Temperance Buildings: The Way Out of Darkest England

Temperance was one of the most influential social movements in 19th century England.

Alcohol abuse led to widespread poverty and social distress, driving reformers to establish the first English temperance societies in 1830.

In response to their exclusion from alcohol-focused public spaces, these reformers went on to create an entire parallel infrastructure of buildings and institutions. Many of these are still visible on our streets today.

Signing the pledge

At first only spirits were taboo and drinking beer in moderation was accepted. In 1832, however, the ‘Seven Men of Preston’, led by Joseph Livesey, vowed to reject all alcohol. They became known as ‘total abstainers’ or ‘teetotallers’, a phrase coined by another Preston man, Richard Turner.

Over the next century, millions ‘signed the pledge,’ committing to a life of abstinence and advocating for alcohol restrictions, even prohibition. The ‘drink question’ dominated political debate for decades.

Temperance societies

By the end of the 19th century, thousands of temperance societies had appeared. Most towns and many villages had them, and there were societies for butchers, bakers, doctors, engine-drivers and many other trades, as well as for the army and the navy, and exclusively for women. One of the most successful was the Band of Hope, founded in Leeds in 1847, which enlisted the young.

At the start of the movement, temperance campaigners tried to ‘save’ drunkards, persuading them of the error of their ways.

In 1853 the foundation of the United Kingdom Alliance, influenced by events in the USA, led to a change of strategy. The emphasis was now on campaigning to restrict or ban the sale of alcohol.

Temperance halls and institutes

In the 1830s there were few public halls. Most meetings and social gatherings were held at inns, whose main business was selling alcohol.

Uncomfortable with meeting in these places, temperance reformers raised money to acquire their own premises. By 1853 over 300 temperance halls existed across England, with more than 90 in London alone.

Temperance halls came in all shapes and sizes, from wooden huts and corrugated iron ‘tin tabernacles’ to impressive architect-designed buildings.

Halls were built in many architectural styles. Many early halls looked like chapels or nonconformist meeting houses. Others could hardly be told apart from a house.

The largest hall, at Leicester, was a monumental Classical building which was demolished in the 1960s. The hall at Cirencester, Gloucestershire, is the oldest surviving one in Gothic style.

Some of these buildings were sponsored by middle-class and upper-class temperance supporters, but much of this vast building programme was funded through community donations and voluntary, unpaid labour, with working-class communities taking control of their surroundings in ways that anticipated modern community-led regeneration by more than a century.

The sheer range of uses that temperance halls were put to was extraordinary.

As well as temperance meetings and lectures by public figures (Charles Dickens often gave readings in temperance halls), dances and theatrical performances were held in them.

They were let out for political meetings, inquests were held in them, courts met in them, and the Rifle Volunteers (the Victorian Territorial Army) practised drills in them. Their main purpose, however, was to house temperance meetings.

Many temperance halls included educational facilities. ‘Temperance institutes’ supported their members’ desire for self-improvement by providing classrooms, libraries and newsrooms.

Well-off temperance supporters endowed reading rooms in villages across the country. They provided an educational alternative to the public house.