Go back three hundreds years and there were more coffee houses than sprinkles on a Starbucks’ latte. But in those days, they provided a wide range of services….and coffee houses have been described as the seventeenth and eighteenth century version of the Internet, places of information exchange and discussion.

From its unpretentious beginnings, the coffee house became a remarkable institution, at the centre of social, cultural, commercial, and political life. 

Coffee was first introduced into England in 1610, through the trading activities of the East India Company, but it took another half century before it gained a public following. By 1670, the coffee house movement had burst onto the London scene and they became so prominent that hardly a City street could be traversed without meeting one.

Bristol, the country’s second city, saw its first coffee house, called the “Elephant,” open in 1677, although there is evidence that traders had been selling coffee before that date.

The “Elephant” was situated in All Saints Lane, close to the Merchants’ Tolzey, adjoining All Saints’ Church. The Tolzey Walk was a covered colonnade, erected in 1583, where merchants did business on bronze pedestals called 'Nails', the Nails that now stand outside the Corn Exchange.

By eight o’clock in the morning, the coffee houses and taverns surrounding the Tolzey were crowded with traders, ship owners and manufacturers. Most merchants did not have offices but used the coffee houses as their place of business. Bulletins announcing sales, sailings, and auctions covered the walls of the establishments, providing valuable information to the businessman who operated from a table at his favourite coffee house.

Even doctors and lawyer would use them as their consulting rooms.

The coffee houses also provided a gathering place where, for a penny admission charge, any man of any class, who was reasonably dressed, could sip a dish of coffee, read the newsletters of the day, or enter into conversation with other patrons. At a period when journalism was in its infancy and the postal system was unorganised and irregular, the coffee house functioned as reading rooms, for the cost of newspapers and pamphlets was included in the admission charge. 

Naturally, this dissemination of news led to the discussion of ideas, and the coffee house served as the main forum for that debate. 

As the social historian G. M. Trevelyan observed:  "The 'Universal liberty of speech of the English nation'...was the quintessence of Coffee House life." Compared to the taverns, these coffee houses were wonders of sobriety. Each conformed to a set of laws, written or unwritten, which stipulated proper decorum. One anonymous customer described a coffee house as such, ‘They are the sanctuary of health, the nursery of temperance, the delight of frugality, the academy of civility and the free school of ingenuity.’ 

Every other day, depending upon the weather and the state of the road, the mail and some copies of newspapers arrived in Bristol, from London. The newspapers went straight to the coffee houses, where for the price of a small cup of Mocha, people could read the latest news and hear the latest political gossip. Often, the newspapers were read aloud. Coffee houses were also places of learned debate, with scientific lectures and literary discussion.

It is worth noting that Bristol did not acquire its first newspaper until 1702, when William Bonny published the Bristol Post-Boy, but it contained very little news.

The Rev. William Goldwin, headmaster of the Grammar School, in his 1712 poetic description of Bristol, talked scathingly of those who frequented the coffee houses, particularly those who “ o’er Turkish Lap and smoaky Whiffs debate.”

Two of Britain’s leading business institutions can be traced back to their coffee house origins. Edward Lloyd’s coffee house was established in London in the 1680s and from a meeting place for ship owners, captains and merchants, it eventually became Lloyds of London. In a similar way, stockbrokers who frequented Jonathan’s coffee house, moved into a building that became the London Stock Exchange.  

Coffee houses soon became so numerous that they drew the attention of those in authority who, always nervous about anything that might lead to seditious talk, made an attempt to ensure that the contents of newspapers and pamphlets should be vetted in advance by the mayor or alderman.

In 1674, the popularity of this male dominated institution was amply demonstrated by the Women’s Petition Against Coffee, alleging that men were never at home during times of domestic crisis. A year later King Charles the Second tried to suppress them for very different reasons; he viewed them as hotbeds of revolution. His attempt to ban them failed, in the face of popular demand. By then coffee houses were central to both commercial and political life.

It was the English coffee house that started the practice of tipping staff, with collecting tins being labelled “To Insure Prompt Service.”

At the time that coffee houses became popular, the main drink was malt liquor and this was drunk in huge amounts. It is estimated that in 1695, the average daily consumption per man and woman was three pints plus an unspecified amount of cider. Coffee had the opposite effect to alcohol, stimulating rather than dulling the senses. As sober, quiet venues, they allowed people to have polite and reasoned discussion. Often called the “penny universities,” the price of a cup of coffee, they became a European wide institution. 

In 1718, the Trustees of All Saints granted the room over the Church vestry to John Cooke. Cooke’s Coffee House became the most popular in the city and in 1723, it was renamed ‘The London Coffee House’.

Sometimes politics directly affected the coffee houses and in 1785, following Britain’s defeat in the American War of Independence, the ‘American Coffee House’ in Broad Street changed its name to the more patriotic-sounding ‘British Coffee House’. The coffee house was situated next to the White Lion tavern, home of those who had favoured King George’s confrontational policy towards the rebellious colonials.

On one occasion, in contrast to the civilised debate within the coffee house, a drunken mob had emerged from the tavern and “tarred and feathered” effigies of John Hancock and John Adams, two of the American leaders, and hanged them in front of the American Coffee House.

There was the Hot Well coffee house, to serve those who frequented the spring, the Castle coffee house in Castle Street, the Custom House coffee house in Queen Square, the Gibb coffee house in Prince’s Street and many, many others.

By the 1790s, the fashion of drinking coffee in public had ended and coffee houses were no longer popular. Foster’s Coffee House, in Corn Street, closed. For many years, however, one of the roles of the coffee house was remembered, when inn keepers retained the “coffee room” as a place for those who wanted to quietly read a newspaper.

There were a number of reasons why the coffee houses lost their popularity. In London, a number of them reinvented themselves as exclusive clubs, the most well known being St. James’ and White’s. This was in contrast with the coffee houses, where entry had been open to all.

The greater availability of newspapers also discouraged people from gathering at the coffee house. But perhaps the main reason for their decline was the fact that the British East India Company had begun to import another exotic brew that drew a popular following, “tea”……..…

© David Jones

January 2004

Tel: 0117 930 0303

djones@bristol-mc.co.uk