Rummage

“An unsystematic and untidy search through stuff…”

Cider, miners and an Englishman’s Castle

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The Cider Bill of 1763 was a proposed measure to put a tax on the production of cider. Britain’s national debt had reached unprecedented levels during the early 1760s following the country’s involvement in the Seven Years War. The chancellor of the exchequer Sir Francis Dashwood, better known for his depraved antics as one of the ‘monks of Medmenham Abbey’, or the Hellfire Club, was responsible for introducing the measure shortly before he fell from office with the prime minister, the earl of Bute.

The bill was universally unpopular but particularly so in the West Country. Across Somerset, Devon, Cornwall, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire and Worcestershire, there were county meetings to mount objections to the new excise. There and elsewhere in England, petitions to Parliament were organised and MPs were instructed to oppose the cider bill.

Excise Men were generally unwelcome, but it was reported that in Kingswood, the miners welcomed those seeking to collect the new tax and gave them a tour of their mine shafts…where they then left them. They provided the unfortunate Excise Men with food and water, but kept them down there until they had seen the error of their ways and promised not to be so foolish in future.

To add insult to injury, the miners also charged them for ‘bed and breakfast’ as they released them.

Detail from The Devil to Pay; or, The State Indifference (1763). © The Trustees of the British Museum.

Baron Sir William Pynsent was MP for Taunton between 1715-1722 and Sheriff of Somerset 1741-1742. He had made his fortune in the cider trade.  In desperation, Pynsent wrote to Pitt and vowed to leave his entire estate to him upon his death if he were to challenge the Cider Act. Pitt was more than up to the job – not only was he a gifted speaker, he was well respected and already critical of Bute’s government. 

One of the main complaints about the tax was the provision for warrent-less searches. Excise Men could enter any house or building in search for barrels of cider or cider presses. In a passionate speech Pitt argued against the forced entry into peoples homes to collect the unpaid taxes, and for the rights of an individual’s privacy from government intrusion saying:

“The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the wind may blow through it; the storm may enter; the rain may enter; but the King of England cannot enter — all his force dares not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement! ”

This was a direct reference to an earlier judgment of 1505 by the King’s Bench… “but the house of one is to him his castle and his defence..” and is the origin of the principle of an Englishman’s Home is his Castle.

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