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Opium, Laudanum And The Other Drugs That Played A Big Part In Victorian Life.


Women on the floor smoking opium and three eunuchs watching them. A still from Georges Rémond’s Dandy-Pacha, 1920.
"There were opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where the memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins that were new."

 Oscar Wilde in his novel, ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ (1891).


The opium den, exuding an air of mystery, peril, and fascination, was a common feature in Victorian literature, poetry, and newspapers of the time, capturing the public's interest and stimulating their imagination.

“It is a wretched hole… so low that we are unable to stand upright. Lying pell-mell on a mattress placed on the ground are Chinamen, Lascars, and a few English blackguards who have imbibed a taste for opium.” So reported the French journal ‘Figaro’, describing an opium den in Whitechapel in 1868.

It is probable that the general public reacted negatively to these portrayals, imagining places such as London's docklands and the East End as being filled with opium, exoticism, and danger. In the 19th century, a small Chinese community had settled in the established slum of Limehouse in London's docklands, known for its backstreet pubs, brothels, and opium dens. These venues mainly catered to sailors who had become addicted to the drug while abroad.



Although the press and fiction often depicted opium dens in a sensationalised manner, the truth was that such establishments were scarce outside of London and the ports. These locations served as points of entry for opium, which arrived alongside various goods from different parts of the British Empire.

The India-China opium trade was very important to the British economy. Britain had fought two wars in the mid 19th century known as the ‘Opium Wars’, ostensibly in support of free trade against Chinese restrictions but in reality because of the immense profits to be made in the trading of opium. Since the British captured Calcutta in 1756, the cultivation of poppies for opium had been actively encouraged by the British and the trade formed an important part of India’s (and the East India Company’s) economy.

Opium and other narcotic drugs played an important part in Victorian life. Shocking though it might be to us in the 21st century, in Victorian times it was possible to walk into a chemist and buy, without prescription, laudanum, cocaine and even arsenic. Opium preparations were sold freely in towns and country markets, indeed the consumption of opium was just as popular in the country as it was in urban areas.



Laudanum, an alcoholic herbal concoction with 10% opium, was the favored remedy of the time. Referred to as the 'aspirin of the nineteenth century,' laudanum served as a widely used pain reliever and relaxant, prescribed for various conditions such as coughs, rheumatism, women's health issues, and even as a sleep aid for infants and young children, which was particularly concerning. Moreover, the accessibility of laudanum, with twenty or twenty-five drops costing just a penny, made it an affordable option for many.

19th century recipe for a cough mixture:

Two tablespoonfuls of vinegar,

Two tablespoonfuls of treacle

60 drops of laudanum.

One teaspoonful to be taken night and morning.


Those addicted to laudanum would experience periods of intense euphoria, alternating with profound episodes of depression, accompanied by slurred speech and restlessness. The withdrawal effects comprised aches, cramps, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. Surprisingly, it wasn't until the early 20th century that its addictive nature was acknowledged.

The Awakening, Matignon, 1905

Many notable Victorians are known to have used laudanum as a painkiller. Authors, poets and writers such as Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot were users of laudanum. Anne Bronte is thought to have modelled the character of Lord Lowborough in ‘The Tenant of Wildfell Hall’ on her brother Branwell, a laudanum addict. The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley suffered terrible laudanum-induced hallucinations. Robert Clive, ‘Clive of India’, used laudanum to ease gallstone pain and depression.


Over the channel, the French had it much worse…

Paris had a true dependency on opium. Known as ‘la fée brune’ (the brown fairy), this addiction stemmed from soldiers returning from French Indochina (Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos), making ‘midnight oil’ the trendy drug of preference in the French capital.



Georgies Barbier illustration. 1925

An estimated number of over 1,200 opium dens were believed to be present in the city. The iconic Moulin Rouge was rumored to serve as a center for opium-related activities, with speculation that the notorious elephant’s head area of the establishment functioned as a luxurious and exclusive opium den.


Infamous opium users included Charles Baudelaire, Picasso, Brassaï and Jean Cocteau, who shared his struggles against opium with the world in writings such as Opium.

I became addicted with caution and under medical supervision. There are doctors capable of pity. I never exceeded ten pipes. I smoked the rate of three in the morning (at nine o’clock), four in the afternoon (at five o’clock), three in the evening (at eleven o’clock). I believed that, in this way, I was reducing the chances of addiction. With opium I suckled cells, which were restored to the world after five months of abstinence, and I suckled them with countless unknown alkaloids, whereas a morphine addict, whose habits frighten me, fills his veins with a single known poison and surrenders himself far less to the unknown.
Of course opium remains unique and the euphoria it induces is superior to that of health. l owe it my perfect hours. It is a pity that instead of perfecting curative techniques, medicine does not try render opium harmless.

– Jean Cocteau, Opium


Back in blighty, many of the opium-based preparations were targeted at women. Marketed as ‘women’s friends’, these were widely prescribed by doctors for problems with menstruation and childbirth, and even for fashionable female maladies of the day such as ‘the vapours’, which included hysteria, depression and fainting fits.



A postcard from the early 1900s.

Opiates were also administered to children. In order to pacify them, children were frequently given Godfrey’s Cordial (also known as Mother’s Friend), a mixture of opium, water, and treacle, suggested for colic, hiccups, and coughs. Excessive consumption of this hazardous remedy has been linked to the serious illness or death of numerous infants and children.

The Pharmacy Act of 1868 aimed to regulate the sale and distribution of opium-based products by permitting only registered chemists to sell them. Nevertheless, this measure proved largely ineffective since there was no restriction on the quantity that chemists could dispense to the public.

The Victorian perspective on opium was intricate. While the middle and upper classes considered the extensive consumption of laudanum by the lower classes as 'misuse' of the substance, their own opiate usage was regarded merely as a 'habit'.



Preparing a “pill” of opium for the pipe

At the end of the 19th century, a new pain reliever called aspirin was introduced. During this period, many doctors started to express concerns regarding the widespread use of laudanum and its addictive properties. This led to a growing movement against opium, fuelled by public perception of opium smoking for pleasure as a vice associated with Orientals, a belief perpetuated by sensationalist media and fictional works like Sax Rohmer's novels featuring the villainous Dr. Fu Manchu, an Oriental figure intent on dominating the Western world. In 1888, Benjamin Broomhall established the "Christian Union for the Severance of the British Empire with the Opium Traffic." The anti-opium movement achieved a significant milestone in 1910 when, following extensive advocacy efforts, Britain agreed to end the India-China opium trade.

 


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