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In which Squire finds the Governor pushing into his territory
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In 1804 James Squire and his Malting Shovel Tavern got some competition in the beer brewing stakes from a surprising source – the colonial government. It built its own brewery in Parramatta, on the corner of George and O’Donnell streets, and brewed its first batch of beer in September 1804. But it wasn’t a serious threat to Squire; unable to control the rampant theft of beer by brewery employees, the government decided to pull out just a year later.
The decision to brew beer was one Governor Philip Gidley King had been thinking about for a while. With plenty of the populace of the colony still getting stonkered on rum and other spirits, he felt the addition of a beverage lower in alcohol would be a good thing for the colony. It was also the time leading into the so-called Rum Rebellion, (which we don’t deal with much here as there’s no evidence it had any effect on Squire). The NSW Marine Corps had effected a monopoly on spirits, so the government brewing beer was also seen as a way of breaking the ranking soldiers’ control of the alcohol market.
King had been thinking about it as far back as mid-1802 and mentioned his thoughts in correspondence with an MP by the name of Lord Hobart in England, who very much liked the idea.
“The introduction of beer into general use among the inhabitants,” Lord Hobart wrote, “would certainly lessen the consumption of spirituous liquors. I have therefore in conformity with your suggestion taken measures for furnishing the colony with a supply of ten tons of porter, six bags of hops, and two complete sets of brewing materials.”
He also said he’d get merchant ships to bring out more porter and hop plants when the growing season was suitable.
By May 9, 1803, King’s dreams of a brewery were becoming reality. “We are commencing with fixing the materials brought by the Cato [a ship] in a large government building at Parramatta,” he wrote to undersecretary Sullivan, “which I have no doubt will succeed and greatly prevent the importation and use of spirits.”
By September of that year King was fretting that, while the building was almost finished “we are in want of a proper person” to brew the beer that “will be of infinite advantage to the inhabitants”. Yes, it seemed King was putting way too much faith in the qualities of beer.
That problem of finding a brewer was solved in March 1804 when David Collins, now governor in Tasmania, sent King “a man who is a most excellent brewer”. A man who planned to bring with him some unnamed roots and leaves from Tasmania that he claimed were very good substitutes for hops. While unnamed, this was likely Thomas Rushton, who has been recorded as the brewer when the brewery opened in September 1804.
Rushton must have been late in arriving because on April 1, King wrote to under-secretary Sullivan that “a small quantity of beer” had been made at the brewery but “unfortunately we have not a professed brewer in the colony”. It would appear King wasn’t very well-informed – Squire had been brewing for around a decade by this time (though other correspondence from King seems to dismiss Squire as someone who only brewed in “small quantities”) and others were making and selling their own beer too. The latter would have been easy for King to discover, given they’d been taking out ads in the Sydney Gazette for the past year.
On September 15 the brewery – capable of making 3600 barrels of beer a week – swung into gear. King released a general order on September 25, 1804, that people running licenced premises could buy up to 32 gallons of beer, for which they would be charged a shilling and fourpence per gallon. Commissioned civil and military officers would get five gallons a week and sergeants three gallons at a shilling a gallon. And the settlers? Well it was up to the whims of the governor as to how much they could have. Payment was to be made in “wheat, barley, hops, casks or iron hoops delivered into His Majesty’s stores”.
In the first month, the brewery put out 2300 gallons of beer a week and in December, King wrote to Lord Hobart claiming success and promising to send over a few bottles. That month, the total output was 4247 gallons, of which the convicts’ share accounted for 1345 gallons, the military’s 1251 gallons, the settlers received 950 gallons all-up and even the police force got to slake their thirst, being given 105 gallons in the first few months of the brewery’s operation.
The success of the government’s endeavours to brew beer didn’t last. Partially because each employee at the brewery got around four gallons of beer a week. And there were quite a few employees; with perks like that it’s not hard to understand why everyone wanted to work there. The free beer wasn’t enough, there was apparently widespread theft as well. So King decided to admit defeat and, by 1806, looked to lease out the brewery to Rushton for two years. The lease was free, as long as he abided by a series of conditions, which included supplying “200 gallons of strong beer per month to the governor” for use of the convicts.
Rushton chose not to renew the lease and an ad in the Sydney Gazette in June 1808 announced he had started brewing at the Brickfields (between Circular Quay and Central stations).
He didn’t last there long either – less than a year later the Brickfields brewery was being let out. It did come with the offer that “any person wishing to take the same who may not be conversant in malting and brewing, the proprietor has no objection to give such needful instructions, as if pursued, cannot fail of making good beer”.
The government’s brewery in Parramatta appears never to have made another batch of beer after Rushton left.