by Karen Brooks
There are many real historical figures populating the book and the chocolate house, from King Charles II and his chief mistress, Lady Barbara Castlemaine, to Sir Henry Bennet (who really did wear a plaster on his nose), Joseph Williamson, the Earl of Clarendon, the Earl of Rochester, the Duke of Buckingham, Sam’s servants, relations and acquaintances, Charles Sedley, Robert Boyle, John Evelyn (another famous diarist whose works were also invaluable), and Lord and Lady Sandwich. A full list of historical figures and fictional ones is included for the curious. Just as an aside, I should also add that Matthew Lovelace is the fictitious son of a famous poet of the times, Richard Lovelace. There is no record of Richard ever having a son, so it was easy to create Matthew. The poetry of Lovelace is both political and of the heart and I tried to imagine what kind of son a man who could produce such lovely language and thoughtful verses might have. Matthew is the result. Matthew’s Uncle Francis also existed and was later appointed the Governor of the colony of New York — though he ended his life in ignominy in an English gaol.
Apart from the ships of the Blithman fleet and Matthew’s Odyssey, every ship mentioned was real, including the doomed London, which really did blow up and kill three hundred women and children. Even the Black Eagle, which Fear-God and Glory were press-ganged to serve upon, was real and not only was the captain arrested, but it did indeed have a hull full of infected Quakers, causing the crew to abandon ship and thus spread the pestilence.
The information about the transmission of the plague, including the figures in the Bills of Mortality, the crowded church services, the awful slaughter of dogs, cats and other animals, the evacuation of London, the removal of the court to Oxford and their subsequent appalling behaviour, the heat and swarms of flies, all really happened. People were shut up in houses once infection was discovered — even the uninfected — for forty days and guards were posted and crosses painted. Bells tolled relentlessly, burial pits were dug as the churches’ graveyards filled. The women who visited the infected really did garner a bad reputation for killing them and stealing — some deserved — though there were also those who showed remarkable compassion, bravery and dedication. Descriptions of people running naked, spitting, dying where they fell, etc. is all documented. It’s heart-breaking to read.
Some terrific books I read which covered the plague were Stephen Porter’s London’s Plague Year and The Great Plague; The Plague and the Fire by James Leasor, Daniel DeFoe’s Journal of the Plague Year, and Rebecca Ridell’s 1666: Plague, War and Hellfire — a wonderful addition to the plague (and Great Fire) canon. Of course, many books about Stuart London have chapters dedicated to the plague as well.
Then there is fantastic fiction: Geraldine Brooks’ (no relation, sadly) marvellous Year of Wonders remains one of my favourites. The Darling Strumpet by Gillian Bagwell was terrific, Charlotte Bett’s The Apothecary’s Daughter, Plague by CC Humphreys and the wonderful The Vizard Mask by Diana Norman were also superb reads.
The movements of Sam and the royals during the Great Fire are accurate, as is the description of the flames’ devastating path, what burned and what happened to the dispossessed. According to official records, only four people died. This has since been contested as the homeless, the very poor, Quakers, Jews and other ‘dissenters’ would not have been accounted for — similarly with the plague figures.
The Great Fire was a catastrophe of Biblical proportions. Coming on the back of war and plague and considering approximately three-quarters of the city burned, London’s recovery (which took decades — not the three years contemporaries claimed) was remarkable. Starting in Thomas Farriner’s bakery in Pudding Lane, it swiftly spread. Allegedly it was finally stopped in Pie Corner where, according to historians, it continued to burn and smoulder for weeks after. But there’s something neat and poetic in the notion that what started in Pudding ended in Pie, hence the chapter title. There are various monuments erected in remembrance of what happened, the most famous being the huge Doric column at the junction of Monument Street and Fish Street Hill. At one stage, the plaque at the base of the monument blamed Catholics for starting the fire. This was later removed. Sadly, Robert Hubert, a native of Rouen and a watchmaker who’d worked in London, maintained he started the fire, throwing fireballs into Farriner’s window (there was no window where he said). While the authorities knew he didn’t do it (and was mentally ill, though they wouldn’t have described it that way then), due to his own testimony, he was hanged on the 29th October, 1666.
Really useful books covering the Great Fire were Walter George Bell’s The Great Fire of London, Stephen Porter The Great Fire of London, Neil Hanson The Dreadful Judgement; Adrian Tiniswood The Great Fire of London 1666: the essential guide, Rebecca Ridell’s book above, and again, many other general books or those focussing on Charles II also dealt with both the plague and the fire, each one revealing different aspects and details.
For general books on the era, including those on Charles II as well as about his father and the Civil War led by Oliver Cromwell, I found Geoffrey Robertson’s The Tyrannicide Brief so informative and helpful; likewise, Jenny Uglow’s A Gambling Man: Charles II and the Restoration was invaluable. As always, Antonia Fraser’s King Charles II and her magnificent The Weaker Vessel were essential reading. Peter Ackroyd’s Rebellion and The King’s Bed: Sex, Power and the Court of Charles II by Don Jordan and Michael Walsh were great reads as was their King’s Revenge. Julian Whitehead’s Rebellion in the Reign of Charles II, which I purchased last minute in Glasgow on my research trip, was a complete gem of a book. Gosh, this list is growing, but there is more, including so many fabulous works of fiction, including Girl on the Golden Coin by Marci Jefferson, Royal Escape by Georgette Heyer, Jean Plaidy’s The Lovers of Charles II, Andrew Taylor’s The Ashes of London, Susanna Gregory’s Thomas Chaloner series and Edward Marston’s Christopher Redmayne series. My absolute favourite, if I have to pick one, would be Restoration by Rose Tremain and the sequel, Merivel: A Man of His Times. Wait! I also cannot go past Iain Pears’ An Instance at the Fingerpost. What a book. This is just an example of some of the books I read to help me understand and immerse myself in this period. I have reviewed many on my website and on Goodreads.
One of the first books on chocolate I read (and re-read) was Sophie D Coe and Michael D Coe’s The True History of Chocolate. A sublime, erudite and wonderful read, it takes the reader right back through time and to cacao’s origins, its introduction to the world and how it became, basically, an economic tour de force as well as a taste sensation, imbued with all sorts of connotations, many sexual. It doesn’t steer away from its dark and shocking relationship to humans — specifically, slavery and the exploitation of local populations in Africa, South America and other colonised outposts so the western world might indulge in ‘sin in a bowl’.
I also want to recommend Dr Kate Loveman’s fabulous work on the history of chocolate and acknowledge her enthusiastic response to an early email I sent her outlining my project. Among the many other books on chocolate and its history that were very useful were: Chocolate: History, Culture, and Heritage edited by Louis Evan Grivetti and Howard-Yana Shapiro; Cocoa and Chocolate: A Short History of Their Production and Use (1886); A Curious Treatise of the Nature and Quality of Chocolate by Antonio Colmenero de Ledema, translated by Don Diego de Vades-forte (1640) — the treatise Rosamund tries to read and finally masters did exist and is very readable, if dry in parts; The Indian Nectar: Or a Discourse Concerning Chocolate by Henry Stubbes (1662); Chocolate: A Global History by Sarah Moss and Alexander Badenoch; Taste: A Story of Britain Through its Cooking by Kate Colquhoun; Chocolate, Women and Empire by Emma Robertson; The Chocolate-plant and its Products (Theobroma cacao) by Ellen H Richards; and Sacred Gifts, Profane Pleasures: A History of Tobacco and Chocolate in the Atlantic World by Marcy Norton.
Chocolate and its relationship to slavery must be acknowledged and I only really brush on it in this novel. Immediately after this period, human rights abuses and terrible inju
stices occurred. They are arguably still occurring. I think it’s really important to be aware of this. In writing this book I found it a struggle to accept that the production of something so delicious could also be such a damning an indictment on humanity.
During the period in which the book is set and afterwards, slavery was growing and the brutal, inhumane treatment of African people was wrenching to research, as was that of the South and North American natives during what was regarded in Europe as a time of conquest and discovery — something that involved so much bloodshed, trampling of human dignity and gross mistreatment in the name of kings, queens, power, faith and country. I don’t delve too deeply into this except tangentially with Matthew Lovelace’s observations and, of course, the way Bianca and Jacopo are generally treated. But it’s important to know that there were people, even back then, who were appalled by slavery and the vicious and cold-hearted justification for abuse on the basis of skin colour. Not that it prevented slavery continuing for a long time afterwards. People like Rosamund and Matthew did exist, just as those arguing for religious and other tolerations did as well. Some of the books I read in order to understand this better include: The Logbooks: Connecticut’s Slave Ships and Human Memory by Anne Farrow; Classic Slave Narratives by Fredrick Douglass and African Voices on Slavery and the Slave Trade, edited by Alive Bellagamba, Sandra E. Greene and Martin A. Klein.
The other specific group to have a long and complicated relationship with chocolate was the Quakers, or Friends. This really developed after the time the book ends, though I do hint at it — firstly, by including two main Quaker characters but also by having persecuted Quakers (and they really were maltreated terribly by Charles’s government) aboard the ship Rosamund and Matthew sail to the New World at the end. The presence of Mr Hershey (of chocolate fame) is no accident and, as Quakers were regarded as exceptional businessmen (because they were considered honest and fair), you can imagine the conversations that might have occurred en route to Boston.
Many of the well-known major chocolate companies have their origins with Quakers: e.g. Cadbury, Rowntree, Fry. Quakers also introduced very fair working conditions — for white men and women (while, sadly, exploiting black workers) — education programs, health care, and they were among the first abolitionists as well. Researching the Friends’ incredible history was enlightening to say the least and I owe a huge debt of gratitude to the wise and wonderful Mark Nicholson for a conversation on my stoop about Quakers and chocolate. Because of him, the book took a particular direction and I learned so much. Also, his lovely wife, Robin McLean, a Friend and my friend, furthered my relationship with the Friends and took me to a Meeting in Hobart where I experienced their fellowship and was so very warmly welcomed. Mark and Robin also hosted a lunch so I could further expand my knowledge and ask a thousand questions of the patient and knowledgeable Dr Peter Jones, a scholar of Quakerism and much more besides. It was from him and the academic articles he subsequently sent me that I learned there could indeed be ‘Quakers of colour’ such as Bianca and Jacopo.
I also read the writings of George Fox and James Nayler, the ‘founding fathers’ of Quakerism, as well more recent writings such as Rosemary Moore’s The Light in Their Consciences: The Early Quakers in Britain, 1646–1666, H Larry Ingle’s First Among Friends: George Fox and the Creation of Quakerism, and the marvellously named Pink Dandelion’s very useful The Quakers: A Very Short Introduction.
The time in which the novel was set is also regarded as the birth of journalism as we know it (for better and worse). Roger L’Estrange and Henry Muddiman and their news sheets, news books and handwritten pamphlets all existed. Correspondents wrote both under their own names and anonymously. L’Estrange and Muddiman had ‘sources’ planted everywhere to report to them various goings-on, and people clamoured for the type of news and gossip they printed. The clamp-down on the presses really happened, as did the punishments mentioned. The men who died for their craft and a stubborn belief in what we call the ‘freedom of the press’ were all real people. I found the whole history of journalism and publishing fascinating, especially when I discovered the words ‘false news’ were often levelled at anti-government stories — an echo of how the term ‘fake news’ is used to discredit journalists and newspapers today. In the seventeenth century, there was a concerted effort to control the dissemination of information and ensure that only ‘good’ things were written about the King and his government — of course, it failed. I always say this, but the more I learn and write about the past, the more resonances I find in the present. It’s scary.
Some fabulous books that explored the complex and volatile history of newspapers and journalism were The Restoration Newspaper and its Development, by James Sutherland, and Read All About it: A History of the British Newspaper by Kevin Williams.
It was in London’s coffee and chocolate houses that news was shared, and dissent in many forms was born — you really cannot explore one without reference to the other. Chocolate and coffee houses were quite democratic in that anyone (male) could enter, providing he could pay for his drink. Nobles literally drank with people of lower social ranks and communicated with them. A sober pastime, drinking chocolate and coffee became associated with the distribution of information up and down the social scale. Because literacy was increasing and people had access to news in a way that was unprecedented in the past, it was natural they sought to challenge, if not overturn, the status quo, which was very threatening for the powers that be. So much so that in 1675 Charles II tried to close the coffee and chocolate houses, believing they posed such a threat. There was an outcry, and he was forced to back down.
Almost immediately after the book ends, around 1680, newspapers as we recognise them were born, and the coffee houses of Garraways (which existed during Rosamund’s time) and Lloyds (which came soon after and metamorphosed into the famous Lloyd’s of London) were host to the kind of debates, auctions — including candle auctions — and gossip that occur at the Phoenix. The political parties of Whigs and Tories have their origins in these houses and many, many plots against the government and/or their opponents were hatched beneath their smoky roofs. Chocolate houses that encouraged this kind of discourse and political affiliations sprang up, such as Ozinda’s and White’s in St James’s Street and the Cocoa Tree in Pall Mall — but these were established well after the book finishes. The relationship between the printed word, politics, dissension and chocolate and coffee was very real.
Some of the fascinating books I used that explore the history of the coffee houses are Brian Cowan’s The Social Life of Coffee: The Emergence of the British Coffee House; Markman Ellis’s The Coffee House: A Cultural History; Anthony Clayton’s London’s Coffee Houses: A Stimulating Story. Again, all references to coffee houses in the novel and their owners and locations, with a couple of exceptions, are factual.
For general information on the era, including language, clothes, fabrics, houses, etiquette, politics, major and minor events, social customs etc., I used Liza Picard’s thoroughly entertaining and wonderfully detailed Restoration London as well as Daily Life in Stuart England by Jeffrey Forgeng and The Growth of Stuart London by Norman G Brett-James. Ian Mortimer’s marvellous A Time Traveller’s Guide to Restoration Britain, which I only found as I began the official edit, was terrific. One book I found so helpful and amusing was The Canting Academy, or, The Devil’s Cabinet Opened Wherein Is Shewn the Mysterious and Villainous Practices of That Wicked Crew, Commonly Known By the Names of Hectors, Trapanners, Gilts by Richard Head (is that his real name I wonder?), written in 1673. It explores the patois of the day and helped make some of the language my characters deploy more colourful and accurate to the era.
All books and other publications mentioned in the novel existed at the time as did their authors.
I have been asked numerous times did I eat or drink much chocolate while writing this book… Of course I did! How often can a person down drinks of dark chocolate or stuff their mouth with 70 per cen
t cacao, liquor-filled treats, and claim it’s for research? I tasted good, bad, rich, decadent, watery, powdery, ghastly, scrumptious, moreish and irresistible drinks and food. Before you ask, the best drinks I had were in Pittenweem in Scotland (an amazing place with a dark history which will feature in my next novel), and Venice — in Venice, my spoon quite literally stood up in the drink it was so thick and luscious. Nutpatch in Hobart, Tasmania make divine chocolates — try to stop at one — but I also enjoy Lindt and Cadbury. Understanding cacao’s history better meant I felt guilty the entire time I was eating or drinking. It truly became a guilty pleasure which I think sums up the relationship we have with chocolate — for all sorts of reasons — perfectly.
While I take great care to make my story as historically accurate as possible it is primarily a work of fiction, written from my crowded head and full heart. Every accurate fact is due to the diligence and hard work of all the wonderful writers I have mentioned (and many more I didn’t) and I thank them profusely. Any mistakes are a happy accident of creativity or, let’s face it, a ‘whoops’ moment (and I cringe and pray they’re not held against me) and I do humbly beg your pardon and take full responsibility.
Mostly, I hope you enjoyed reading The Chocolate Maker’s Wife as much as I loved writing it.
Karen Brooks
Hobart 2018
LIST OF CHARACTERS