The History of Gambling in England

“Thirdly, Several schemes for shares and chances, only entitling the purchasers to all prizes above twenty pounds.

“Fourthly, A bait for those who can only afford to venture a shilling.

“Then come the ingenious sett of lottery merchants, viz. Lottery magazine proprietors – Lottery tailors – Lottery stay makers – Lottery glovers – Lottery hat makers – Lottery tea merchants – Lottery snuff and tobacco merchants – Lottery handkerchiefs – Lottery bakers – Lottery barbers (where a man, for being shaved, and paying threepence, may stand a chance of getting ten pounds) – Lottery shoe blacks – Lottery eating houses; one in Wych Street, Temple-bar, where, if you call for six penny worth of roast, or boiled beef, you receive a note of hand, with a number, which, should it turn out fortunate, may entitle the eater of the beef to sixty guineas – Lottery oyster stalls, by which the fortunate may get five guineas for three penny worth of oysters. And, to complete this curious catalogue, an old woman, who keeps a sausage stall in one of the little alleys leading to Smithfield, wrote up, in chalk, Lottery sausages, or, five shillings to be gained for a farthing relish.”

In 1782 an Act was passed, whereby lottery office keepers were to pay a licence of £50, under a penalty of £100 if they did not do so.

Sir Ashton Lever disposed of his Museum by lottery in 1758 by Act of Parliament, and another Act was procured to dispose of, by lottery, a large diamond, the property of the deceased Lord Pigot, valued at £30,000. This lottery was drawn on Jan. 2, 1801, and the winner of the prize was a young man, name unknown. It was, afterwards, sold at Christie’s on May 10, 1802, for 9500 guineas. It was again sold, and is said to have passed into the possession of Messrs Rundell and Bridge, the Court jewellers, who are reported to have sold it to an Egyptian Pasha for £30,000.

But, in the latter part of the eighteenth century, a system of private lotteries, called “little goes” had sprung up, and they are thus described in the Times of 22nd July 1795:

“Amongst the various species of Gaming that have ever been practised, we think none exceeds the mischiefs, and calamities that arise from the practice of private lotteries, which, at present, are carrying on, in various parts of the town, to very alarming extents, much to the discredit of those whose province it is to suppress such nefarious practices, as they cannot be ignorant of such transactions. ‘The little go,’ which is the technical term for a private lottery, is calculated only for the meridian of those understandings, who are unused to calculate and discriminate between right and wrong, and roguery and fair dealing; and, in this particular case, it is those who compose the lower order of society, whom it so seriously affects, and, on whom, it is chiefly designed to operate. No man of common sense can suppose that the lottery wheels are fair and honest, or that the proprietors act upon principles anything like honour, or honesty; for, by the art, and contrivance, of the wheels, they are so constructed, with secret springs, and the application of gum, glue, &c., in the internal part of them, that they can draw the numbers out, or keep them in, at pleasure, just as it suits their purposes; so that the ensurer, robbed and cajoled, by such unfair means, has not the most distant chance of ever winning; the whole being a gross fraud, and imposition, in the extreme. We understand the most notorious of these standards of imposition, are situated in Carnaby Market, Oxford Road, in the Borough, Islington, Clerkenwell, and various other places, most of which are under the very nose of Magistracy, in seeming security, bidding defiance to law, and preying upon the vitals of the poor and ignorant.

“We hope the Magistrates of each jurisdiction, and those who possess the same power, will perform their duty on behalf of the poor, over whom they preside, and put a stop to such a growing, and alarming evil, of such pernicious and dangerous tendency; particularly as the proprietors are well-known bad characters, consisting of needy beggars, desperate swindlers, gamblers, sharpers, notorious thieves, and common convicted felons; most of whose names stand recorded in the Newgate Calendar for various offences of different descriptions.”

11th Aug. 1795. “On Friday night last, in consequence of searching warrants from the parochial magistrates of St James’s Westminster, upwards of 30 persons were apprehended at the house of one M’Call, No. 2 Francis Street, near Golden Square, and in the house of J. Knight, King Street, where the most destructive practices to the poor were carrying on, that of Private Lotteries (called Little Goes). Two wheels, with the tickets, were seized on the premises. Upon examination of those persons, who proved to be the poor deluded objects who had been there plundered, they were reprimanded, and discharged.

“The wives of many industrious mechanics, by attending these nefarious houses, have not only been duped out of their earnings (which ought to have been applied to the providing bread for their families), but have even pawned their beds, wedding rings, and almost every article they were possessed of, for that purpose.”

Here are two anecdotes of the winners of the great prize, which was, usually, £20,000, from the Times:

27th Dec. 1797. “Dr B., a physician at Lime (Dorset), a few days since, being under pecuniary embarrassment, and his house surrounded by bailiffs, made his escape by a window, into a neighbour’s house, from whence he fled to London. The furniture was seized, and the sale actually commenced, when it was stopped by a letter, stating that the Doctor, upon his arrival in London, found himself the proprietor of the £20,000 prize. We guarantee the truth of this fact.”

19th Mar. 1798. “The £20,000 prize, drawn on Friday, is divided amongst a number of poor persons: a female servant in Brook Street, Holborn, had a sixteenth; a woman who keeps a fruit stall in Gray’s Inn Lane, another; a third is possessed by a servant of the Duke of Roxburghe; a fourth by a Chelsea carrier of vegetables to Covent Garden; one-eighth belongs to a poor family in Rutlandshire, and the remainder is similarly divided.”

In 1802, old Baron d’Aguilar, the Islington miser, was requested, by a relation, to purchase a particular ticket, No. 14,068; but it had been sold some few days previously. The baron died on the 16th of March following, and the number was the first drawn ticket on the 24th, and, as such, entitled to £20,000. The baron’s representatives, under these circumstance, published an advertisement, offering a reward of £1000 to any person who might have found the said ticket, and would deliver it up. Payment was stopped. A wholesale linen draper in Cornhill (who had ordered his broker to buy him ten tickets, which he deposited in a chest), on copying the numbers for the purpose of examining them, made a mistake in one figure, and called it 14,168 instead of 14,068, which was the £20,000 prize. The lottery being finished, he sent his tickets to be examined and marked. To his utter astonishment, he then found the error in the number copied on his paper. On his demanding payment at the lottery office, a caveat was entered by old d’Aguilar’s executors; but, an explanation taking place, the £20,000 was paid to the lucky linen draper.

Although these lotteries were a great source of revenue to Government, and, consequently, relieved the taxpayer to the amount of their profit, it began to dawn upon the public that this legalised gambling was somewhat immoral; and, in 1808, a Committee of the House of Commons was appointed, to inquire how far the evil attending lotteries had been remedied by the laws passed respecting the same; and, in their Report, they said that “the foundation of the lottery system is so radically vicious, that your Committee feel convinced that under no system of regulations, which can be devised, will it be possible for Parliament to adopt it as an efficacious source of revenue, and, at the same time, divest it of all the evils which it has, hitherto, proved so baneful a source.”

Yet they continued to be held; but, when the Lottery Act of 1818 was passing through the House of Commons, Mr Parnell protested against it, and, in the course of his speech, suggested that the following epitaph should be inscribed on the tomb of the Chancellor of the Exchequer: “Here lies the Right Hon. Nicholas Vansittart, once Chancellor of the Exchequer; the patron of Bible Societies, the builder of Churches, a friend to the education of the poor, an encourager of Savings’ banks, and – a supporter of Lotteries!”

And, in 1819, when the lottery for that year was being discussed, Mr Lyttleton moved:

1. That by the establishment of State lotteries, a spirit of gambling, injurious, in the highest degree, to the morals of the people, is encouraged and provoked.

2. That such a habit, manifestly weakening the habits of industry, must diminish the permanent sources of the public revenue.

3. That the said lotteries have given rise to other systems of gambling, which have been but partially repressed by laws, whose provisions are extremely arbitrary, and their enforcement liable to the greatest abuse.

4. That this House, therefore, will no longer authorise the establishment of State lotteries under any system of regulations whatever.

Needless to say, these resolutions were not passed, but the Lottery was on its last legs, for, in the Lottery Act of 1823, provision was made for its discontinuance after the drawing of the lottery sanctioned in that Act. Yet this was not adhered to, and a “last lottery” was decreed to be drawn in 1826. Its date was originally fixed for the 18th of July, but the public did not subscribe readily, and it was postponed until the 18th of October, and, on that day it was drawn at Cooper’s Hall, Basinghall Street. Here is an epitaph which was written on it:

In Memory of

The State of Lottery,

the last of a long line

whose origin in England commenced

in the year 1569,

which, after a series of tedious complaints,

Expired

on the

18th day of October 1826.

During a period of 257 years, the family

flourished under the powerful protection

of the

British Parliament;

the Minister of the day continuing to

give them his support for the improvement

of the revenue.

As they increased, it was found that their

continuance corrupted the morals,

and encouraged a spirit

of Speculation and Gambling among the lower

classes of the people;

thousands of whom fell victims to their

insinuating and tempting allurements.

Many philanthropic individuals

in the Senate,

at various times, for a series of years,

pointed out their baneful influence,

without effect;

His Majesty’s Ministers

still affording them their countenance

and protection.

The British Parliament

being, at length, convinced of their

mischievous tendency,

His Majesty GEORGE IV.

on the 9th of July 1823,

pronounced sentence of condemnation

on the whole race;

from which time they were almost

Neglected by the British Public.

Very great efforts were made by the

Partisans and friends of the family to

excite

the public feeling in favour of the last

of the race, in vain:

It continued to linger out the few

remaining

moments of its existence without attention,

or sympathy, and finally terminated

its career unregretted by any

virtuous mind.

In 1836 an Act was passed “to prevent the advertising of Foreign and illegal lotteries,” but circulars still come from Hamburg and other places. In 1844 an Act was passed “to indemnify persons connected with Art Unions, and others, against certain penalties.” Still there were minor lotteries and raffles, and the law was seldom set in force against them, any more than it is now when applied to charitable purposes; yet in 1860 one Louis Dethier, was haled up at Bow Street for holding a lottery for £10,000 worth of Twelfth Cakes, and was only let off on consenting to stop it at once, and nowadays the lottery is practically dead, except when some petty rogue is taken up for deluding children with prize sweets.

CHAPTER XIX

Promoters and Projectors – Government loans – Commencement of Bank of England – Character of a Stock Jobber – Jonathan’s – Hoax temp. Anne – South Sea Bubble – Poems thereon.

We are apt to think that company promoters and commercial speculation are things of modern growth, but Projectors and Patentees (company promoters and monopolists) were common in the early seventeenth century; and we find an excellent exposition of their ways and commodities in a poetical broadside by John Taylor, the Water poet, published in 1641. It is entitled The complaint of M. Tenter-hooke the Proiector, and Sir Thomas Dodger, the Patentee. Under the title is a wood-cut, which represents a Projector, who has a pig’s head and ass’s ears, screws for legs, and fish hooks for fingers, bears a measure of coal, and a barrel of wine, on his legs respectively, tobacco, pipes, dice, roll tobacco, playing cards, and a bundle of hay slung to his body, papers of pins on his right arm, and a measure for spirits on his left arm, a barrel and a dredger on the skirts of his coat. With his fish hook fingers, he drags bags of money. This is Tenter-hooke, who is saying to his friend Sir Thomas Dodger, who is represented as a very well dressed gentleman of the period:

“I have brought money to fill your chest,For which I am curst by most and least.”

To which Sir Thomas replies:

“Our many yeares scraping is lost at a clap,All thou hast gotten by others’ mishap.”If any aske, what things these Monsters be‘Tis a Projector and a Patentee: Such, as like Vermine o’re this Lande did crawle,And grew so rich, they gain’d the Devill and all.Loe, I, that lately was a Man of Fashion,The Bug-beare and the Scarcrow of this Nation,Th’ admired mighty Mounte-banke of Fame,The Juggling Hocus Pocus of good name;The Bull-begger who did affright and feare,And rake, and pull, teare, pill, pole, shave and sheare,Now Time hath pluck’d the Vizard from my face,I am the onely Image of disgrace.My ugly shape I hid so cunningly,(Close cover’d with the cloake of honesty),That from the East to West, from South to North,I was a man esteem’d of ex’lent worth.And (Sweet Sir Thomas Dodger,) for your sake,My studious time I spent, my sleepes I brake;My braines I tost with many a strange vagary.And, (like a Spaniell) did both fetch and carryTo you, such Projects, as I could invent,Not thinking there would come a Parliament.I was the great Projector, and from me,Your Worship learn’d to be a Patentee;I had the Art to cheat the Common-weale,And you had tricks and slights to passe the Seale.I took the paines, I travell’d, search’d and sought,Which (by your power) were into Patents wrought.What was I but your Journey man, I pray,To bring youre worke to you, both night and day:I found Stuffe, and you brought it so about,You (like a skilfull Taylor) cut it out,And fashion’d it, but now (to our displeasure)You fail’d exceedingly in taking measure.My legs were Screws, to raise thee high or low,According as your power did Ebbe or Flow;And at your will I was Screw’d up too high,That tott’ring, I have broke my necke thereby.For you, I made my Fingers fish-hookes stillTo catch at all Trades, either good, or ill,I car’d not much who lost, so we might get,For all was Fish that came into the Net.For you, (as in my Picture plaine appeares)I put a Swine’s face on, an Asses eares,The one to listen unto all I heard,Wherein your Worship’s profit was prefer’d,The other to tast all things, good or bad,(As Hogs will doe) where profit may be had.Soape, Starch, Tobacco, Pipes, Pens, Butter, Haye,Wine, Coales, Cards, Dice, and all came in my wayI brought your Worship, every day and houre,And hope to be defended by your power.Sir Thomas Dodgers’ AnswerAlas good Tenter-hooke, I tell thee plaine,To seeke for helpe of me ‘tis but in vaine:My Patent, which I stood upon of late,Is like an Almanacke that’s out of Date.‘T had force and vertue once, strange things to doe,But, now, it wants both force and vertue too.This was the turne of whirling Fortune’s wheele,When we least dream’d we should her changing feele.Then Time, and fortune, both with joynt consent,Brought us to ruine by a Parliament;I doe confesse thou broughtst me sweet conceits,Which, now, I find, were but alluring baits,And I, (too much an Asse) did lend mine eareTo credit all thou saydst, as well as heare.Thou in the Project of the Soape didst toyle,But ‘twas so slippery, and too full of oyle,That people wondered how we held it fastBut now it is quite slipp’d from us at last.The Project for the Starch thy wit found out,Was stiffe a while, now, limber as a Clout,The Pagan weed (Tobacco) was our hope,In Leafe, Pricke, Role, Ball, Pudding, Pipe, or Rope.Brasseele, Varina, Meavis, Trinidado,Saint Christophers, Virginia, or Barvado;Bermudas, Providentia, Shallowcongo,And the most part of all the rest (Mundungo58)That Patent, with a whiffe, is spent and broke,And all our hopes (in fumo) turn’d to smoake,Thou framdst the Butter Patent in thy braines,(A Rope and Butter take thee for thy paines).I had forgot Tobacco Pipes, which areNow like to thou and I, but brittle ware.Dice run against us, we at Cards are crost,We both are turn’d up Noddies,59 and all’s lost.Thus from Sice-sinke, we’r sunke below Dewce-ace,And both of us are Impes of blacke disgrace.Pins pricke us, and Wine frets our very hearts,That we have rais’d the price of Pints and Quarts.Thou (in mine eares) thy lyes and tales didst foyst,And mad’st me up the price of Sea-coales hoyst.Corne, Leather, Partrick, Pheasant, Rags, Gold-twist,Thou brought’st all to my Mill; what was’t we mist?Weights, Bon60 lace, Mowstraps, new, new, Corporation,Rattles, Seadans,61 of rare invented fashion.Silke, Tallow, Hobby-horses, Wood, Red herring,Law, Conscience, Justice, Swearing, and For-swearing.All these thou broughtst to me, and still I thoughtThat every thing was good that profit brought,But now all’s found to be ill gotten pelfe,I’le shift for one, doe thou shift for thyselfe.

The first loans to Government, in a regular form, took the form of Tontines, so called from their inventor Lorenzo Tonti. A Tontine is a loan raised on life annuities. A number of persons subscribe the loan, and, in return, the Government pay an annuity to every subscriber. At the death of any annuitant, his annuity was divided among the others, until the sole survivor enjoyed the whole income, and at his death, the annuity lapsed. As an example, a Mr Jennings, who died in 1798, aged 103 – leaving behind him a fortune of over two millions – was an original subscriber for £100 in a Tontine: he was the last survivor, and his income derived for his £100 was £3000 per annum. Our National Debt began in 1689 – by that, I mean that debt that has never been repaid, and dealings in which, virtually founded Stockbroking as a business. The Bank of England started business on 1st Jan. 1695, and, from that time, we may date the methodical dealing in Stocks and Shares. Of course there were intermediaries between buyer and seller, and these were termed “Stock brokers.” They first of all did business at the Exchange, but as they increased in number their presence there was not desirable, and they migrated to ‘Change Alley, close by. These gentry are described in a little book, published in 1703, called, Mirth and Wisdom in a miscellany of different characters.62

“A Stock Jobber

“Is a Rational Animal, with a sensitive Understanding. He rises and falls like the ebbing and flowing of the Sea; and his paths are as unsearchable as hers are. He is one of Pharaoh’s lean kine in the midst of plenty; and, to dream of him is, almost, an Indication of approaching Famine. He is ten times more changeable than the Weather; and the living Insect from which the Grasshopper on the Royal Bourse was drawn, never leap’d from one Place to another, as he from one Number to another; sometimes a Hundred and a half is too little for him; sometimes Half a hundred is too much; and he falls seven times a Day, but not like David, on his knees, to beg pardon for former Sins, but to be made capable of sinning again. He came in with the Dutch, and he had freed us from as great a Plague as they were, had he been so kind as to have went out with them. He lives on the Exchange, but his Dwelling cannot be said to be the Place of his Abode, for he abides no where, he is so unconstant and uncertain. Ask him what Religion he professes, he cries, He’ll sell you as cheap as any Body; and what Value such an Article of Faith is of, his Answer is, I’ll give you as much for a Debenture, as the best Chapman thereabout shall. He is fam’d for Injustice, yet he is a Master of Equity in one particular to perfection, for he cheats every Body alike, and is Equal in all his Undertakings. The Den from which this Beast of Prey bolts out is Jonathan’s Coffee House, or Garraway’s; and a Man that goes into either, ought to be as circumspect as if in an Enemy’s country. A Dish of tea there, may be as dear to him as a good Purchase, and a Man that is over reach’d in either, tho’ no Drunkard, may be said to have drank away his Estate. He may be call’d a true Unbeliever, and out of the Pale of the Church, for he has no Faith. Is a meer Tolandist in secular Concerns, at the very minute that he is ready to take up any Goods upon Trust that shall belong to his Neighbour. St Paul’s Cathedral would be a Mansion-House fit for a Deity indeed, in his Opinion, did but the Merchants meet there; and he can give you no subtantialler a Reason for liking Salter’s Hall better than the Church, than because of its being a House of Traffick and Commerce, and the Sale being often held there. He is the Child of God in one Sense only, and that is by reason of his bearing His Image, but the Devil in many, for he fights under his Standard. To make an end of a Subject that is endless; he has the Figure of a Man, but the Nature of a Beast; and either triumphs over his Fellow Adventurers, as he eats the Bread of other People’s Carefulness, and drinks the Tears of Orphans or Widows, or being made himself Food for others, grows, at last, constant to one place, which is the Compter, and the fittest House for such an unaccountable Fellow to make up his Accounts in.”

Jonathan’s was, especially, the Coffee House which stock jobbers frequented. Addison, in the first number of the Spectator, says, “I sometimes pass for a Jew in the assembly of Stock Jobbers at Jonathan’s”; and Mrs Centlivre has laid one of the scenes in her Bold Stroke for a Wife, at Jonathan’s: where, also, was subscribed the first foreign loan, in 1706.

There was a Stock Exchange hoax in the reign of Queen Anne. A man appeared, galloping from Kensington to the City, ordering the turnpikes to be thrown open for him, and shouting loudly that he bore the news of the Queen’s death. This sad message flew far and wide, and dire was its effects in the City. The funds fell at once, but Manasseh Lopez and the Jews bought all they could, and reaped the benefit when the fraud was discovered. In 1715, too, a false report that the Pretender had been taken, sent the Funds bounding up, to the great profit of those who were in the secret of the hoax.