Rum Punch, An Imperial Tipple

After learning about Puritan taverns [see previous blog], I began researching 17^th century “church-raising” in Salem Village.  The process is basically the same thing as a barn-raising, and requires almost complete community participation to raise the walls and connect them to the roof rafters. But research often leads to unexpected results.

Apparently, the town of Medford rewarded participants in the local church-raising with a beverage which required “four barrels of beer, 24 gallons of West India rum,30 gallons of New England rum, 35 pounds of loaf sugar; 25 pounds of brown sugar; 465 lemons.” * In other words, a very large rum punch. Intrigued, I shifted my focus away from churches to 17^th century rum punch. The beverage was immensely popular on both sides of the Atlantic from about 1650 to 1850. In a way, rum punch was an alcoholic symbol of the British empire. Rum and sugar came from the West Indies; tea from the East Indies, and citrus fruit from southern Europe.

Rum Punch, Beverage of the British Empire

Whene’er a bowl of punch we make,
Four striking opposites we take,
The strong, the weak, the sour, the sweet,

Together mixed most kindly meet.
And when they happily unite,
The bowl is pregnant with delight.

Anecdotal history credits sailors and merchants in the British East India Company with creating Punch after supplies of beer and wine ran low.

The term punch, some say, is derived from the Hindi word for five (later reduced to four), and refers to the number of required ingredients:

One part sour — usually lemon or lime juice to provide the kick
Two parts sweet — sugar, both in granulated and solid form, to balance the citrus acidity
Three parts strong — originally local arak, soon replaced by Caribbean rum
Four parts weak — water, later replaced by black tea
Complete with a dash of bitters—Accent with ground nutmeg

All these ingredients were expensive, which made punch a beverage of wealthy upper and merchant classes.

And then, there was the method of indulgence.

Punch was served in a large silver or porcelain punch bowl. Consumption was a convivial event. Rather than using a ladle to pour the libation into tankards or cups, drinkers tipped small glasses into the bowl. This kept the group together, unwilling to leave the flowing bowl.

Punch drinkers often found themselves slipping onto the floor with their wigs askew. One housewife called the punch bowl the nastiest, sloppiest cluster ever placed on dining room table. Patrons constantly filling glasses from the flowing bowl with increasingly unsteady hands, created a table swimming in punch and a drenched floor.

Admiral Russell’s Very Large Punch Party

The most famous punch party was the one held in Spain by Admiral Edward Russell on either Christmas Day or October 25, 1694, depending on the source material.

Admiral Russell expected to return to England with his fleet for the Christmas holiday. Alas, King William III ordered Russell to winter in Cadiz. Admiral Russell was very disappointed, allegedly saying, “I am at present under a doubt with myself whether it is better not to die.” [I suggest Admiral Russell was a man who wanted his Christmas pudding.]

To console himself in his disappointment, Admiral Russell decided to throw a party for 6,000 officers in the Royal Navy fleet at Cadiz and charge it to the government. There were over 150 different items on the menu, all forgotten now.

But the centerpiece was the rum punch which was prepared in a Delft fountain that could hold 12 hogsheads [700 gallons] of rum punch. The party lasted until the fountain was dry — about a week.

The punch recipe called for 4 hogsheads of brandy, 1 pipe of Malaga wine, 20 gallons of lime juice, 2500 lemons, 13 underweight of fine white sugar, 5 pounds of grated nutmegs, and 8 hogsheads of water.

One guest recalled:
“There was in the middle of a garden of lemons and oranges… a fountain which was set with Dutch tiles in the bottom and sides, and was made clean as a Japan punchbowl. In this fountain, on Christmas-day was poured six butts of water, half a hogshead of strong mountain Malaga wine, two hundred gallons of brandy, six hundredweight of sugar, twelve thousand lemons, and nutmegs and sugar in proportion.”

Since it would be impossible for guests to dip their glasses into the bowl, a young man in a rowboat rowed around the fountain mixing the ingredients with his oars and serving the guests. The oarsman could only work a 15 minute shift; otherwise he could pass out from the fumes.

Eventually, a guest decided it would be fun to jump in the fountain. Soon, almost everyone wanted to splash around. “In went the mob with their shoes and stockings and all on, and like to have turned the boat with the boy over, and so he might have been drowned in punch …”

If you’d like to enjoy a single serving of rum punch, you can check out the process here:

Sandra’s Books: Sea Tigers & Merchants. Ambition, Arrogance & Pride. Saxon Heroines. Two Coins. Rama’s Labyrinth.

*Edward Field. The Colonial Tavern. 1897. Page 8.

Illustrations & A Few Sources:

Punchbowl Sign, The Punch Bowl, Hurlfield Road, Sheffield by Ian S; Lemons by André Karwath aka Aka; Nutmegs by Ganesh Mohan T; Silver Punch Bowl. 1680-81; Old English Glassware; A Glee, 1786; HMS Tiger taking the “Schakerloo” in the harbor of Cadiz, 1674; Admiral Russell by Thomas Gibson, 1715; Cadiz-Fuente by ikerbuffon; Miniature boats in fountain by DiscoA340. Ryan Greene. “Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: Top 5 most Outrageous Parties in History.” Watson Adventures. Apr 12, 2021. Simon Difford. “History of Punch.” Difford’s Guide. Wendy Leigh. “The 17^th Century Rum Punch Recipe That’s Remembered by Rhyme.” Tasting Table. Dec 4, 2022.