there), W – Winter Temperate Seawater, WNA – Winter North Atlantic Prefix, L – Lumber, L ⦵ R – Lloyd’s Register)

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons /

Now, when a ship is commissioned, the exact location of the load line is calculated by a classification society, its position on the hull is verified and a load line certificate is issued. Calculations take into account the route the ship will take, and the seasons and sea temperature conditions of the geographic locations the ship will pass through en-route to its destination to ensure its adequate stability. The basic symbol, of a circle with a horizontal line passing through its centre, is now recognised worldwide.

You can find out more about the history of Lloyd’s Register Foundation and their work supporting research, innovation and education to help the global community tackle the most pressing safety and risk challenges at www.lrfoundation.org.uk

It was at the height of Britain’s global, imperial power that Cutty Sark embarked on treacherous journeys across the world’s biggest oceans. Not only was she the fastest vessel of her day, but she could carry a million pounds of tea from China to Britain to quench the thirst of the Victorian public. Vessels like the Cutty Sark were a central plank in Britain’s expanding networks of trade and commerce, which drove the empire’s growth in the 19th century.

By 1901, the year Queen Victoria died, the British empire embraced 12 million square miles of the globe. British merchants also thronged the wharves of ports outside of Britain’s possession, as in China, Syria and South America.

Photographed by Green, Allan C., 1926.

Image Credit: State Library Victoria / Public Domain

The goods these ships carried introduced Victorians to new products: tea from China and India; coffee from the Middle East; spices from Southeast Asia; textiles from Egypt; timber from Canada; and frozen meats from Australia and New Zealand.

These arrived as raw commodities from Britain’s colonies, and returned as manufactured goods, protected on the high seas by the Royal Navy. Although British merchant vessels had the Navy’s protection, they could not afford complacency when it came to speed and efficiency. Key to Cutty Sark’s fame and success was the state-of-the-art technology with which she was outfitted.

State-of-the-art

At the time, competing fleets utilised whatever technological advantages were available in order to dominate trade and commodities. Among the Cutty Sark’s forest of sheets and halyards is evidence of significant changes in shipbuilding.

Cutty Sark’s hull is among the sharpest among tea clippers, meaning it required ballast for stability when unladen. Constructed from teak above the waterline, rock elm below and with a keel of pitch pine, it also featured metal sheeting over its hull. This kept the hull cleaner, so it sailed faster. It also had a wrought-iron frame to which all external timbers were secured by bolts. This made it stronger and less susceptible to leaks which would occupy valuable crew time to remedy.

“To maintain their edge, shipbuilders and architects are having to pioneer and innovate new technologies and techniques of shipbuilding,” explains Max Wilson, Senior Archivist at Lloyd’s Register Foundation, a public-facing library and archive holding material concerning over 260 years of marine and engineering science and history.

which possesses one of the best archives of ships and ship-building in the world. “We see this starkly over the 19th century.”

A plan and survey report for the Cutty Sark.

Image Credit: Lloyd's Register Foundation

Designers aimed to maximise the speed of cargo delivery, harness cargo carrying capacity to bolster the safety of passengers and goods, and to increase the number of journeys ships could undertake. Ultimately, they aimed to increase their share of the merchant trade.

Victorian sensation

Cutty Sark was built by John Willis in Scotland in 1869 against a backdrop of great transformations in shipbuilding. Shipbuilding moved northwards in Britain, while motive power was shifting from wind to steam and wood construction was being replaced with iron and composite solutions.

As the ‘age of sail’ threatened to pass into memory, the Cutty Sark was a last throw of the dice. In 1840 steam ships made up about 4 percent of Britain’s merchant fleet: by around 1870, this had grown to around 20 percent. By 1890, this would be around 75 percent. The Cutty Sark was built as a way to demonstrate the power of sail and wind against steam power.

“The sailing ships were still very reliable at that time,” says Zach Schieferstein, Archivist at Lloyd’s Register Foundation. “Ships like the Cutty Sark that were built for a purpose of transporting tea were built for speed and travelling long distances, getting the first tea of the season ready to sell for those high premiums.”

The Cutty Sark’s fastest recorded speed was 17.5 knots, considerable for a container ship, and the furthest she travelled in a 24-hour period was around 350 nautical miles. “It wasn’t uncommon to make the journey from Shanghai to ports in Britain in about 100 to 120 days. For the time, it was really setting records.”

Helping her rack up these miles were 32 sails, which could stretch over 32,000 square feet, suspended on 11 miles of rigging. She carried an average of 26 crew and was larger than clippers that had come before: with a gross tonnage of 963, a length of 212.5 feet, breadth of 36 feet and depth of 21 feet.

Cutty Sark traded between China, Australia, later to South Africa and South America, and for a while held the record for journeying between Australia and Britain. Over the course of the century, tea had emerged as the national drink and the Cutty Sark became associated with tea races. The annual tea race was a Victorian sensation. A premium or bonus was paid to the ship that arrived with the first tea of the year. Clipper ships like Cutty Sark raced from China’s tea ports to London to fetch the highest price for its cargo. In 1866’s so-called ‘great tea race’, the progress of ships was reported by telegraph and followed in the papers, with bets placed on the outcome.

First-rate

In this period there was a simultaneous explosion in the service industries attached to shipping.

For example, Edward Lloyd’s Coffee House had become known as the meeting place in the City for those seeking shipping intelligence. A committee called The Register Society, made up of underwriters and brokers, ship-owners and merchants who associated through Lloyd’s coffee house, was formed in 1760. The Register Book published by the Society, later to become Lloyd’s Register, provided critical information on vessel seaworthiness which was critical for merchants and underwriters assessing the risks of any one voyage. This was the true beginning of classification and Lloyd’s Register as the first classification society which now possesses a vast archive and library.

In 1760, merchants who met at Edward Lloyd’s London coffee shop established the Society for the Registry of Shipping. From 1764, it funded surveyors to list, rate and class the condition of vessels. This was the origin of the world’s first classification society in Lloyd’s Register, which today possesses one of the best archives of ships and ship-building in the world.

“It was born out of this desire to have reliable and up-to-date information on merchant shipping,” explains Schieferstein, “and to make it safer as well, for passengers, for cargo and for the crew.”

The first mention of the Cutty Sark in the Register Book, from the supplements section of the 1869 Register Book.

Image Credit: Lloyd's Register Foundation

Lloyd’s Register’s surveyors would assess a ship, using “A1” from 1768 to indicate a ship of the highest class. they thereby introduced the term “first rate” to denote quality. Cutty Sark was given this A1 rating.

Continuing developments in steam technology resulted in the sale of Cutty Sark, to serve first as a Portuguese cargo ship, and later as a training vessel in Cornwall and on the Thames. It was towed into its current dry dock in 1953 to become one of the nation’s most treasured heritage sites, whose story becomes richer with the documents and records collated by Lloyd’s Register Foundation.

You can find out more about the history of Lloyd’s Register Foundation and their work supporting research, innovation and education to help the global community tackle the most pressing safety and risk challenges at www.lrfoundation.org.uk

But was that famous moment really when the game was invented? Here we take a look at the evolution of the sport, from its earliest versions, to the global phenomenon it is today.

Origins

Rugby’s origins can actually be traced back over 2,000 years to the Roman game of harpastum, derived from the Greek word ‘seize’, which involved handling a ball. This game may have been played during the Roman occupation of Britain in the 1st century BC. 

Although codified at Rugby School, throughout medieval Europe and beyond, various forms of traditional football games with ball handling and scrummaging formations were played. Different regions had their own variations, including New Zealand’s Ki-o-rahi, Australia’s marn grook, Central Italy’s Calcio Fiorentino, and Japan’s kemari among others. 

Main: “Football” match in Piazza Santa Maria Novella in Florence, between 1523 and 1605 by Stradanus, based on a design by Giorgio Vasari. Inset: “Harpastum”, a form of ball game played in the Roman Empire, circa 100 BC – 400 AD

Image Credit: Main: Wikimedia Commons / Stradanus / Giorgio Vasari / Public Domain. Inset: Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain

Various early ball games were played during the Middle Ages (5th to 16th century). In England during the 14th and 15th centuries, documents record young men leaving work early to compete for their village or town in football games, which could be fairly violent. Shrove Tuesday football matches in particular became annual traditions, and there were many regional variations, often taking place over a wide area, across towns, villages, fields, and streams.

These local games continued well into the 19th century until football for the common man was gradually suppressed, notably by the 1835 Highways Act which forbade the playing of football on highways and public land. However, the sport did find a home in English public schools, where it was modified into two main forms: a dribbling game primarily played with the feet (promoted at Eton and Harrow), and a handling game (favoured by Rugby, Marlborough, and Cheltenham).

A ‘Foot Ball’ game between Thames and Townsend clubs, played at Kingston-upon-Thames, London, Shrove Tuesday, 24 February 1846

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain

The legend of William Webb Ellis

The roots of modern rugby can be traced to Rugby School in Warwickshire, England. In 1749, the boy’s school moved from the town centre to a new 8 acre site on the edge of the town known as the Close, providing more space for the boys to exercise.

The football played there between 1749-1823 had few rules. Although touchlines had been introduced to demarcate the playing area, the game was still fairly hectic, with teams often consisting of around 200 boys. The ball could be handled, but running with the ball was not allowed; progress towards the opposition’s goal was made by kicking. 

While there is some debate and legend surrounding the exact moment and individual responsible for the game’s inception, the story of William Webb Ellis is perhaps the most enduring. According to legend, in autumn 1823, a young William Webb Ellis disregarded the established rules of football and, during a game on the Close, picked up the ball and ran with it.

According to the rules of the day, the opposing team could only advance to the spot where the ball had been caught, and Ellis should have moved backwards to give himself enough room to either kick the ball up the field or place it for a kick at goal. Instead, Ellis’ impulsive act is said to have laid the foundation for the game of rugby as we know it today.

However, the veracity of this tale is debated. While it is known that Webb Ellis was a student at Rugby School at the time, there is no direct evidence aside from a citation by the Old Rugbeian Society in an 1897 report on rugby’s origins by Matthew Bloxam. Nevertheless, the symbolism of Webb Ellis’s actions has persisted, and he remains an iconic figure in the sport, with the Rugby World Cup trophy named after him.

Left: Webb-Ellis carries the ball during a school football match played in 1823. Right: The only known contemporary image of Webb Ellis, published in the Illustrated London News, 29 April 1854.

Image Credit: Left: Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain. Right: Wikimedia Commons / The Illustrated London News (issue 24, page 400) / Public Domain

Public school influence

Rugby’s lack of standardised rules resulted in a variety of playing styles, and a somewhat chaotic playing field.

Rugby School, which gave its name to the sport, played a pivotal role in rugby’s development. Encouraged by Rugby School’s influential headmaster Thomas Arnold (headmaster from 1828-1842), many pupils from this time were instrumental in the game’s expansion. By 1841, the rules and fame of ‘rugby’ had spread fast as Rugby School’s pupils moved on to university, (mostly to Oxford and Cambridge), prompting a need for standardisation.

In 1845, the first rugby rules – the ‘Cambridge Rules’ – were established by members of Cambridge University. These introduced the concept of the ‘scrummage’ (the precursor to the modern scrum), and prohibited handling the ball forward, shaping ‘Rugby Union’. These laid the groundwork for the Rugby School rules established in 1845, which played a significant role in shaping the modern sport.

By 1863, boarding schools and clubs had developed further rule sets. Increasingly, rugby was seen as a sport of British imperial ‘manliness’, associated with the education of young gentlemen in public schools and universities.

After graduation, many young men wanted to continue playing. Following the formation of the first football clubs in the mid-19th century, rugby gradually became institutionalised. Blackheath and the Edinburgh Academicals were some of the first rugby clubs to form in 1858, and club matches began in England when Blackheath played Richmond in 1863.

The spread of rugby

In 1863, representatives of leading football clubs met to attempt to establish a common set of rules, but disputes arose over issues like handling the ball and ‘hacking’ (a tactic of tripping opponents and kicking their shins). Both were allowed under rugby’s rules but prohibited in other forms of football.

Advocates for rugby, led by F.W. Campbell of Blackheath, staunchly defended hacking, considering it character-building and its abolition ‘unmanly’. Consequently, rugby did not adopt the rules established for the newly formed Football Association (FA), leaving rugby outside the FA’s jurisdiction. (Hacking was later abolished during the late 1860s). 

However, the death of a player in a practice match in 1871 prompted members of leading rugby clubs to organise an official meeting. That same year, Rugby saw its first international match when Scotland faced England in Edinburgh, resulting in victory for Scotland. This historic game marked the beginning of international rugby and, combined with the official rugby club meeting, led to the formation of the Rugby Football Union (RFU).

(Hacking remained a part of the game at Rugby School, causing the school to delay its entry into the RFU until 1890.) 

The “First international”, Scotland v England in Edinburgh, 28 March 1871

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain

The first official university match was played in 1872, and graduates from these universities introduced rugby to other British schools. Former pupils, ‘Old Rugbeians’, who had joined the army officer class helped expand the game internationally. By 1886, the International Rugby Board (now ‘World Rugby’) was established, and rugby began to gain popularity among middle and working-class men.

As rugby became more standardised, it became renowned for strict adherence to the rules and the spirit of the game, with a strong emphasis on discipline, self-control, mutual respect, and fair play. By the late 19th century, rugby, along with cricket, was seen as a sport that cultivated the ‘civilised’ manly behaviour of the elite, instilling values of unselfishness, fearlessness, teamwork, and self-control.

The split: Rugby Union and Rugby League

In 1895, a significant split occurred in rugby when clubs in Northern England formed the Northern Rugby Football Union (NRFU). This stemmed from a dispute over player compensation and working-class participation. The NRFU allowed player payments, which were prohibited by the Rugby Football Union (RFU), rugby union’s governing body.

The NRFU’s establishment led to the creation of Rugby League in 1922. This introduced distinct rules, including a six-tackle rule and a focus on speed and agility. Rugby League gained popularity in England’s northern regions and parts of Australia, while Rugby Union continued to dominate in the south and expanded globally.

The division between Rugby Union and Rugby League persisted for decades, with each developing its own distinct culture, traditions, and following. It was only in the late 20th century that Rugby League began to regain ground, especially in Australia and New Zealand.

The International Stage

Over the years, more nations embraced rugby, leading to the establishment of international competitions like the Six Nations and the Rugby Championship. In 1900, Rugby Union became an Olympic sport, and by 1908, three major Southern Hemisphere nations – New Zealand, Australia and South Africa – played international matches against Northern Hemisphere nations.

While rugby was later dropped from the Olympics in 1924, the inaugural Rugby World Cup was held in 1987. Additionally, Rugby Sevens (played with smaller teams in matches lasting 14 minutes) has been featured in the Olympics since the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.

The interior of Twickenham Stadium in 2012, England’s home stadium

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Photo by DAVID ILIFF. / License: CC BY-SA 3.0

Evolution

In the late 20th century, commercialism and television’s growing influence led to the professionalisation of rugby, allowing players to earn a living from the sport, and raising its standards and global appeal. While historically a sport for men (despite women’s games being played as early as the 1880s), Rugby Union has made progress in promoting women’s rugby, with the Women’s Rugby World Cup, beginning in 1991, instrumental in advancing the women’s game. 

Rugby continues to evolve, with new nations emerging as competitive forces on the international stage. Japan’s impressive performance in the 2019 Rugby World Cup generated interest in Asia, contributing to rugby’s fast-growing global reach. However, concerns over player welfare, particularly regarding concussion management, have prompted changes in the laws of the game once more, highlighting rugby’s ongoing evolution.