First chippy off the blocks
QUESTION When did the first fish and chip shop open?
It Is said that Marranos Jews, who fled Portugal in the 16th century under the threat of forced conversion to Christianity, popularised fried fish in the UK.
As secretly practising Jews, they would use the Christian practice of fish on Fridays to their advantage by eating it cold on a saturday. Observant Jews do not carry out any tasks on a saturday, the sabbath, including cooking.
Written references to selling ‘fried fish — Jewish style’ appear in the 1830s. An article taken from a London paper in the Monmouthshire Merlin of October 7, 1837, headlined ‘Frightful death by burning’, describes how Rebecca Mendes, 47, of Whitechapel, East London, who earned a living by frying fish, was burned to death when the pan of hot oil she was using to cook flounders caught fire.
Charles Dickens mentions fish and chips, but doesn’t link the two dishes. In Oliver twist, Fagin lives in an area of ‘fried fish warehouses’ and in A tale Of two Cities, Dickens writes about ‘husky chips of potatoes, fried with some reluctant drops of oil . . .’
the invention of chips, fried potatoes or French fries is a hotly debated subject, with the French, Belgians and Americans claiming to have invented the dish. It is said that ‘potatoes fried by the French method’ were sold outside the cotton mills of Lancashire in 1860.
When the two dishes were combined is unclear. A blue plaque at Oldham’s tommyfield Market claims this was where the first fish and chip shop opened. However, others say a Jewish immigrant, Joseph Malin, opened the first recorded fish and chip shop in London in 1860.
Alternatively, a Mr Lees is said to have pioneered the concept in Mossley, Greater Manchester, in 1863. He sold his wares from a market hut and later opened a shop across the road. A notice in the window claimed: ‘this is the first fish and chip shop in the world.’
By the 1870s, this meal was common in industrial towns and cities. some families in mining communities enjoyed this ‘food for the poor’ several times a week. Local authorities started to enforce hygiene rules, but it was not until 1900 that fully tiled shops appeared, specialist coal-fired cooking ranges were manufactured and beef dripping supplanted cottonseed oil.
Entrepreneurs identified a demand to dine out and fish and chips saloons started to appear. they were typically brick built with a corrugated iron roof. It is said that samuel Isaacs, who ran a wholesale and retail fish business in London and the south-East, opened the first in 1896, serving fish and chips, bread and butter and tea for 9d.
One of the few surviving is the Fish and Chip saloon at the Beamish Living Museum Of the North in Co. Durham.
they were followed by upmarket fish and chips palaces with oak panelling, wall-to-wall carpets and chandeliers. Harry Ramsden’s, established in Guiseley, West Yorks, in 1928 is the most famous.
By 1910, there were 25,000 fish and chip shops in Britain, peaking at 35,000 in 1927. today, there are 10,500.
Lyn Pask, Blackwood, Gwent.
QUESTION Is there evidence that Napoleon applied to join the Royal Navy?
tHE story that Napoleon wished to join the Royal Navy has no foundation. He certainly never applied.
As a young man, he briefly wanted to join the French navy. Born in Corsica, Napoleon joined the military academy at Brienne-le-Chateau in central France.
In 1783, Inspector-General M. de Keralio wrote this appraisal: ‘M. de Bonaparte [Napoleon], born August 15, 1769. Height 5 ft 3 in. Constitution: excellent health, docile expression, mild, straightforward, thoughtful. Conduct most satisfactory; has always been distinguished for his application in mathematics.
‘He is fairly well acquainted with history and geography. He is weak in accomplishments — drawing, dancing, music and the like. this boy would make an excellent sailor; deserves to be admitted to the school in Paris.’
However, Napoleon’s elder brother Joseph dissuaded him from his naval ambition. While studying classics with a view to becoming a priest, Joseph was introduced to the Prince of Conde and confided he wanted to join the army.
When asked what branch of the service he would like to enter, Joseph replied: ‘the artillery.’ the Prince told him he should have his true desire.
Joseph wrote to Napoleon telling him of this conversation, begging him to give up his ambitions for the navy and devote himself to the artillery.
‘Napoleon acceded to my proposal, abandoned from that moment all his naval projects and replied that his mind was made up to dedicate himself with me to the artillery, with what success the world has since learned,’ wrote Joseph.
William Fortescue, Southampton.
QUESTION Why is swearing referred to as turning the air blue?
tHE origin of blue in the sense of lewd, coarse or pornographic is a mystery.
John Mactaggart’s scottish Gallovidian Encyclopedia from 1824 gives an early example. ‘thread o’Blue’ to mean ‘any little smutty touch in song- singing, chatting or piece of writing’, but does not supply an origin.
London bibliophile John Camden Hotten suggested in his Dictionary Of Modern slang, Cant And Vulgar Words of 1859 that the lewd connotation had its origins in the French Bibliotheque Bleue, a cheap form of literature with a blue cover containing songs, recipes and stories. It was sold for pennies by peddlers between 1600 and 1830. However, it was not a vulgar publication.
In slang And Its Analogues Past And Present of 1890, John stephen Farmer and William Ernest Henley proposed that blue might refer to the colour of the gown worn by a convicted prostitute in a house of correction.
Another possibility is the colour’s association with uniforms worn by the lower classes, servants and licensed beggars, paralleling the evolution of the term blue collar.
An alternative derivation comes from the idea of talking a blue streak, meaning to speak rapidly or to be voluble or garrulous. this probably stems from the blinding speed and vividness of a lightning flash.
Jon Baldwin, King’s Lynn, Norfolk.