Preface

It is surprising that the vast outpouring of words 0n the `drug problem' in the last ten years has produced no serious historical examination of the place of narcotics in English society. Reactions to contemporary events have been immediate and specific, strangely isolated in their assumption that drug use is peculiarly a feature of the 1960s and 1970s. This book attempts to fill at least part of that gap by examining the place of opium in nineteenth-century society, in language which it is hoped will appeal to that much sought-after being, the `general reader', as much as to the academic historian or drug researcher. Technical language is kept to a minimum. But where it is unavoidable, as for instance with the term `narcotic' or the battery of language used to describe drug habits and their pharmacological basis, readers will find definitions in the Introduction.
This book is, like any history, the product of its own time. It reflects the interests of the I970s, and in particular the efflorescence of writing on social history which has taken place in the last twenty years. Social history as `history with everything else left out' is no longer acceptable; its place has been taken by a concern for the structure of social groups, the study of social movements, popular culture, for urban history and demography. Had this history of opium in the nineteenth century been written say even ten years ago, it would undoubtedly have been classified as `medical' rather than `social' history. It would have concentrated on the `public health' aspects of opium, and would have accepted at face value the testimony 0f the official reports and inquiries.
Today there is a greater awareness of the bias of the sources which earlier writers so unhesitatingly and unquestioningly used, a willingness to use a wider range of evidence or to ask different questions of it. There is a desire to re-create not just `official opinion' but the actual experience of people living at the time, and to consider more analytically the contribution of the social groups involved. This book, in devoting itself primarily to such matters as the `popular culture' of opium, the place of opium in working-class life, and the contribution of the medical and pharmaceutical professions to changed perceptions of opium use, rather than to
the individual experience of `famous opium eaters' such as Thomas De Quincey and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, is very much the product of those concerns.

Any writing, historical writing in particular, is the outcome of cooperation and help, both practically and in terms of ideas and insights, from a large number of people. In a joint publication, this is particularly the case. Virginia Berridge, as a social historian, has been responsible for the historical section (part of the Introduction and Chapters 1 to 17) and Griffith Edwards, as a psychiatrist concerned with drug research and the formation of control policy, for the consideration of the nineteenth century in relation to the present position and for the section of definitions (Chapter 18 and part of the Introduction). The inter-disciplinary nature of the project was an unusual one. It is not often that a historian is so directly confronted with the contemporary implications of historical arguments, or that a psychiatrist looks back to the perceptions and structures which moulded present-day approaches to drug use.
Comments and criticisms on each other's drafts have thus flowed freely. The disjunction between the conclusions of academic historical research and present-day concerns in many respects remains great; but the authors feel that they have at least attempted an exercise in collaboration which could prove productive in other
areas of social policy.
The historical research on which the nineteenth-century section is based has involved the assistance of many others. Virginia Berridge would like in particular to thank the staffs of the Pharmaceutical Society and Miss Jones, the librarian; those of the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, and the Royal Society
of Medicine, the Society of Friends, the University of London Library, Goldsmiths' Library, the Guildhall Library and the library of the Institute of Actuaries. Her thanks are due to the staff of the Greater London Council Record Office, Pauline Sears in particular, and the Middlesex Record Office, to Dr Charles
Newman, Harveian Librarian at the Royal College of Physicians, and to Patricia Allderidge, archivist of Bethlem Royal Hospital. The Librarian of Tower Hamlets Local History Library was helpful in providing access to that library's unrivalled collection of material on East London opium `dens'. The staff of the British  Museum and the Public Record Office gave considerable assistance; and the pharmacists and others who provided reminiscences about the open dispensing of opium at the turn of the century have added a valuable perspective.
A debt is owed to the many historians who contributed suggestions and criticisms when earlier versions and sections of the book were presented as papers. For an historian working in a non-historical environment there is a danger of becoming isolated; and particular thanks are due to members of research seminars at the
Institute of Historical Research, at Bedford College Social Research Group and at University College History of Medicine department who helped ensure that this did not take place. Members of the Pharmaceutical Society, the British Society for the History of Pharmacy, the Social History Society and the Society for the Social History of Medicine also gave valuable help. A transatlantic perspective was provided by the contributions from members of  the Social Research Group of the University of California at Berkeley and the staff of the Center for Socio-Cultural Research into Drug Use at Columbia University in New York. Professor E. J. Hobsbawm and Professor F. M. L. Thompson gave helpful guidance as did Alethea Hayter, Pat Thane, Meta Zimmeck, Anna Davin and Linda Deer. Phil Kuhn, the late Stella Cripps and Pat Whitehead worked hard as research assistants on the project at various stages.
We both owe a considerable debt to our colleagues, ex-colleagues and friends in the Addiction Research Unit. Particular thanks must go to Margaret Sheehan for unfailingly patient help, to Gerry Stimson, to Nigel Rawson and Edna Oppenheimer.
Earlier drafts have been patiently typed by Pat Davis, Sara Marshall, Jean Crutch, Linda Stevens and Diane Hallett. But we are especially indebted to Julia Polglaze, who has provided much more than secretarial assistance and advice, and to Jacqueline May, who patiently and expertly produced the final version.

The research on which the book is based was funded by generous grants from the Drug Abuse Council in Washington and the United Kingdom Social Science Research Council, and we would like to express our thanks to both these organizations.

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