The Deadly London Beer Flood
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In 1814, the London Beer Flood swept through St. Giles, killing 8 people.
In 1814, the streets around Tottenham Court Road were hit by a tsunami of beer, killing eight people and wrecking buildings in St. Giles Rookery.
The source of this rather bizarre incident was the Horse Shoe Brewery, owned by Meux & Co., which was located at the junction of Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Street (where the famous Dominion Theatre sits today). Established in 1764, the brewery was a key producer of porter, a popular type of dark beer that originated in London.
In 1810, the Horse Shoe Brewery installed a 6.7 metre wooden fermentation tank, reinforced with several big iron hoops, and capable of holding over 3,555 barrels of booze. It was used in the production of porter for four years, before the accident struck.
On the afternoon of Monday 17th October 1814, one of those big hoops around the tank—which was nearly full to the brim—snapped. The issue was noted to be fixed later. An hour after, at about 5.30pm, the tank burst, releasing a tsunami of beer with such pressure that it destroyed several casks and knocked the valve of another tank, draining its contents. The beer crashed through the back wall of the brewery, releasing a tidal wave of up to 1.47 million litres of beer (that’s almost 2.6 million pints!) onto the streets of St. Giles Rookery.
In the 19th century, the rookery was London’s most infamous slum, a densely populated cesspit of crime, poverty, squalor, and disease — world’s apart from the area’s affluent reputation today. With poorly built, sub-divided houses in decay, and a maze of crammed alleys and passageways for streets, the rookery was already in a state of disaster before the flood.
Directly behind the brewery, the several metres high wave rushed through New Street and George Street, sweeping through houses and flooding their inhabited cellars with beer and debris. As the area lacked proper drainage, there was nowhere else for the flood to go. Two houses collapsed, while two more were heavily damaged. In one of them, Hannah Banfield, aged four, was sat having tea with her mother and another child when the wave hit. The mother and child were swept outside and survived but Hannah was killed.
Five more people were killed in the cellar of another house, where an Irish wake was being held for a little boy; the deceased boy’s mother, Ann Saville, aged 60, and four mourners: Mary Mulvey, aged 30, and her young son T. Mulvey, aged three, Elizabeth Smith, aged 27, and Catherine Butler, aged 65. A further body, that of Sarah Bates, aged three, was discovered in another house.
The flood also destroyed the back walls of some properties on Great Russell Street, including the Tavistock Arms pub, crushing to death a teenage barmaid, Eleanor Cooper, aged 14, who was in the yard washing pots.
Most people were at home at this time of the evening, with many survivors climbing onto furniture to avoid being swept away or drowned by the torrent of tipple. Within the Horse Shoe Brewery itself, all of the workers survived, though some were badly injured.
According to some later stories, during the flood hundreds of locals took the opportunity to get drunk on or collect the ‘free’ beer any way they could. But there are no contemporary sources, including newspaper reports, that back this up, so it’s probably a load of exaggerated waffle.
While the brewery was taken to court, the coroner’s inquest decided the accident was an act of God. The owners, Meux & Co., weren’t held liable, and didn’t have to pay a penny of compensation, since it was all His fault.
With Meux & Co.’s total loss being about £23,000 (approx. £2.35 million today), the company was on the edge of bankruptcy. Parliament granted them a refund of the tax they paid on the beer they lost, about £7,250 (approx. £737,000 today), which allowed the company to stay afloat.
The Horse Shoe Brewery soon returned to business, operating for another century until its closure in 1921.
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