Growth of Tea and Tobacco Smuggling in the Eighteenth Century—Repressive Laws a Failure

Side by side with the export smuggling of wool, the import smuggling of tobacco and tea grew and throve amazingly in later ages. Every one, knowingly or unsuspectingly, smoked tobacco and drank tea that had paid no duty.

“Great Anna” herself, who was among the earliest to yield to the refining influence of tea—

Great Anna, whom three realms obey,
Doth sometimes counsel take, and sometimes tay—

in all probability often drank tea which had contributed nothing to the revenue. Between them tea and tobacco, in the illegal landing of the goods, found employment for hundreds of hardy seafaring men and stalwart landsmen, and led to much violence and bloodshed, beside which the long-drawn annals of the owlers seem almost barren of incident.

Early in the eighteenth century, when continental wars of vast magnitude were in progress, the list of dutiable articles began to grow quickly, and concurrently with the growth of this list the already existing tariff was continually increased. The smugglers’ trade grew with these growths, and for the first time became a highly organised and widely distributed trade, involving every class. The time had come at last when every necessary of daily use was taxed heavily, often far above its ordinary trading value; and an absurd, and indeed desperate, condition of affairs had been reached, in which people of all ranks were more or less faced with the degrading dilemma of being unable to afford many articles generally consumed by persons of their station in life, or of procuring them of the smugglers—the “free traders,” as they rightly styled themselves—often at a mere one-third of the cost to which they would have been put had their illicit purchasers paid duty.

The Government was, as we now perceive, in the mental perspective afforded by lapse of time, in the clearly indefensible position of heavily taxing the needs of the country, and of making certain practices illegal that tended to supply those needs at much lower rates than those thus artificially created, and yet of being unable to provide adequate means by which these generally detested laws could be enforced. It was, and is, no defence to hold that the revenues thus hoped for were a sufficient excuse. To create an artificial restraint of trade, to elevate trading in spite of restraint into a crime, and yet not to provide an overmastering force that shall secure obedience, if not in one sense respect, for those unnatural laws, was in itself a course of action that any impartial historian might well hold to be in itself criminal; for it led to continual disturbances throughout the country, with appalling violence, and great loss of life, in conflict, or in the darker way of secret murder.

But no historian would, on weighing the evidence available, feel altogether sure of so sweeping an indictment of the eighteenth-century governance of England. It was corrupt, it was self-seeking, it had no breadth of view; but the times were well calculated to test the most Heaven-sent statesmanship. The country, as were all other countries, was governed for the classes; and governed, as one would conduct a business, for revenue; whether the revenue was to be applied in conducting foreign wars, or to find its way plentifully into the pockets of placemen, does not greatly matter. This misgovernment was a characteristic failing of the age; and it must, moreover, be recognised that the historian, with his comprehensive outlook upon the past, spread out, so to speak, map-like to his gaze, has the advantage of seeing these things as a whole, and of criticising them as such; while the givers and administrators of laws were under the obvious disadvantages of each planning and working for what they considered to be the needs of their own particular period, with those of the future unknown, and perhaps uncared for. That there were some few among those in authority who wrought according to their lights, however feeble might be their illumination, must be conceded even to that age.

At the opening of this era, when Marlborough’s great victories were yet fresh, and when the cost of them and of other military glories was wearing the country threadbare, the most remarkable series of repressive Acts, directed against smuggling, began. Vessels of very small tonnage and light draught, being found peculiarly useful to smugglers, the use of such, even in legalised importing, was strictly forbidden, and no craft of a lesser burthen than fifteen tons was permitted. This provision, it was fondly conceived, would strike a blow at smuggling, by rendering it impossible to slip up narrow and shallow waterways; but this pious expectation was doomed to disappointment, and the limit was accordingly raised to thirty tons; and again, in 1721, to forty tons. At the same time, the severest restrictions were imposed upon boats, in order to cope with the ten, or even twelve and fourteen-oared galleys, rowed by determined “free-traders.”

To quote the text of one among these drastic ordinances:

“Any boat built to row with more than four oars, found upon land or water within the counties of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, or Sussex, or in the river Thames, or within the limits of the ports of London, Sandwich, or Ipswich, or any boat rowing with more than six oars found either upon land or water, in any other port, or within two leagues of the coast of Great Britain, shall be forfeited, and every person using or rowing in such boat shall forfeit £40.”

These prohibitions were, in 1779, in respect of boats to row with more than six oars, extended to all other English counties; the port of Bristol only excepted.

As for smuggling craft captured with smuggled goods the way of the revenue authorities with such was drastic. They were sawn in three pieces, and then thoroughly broken up.

The futility of these extraordinary steps is emphasised by the report of the Commissioners of Customs to the Treasury in 1733, that immense smuggling operations were being conducted in Kent, Sussex, Essex, and Suffolk. In twelve months, this report declared, 54,000 lb. of tea and 123,000 gallons of brandy had been seized, and still, in spite of these tremendous losses, the spirit of the smugglers was unbroken, and smuggling was increasing. An additional force of 106 Dragoons was asked for, to stiffen that of 185 already patrolling those coasts.

It was clearly required, with the utmost urgency, for such a mere handful of troops spread over this extended seaboard could scarce be considered a sufficient backing for the civil force, in view of the determined encounters continually taking place, in which the recklessness and daring of the smugglers knew no bounds. Thus, in June 1733, the officers of customs at Newhaven, attempting to seize ten horses laden with tea, at Cuckmere, were opposed by about thirty men, armed with pistols and blunderbusses, who fired on the officers, took them prisoners, and kept them under guard until the goods were safely carried off.

In August of the same year the riding-officers, observing upwards of twenty smugglers at Greenhay, most of them on horseback, pluckily essayed to do their duty and seize the goods, but the smugglers fell furiously upon them, and with clubs knocked one off his horse, severely wounded him, and confined him for an hour, while the run was completed. Of his companions no more is heard. They probably—to phrase it delicately—went for assistance.

In July 1735, customs officers of the port of Arundel, watching the coast, expecting goods to be run from a hovering smuggler craft, were discovered by a gang of more than twenty armed smugglers, anxiously waiting for the landing, and not disposed for an all-night trial of endurance in that waiting game. They accordingly seized the officers and confined them until some boatloads of contraband had been landed and conveyed away on horseback. In the same month, at Kingston-by-the-Sea, between Brighton and Shoreham, some officers, primed with information of a forthcoming run of brandy, and seeking it, found as well ten smugglers with pistols. Although the smugglers were bold and menacing, the customs men on this occasion had the better of it, for they seized and duly impounded the brandy.A more complicated affair took place on December 6th of the same year, when some customs officers of Newhaven met a large, well-armed gang of smugglers, who surrounded them and held them prisoners for an hour and a half. The same gang then fell in with another party, consisting of three riding-officers and six Dragoons, and were bold enough to attack them. Foolish enough, we must also add; for they got the worst of the encounter, and, fleeing in disorder, were pursued; five—armed with pistols, swords, and cutlasses, and provided with twelve horses—being captured.

A fatal encounter took place at Bulverhythe, between Hastings and Bexhill, in March 1737. It is best read of in the anonymous letter written to the Commissioners of Customs by a person who, for fear of the smuggling gangs, was afraid to disclose his real name, and subscribed himself “Goring.” The letter—whose cold-blooded informing, the work evidently of an educated, but cruel-minded person, is calculated to make any reader of generous instincts shiver—is to be found among the customs correspondence, in the Treasury Papers.

“May it please [your] Honours,—It is not unknown to your Lordships of the late battle between the Smuglers and Officers at Bulverhide; and in relation to that Business, if your Honours but please to advise in the News Papers, that this is expected off, I will send a List of the names of the Persons that were at that Business, and the places’ names where they are usually and mostly resident. Cat (Morten’s man) fired first, Morten was the second that fired; the soldiers fired and killed Collison, wounded Pigon, who is since dead; William Weston was wounded, but like to recover. Young Mr. Bowra was not there, but his men and horses were; from your Honours’

“Dutifull and Most faithfull servant,

“Goring.

“There was no foreign persons at this Business, but all were Sussex men, and may easily be spoke with.

“This [is] the seventh time Morten’s people have workt this winter, and have not lost anything but one half-hundred [of tea] they gave to a Dragoon and one officer they met with the first of this winter; and the Hoo company have lost no goods, although they constantly work, and at home too, since they lost the seventy hundred-weight. When once the Smuglers are drove from home they will soon all be taken. Note, that some say it was Gurr that fired first. You must well secure Cat, or else your Honours will soon lose the man; the best way will be to send for him up to London, for he knows the whole Company, and hath been Morten’s servant two years. There were several young Chaps with the Smuglers, whom, when taken, will soon discover the whole Company. The number was twenty-six men. Mack’s horses, Morten’s, and Hoak’s, were killed, and they lost not half their goods. They have sent for more goods, and twenty-nine horses set out from Groombridge this day, about four in the afternoon, and all the men well armed with long guns.

“And if I hear this is received, I will send your Honours the Places names where your Honours will intercep the Smuglers as they go to Market with their Goods, but it must be done by Soldiers, for they go stronger now than ever. And as for Mr. Gabriel Tompkin, Supervisor of Dartford, there can be good reason given that Jacob Walter brought him Goods for three years last past, and it is likewise no dispute of that matter amongst allmost all the Smuglers. The Bruces and Jacob fought about that matter and parted Company’s, and Mr. Tompkin was allway, as most people know, a villain when a Smugler and likewise Officer. He never was concern’d with any Body but Jacob, and now Jacob has certainly done with Smugling. I shall not trouble your Honours with any more Letters if I do not hear from this, and I do assure your Honours what I now write is truth.

“There are some Smuglers with a good sum of money, and they may pay for taking; as Thomas Darby, Edward King, John Mackdanie, and others that are rich.

“The Hoo Company might have been all ruined when they lost their goods; the Officers and Soldiers knew them all, but they were not prosecuted, as [they] was not at Groombridge, when some time since a Custom House Officer took some Tea and Arms too in Bowra’s house at Groombridge.

“The first of this Winter, the Groombridge Smuglers were forced to carry their goods allmost all up to Rushmore Hill and Cester Mark, which some they do now, but Tea sells quick in London now, and Chaps from London come down to Groombridge allmost every day, as they used to do last Winter. When once they come to be drove from home, they will be put to great inconveniences, when they are from their friends and will lose more Goods than they do now, and be at more Charges. Do but take up some of the Servants, they will soon rout the Masters, for the Servants are all poor.

“Young Bowra’s House cost £500 building, and he will pay for looking up.

“Morten and Bowra sold, last Winter, some-ways, about 3,000 [lb.] weight a week.”

We hear nothing further of “Goring,” and there is nothing to show who was the person whose cold malignance appears horribly in every line of his communication. Any action that may have been officially taken upon it is also hidden from us. But we may at least gather from it that the master-men, the employers of the actual smugglers of the goods, were in a considerable way of business, and already making very large profits. We see, too, that the smuggling industry was even then well on towards being a powerful organisation.Still sterner legislative methods were, accordingly, in the opinion of the authorities, called for, and the Act of Indemnity of 1736 was the first result. This was a peculiarly mean and despicable measure, even for a Revenue Act. There is this excuse—although a small one—for it; that the Government was increasingly pressed for money, and that the enormous leakage of customs dues might possibly in some degree be lessened by stern and not very high-minded laws. By this Act it was provided that smugglers who desired (whether on trial or not) to obtain a free pardon for past offences, might do so by fully disclosing them; at the same time giving the names of their fellows. The especial iniquity of this lamentable example of frantic legislation, striking as it did at the very foundations of character in the creation of the informer and the sneak, is a sad instance of the moral obliquity to which a Government under stress of circumstances can descend.

The Act further proceeded to deal with backsliders who, having purged themselves as above, again resumed their evil courses, and it made the ways of transgressors very hard indeed; for, when captured, they were charged with not only their present offence, but also with that for which they had compounded with the Dev— that is to say, with the law. And, being so charged, and duly convicted, their case was desperate; for if the previous offence had carried with it, on conviction, a sentence of transportation (as many smuggling offences did: among them the carrying of firearms by three, or more men, while engaged in smuggling goods), the second brought a sentence of death.

With regard to the position of the pardoned smuggler who had earned his pardon by thus peaching on his fellows, it is not too much to say—certainly so far as the more ferocious smuggling gangs of Kent and Sussex were concerned—that by so doing he had already earned his capital sentence; for the temper of these men was such, and the risks they were made to run by these ferocious Acts were so great, that they would not—and, in a way of looking at these things, could not—suffer an informer to live.

Thus, even the additional inducements offered to informers by statute—including a reward of £50 each for the discovery and conviction of two or more accomplices—very generally failed to obtain results.

Many other items of unexampled severity were included in this Act, and in the yet more drastic measures of 1745 and the following year. By these it was provided that persons found loitering within five miles of the sea-coast, or any navigable river, might be considered suspicious persons; and they ran the risk of being taken before a magistrate, who was empowered, on any such person being unable to give a satisfactory account of himself, to commit him to the House of Correction, there to be whipped and kept at hard labour for any period not exceeding one month.

In 1746, assembling to run contraband goods was made a crime punishable with death as a felon, and counties were made liable for revenue losses. Smuggled goods seized and afterwards rescued entailed a fine of £200 upon the county; a revenue officer beaten by smugglers cost the county £40; or if killed, £100; with the provision that the county should be exempt if the offenders were convicted within six months.

As regards the offenders themselves, if they failed to surrender within forty days and were afterwards captured, the person who captured them was entitled to a reward of £500.

Dr. Johnson’s definition of a smuggler appears on the title-page of the present volume. It is not a flattering testimonial to character; but, on the other hand, his opinion of a Commissioner of Excise—and such were the sworn enemies of smugglers—was much more unfavourable. Such an one was bracketed by the doctor with a political pamphleteer, or what he termed “a scribbler for a party,” as one of “the two lowest of human beings.” Without the context in which these judgments are now placed, it would be more than a little difficult to trace their reasoning, which sounds as little sensible as it would be to declare at one and the same time a burglar to be a dangerous pest and a policeman a useless ornament. But if smugglers can be proved from these pages wicked and reckless men, so undoubtedly shall we find the Commissioners of Excise and Customs, in their several spheres, appealing to the basest of human instincts, and thus abundantly worthy of Johnson’s censure.

The shifts and expedients of the Commissioners of Customs for the suppression of smuggling were many and ingenious, and none was more calculated to perform the maximum of service to the Revenue with the minimum of cost than the commissioning of privateers, authorised to search for, to chase, and to capture if possible any smuggling craft. “Minimum of cost” is indeed not the right expression for use here, for the cost and risks to the customs establishment were nil. It should be said here that, although the Acts of Parliament directed against smuggling were of the utmost stringency, they were not always applied with all the severity possible to be used; and, on the other hand, customs officers and the commanders of revenue cutters were well advised to guard against any excess of zeal in carrying out their instructions. To chase and capture a vessel that every one knew perfectly well to be a smuggler, and then to find no contraband aboard, because, as a matter of fact, it had been carefully sunk at some point where it could easily be recovered at leisure, was not only not the way to promotion as a zealous officer; but was, on the contrary, in the absence of proof that contraband had been carried, a certain way to official disfavour. And it was also, as many officers found to their cost, the way into actions at law, with resultant heavy damages not infrequently awarded against them. It was, indeed, a scandal that these public servants, who assuredly rarely ever brought to, or overhauled, a vessel without reasonable and probable cause, should have been subject to such contingencies, without remedy of any kind.

The happy idea of licensing private adventurers to build and equip vessels to make private war upon smuggling craft, and to capture them and their cargoes, was an extension of the original plan of issuing letters of marque to owners of vessels for the purpose of inflicting loss upon an enemy’s commerce; but persons intending to engage upon this private warfare against smuggling had, in the first instance, to give security to the Commissioners of a diligence in the cause thus undertaken, and to enter into business details respecting the cargoes captured. It was, however, not infrequently found, in practice, that these privateers very often took to smuggling on their own account, and that, under the protective cloak of their ostensible affairs, they did a very excellent business; while, to complete this picture of failure, those privateers that really did keep to their licensed trade generally contrived to lose money and to land their owners into bankruptcy.