WALKER engaged Harrison Burn, a resident of Stockton’s almshouse, to make little pasteboard spills dipped in his mixture, and it was a historic moment when Walker’s solicitor, John Hixon, bought the first friction matches.* Initially they came in paper boxes made by John Ellis, a book-binder, but by 1827 Walker was selling tins of a hundred woodchips, with a slip of sandpaper, for 1s 2d.* Walker marketed them as ‘congreves’ after Sir William Congreve, a pioneer in rocket propulsion.
‘Congreves’ had rivals, but they were fussy affairs. ‘Prometheans’ required a man to wrestle with pliers and a glass vesicle of chemicals before lighting his pipe.* Their inventor, Samuel Jones of the Strand, also marketed friction ‘lucifers’* but like congreves they were dangerously unpredictable. Notwithstanding various refinements,* modern safety matches are little different to congreves, though they burn more soberly and will not ignite even against sandpaper unless it has been impregnated with red phosphorus. You may even drop them on the hearth.
* The word ‘match’ derives from Old French ‘mèche’, meaning the wick of a candle, and prior to Walker’s invention ‘match’ was typically used in English to refer to the cord fuse of a gun. It was the popularity of friction matches like his that changed the primary meaning of the word.
* That is, one shilling and tuppence. A shilling was twelve pence; there were 20 shillings or 240 pence to the pound. The calculator at Measuring Worth suggests that this price in 1827 would be roughly £5 today. It appears that Walker initially charged a shilling for fifty, but was quickly forced by competition to drop his price, in which working-class families were the winners. Some original congreves are kept to this day at Preston Park Museum in Eaglescliffe near Stockton-on-Tees.
* The vesicle (a small glass ‘bladder’) was taped onto the matchstick. When it was broken, typically with a pair of pliers, the chemicals inside reacted with the pre-treated tape and produced a lively flame. Visit ‘Science and Society’ for an image.
* ‘Lucifer’ is Latin for ‘light-bearer’. In Christian doctrine, it is a name for the devil, drawn from Isaiah 14:12-15, who was created as the brightest and mightiest of the angels, but rebelled against God and was cast down from heaven by his peer, the Archangel Michael: see Revelation 12:7-9. The brand name ‘lucifer’ was used as a generic term for friction matches until the 1920s.
* One very unsuccessful ‘refinement’ was the introduction of white phosphorus, which is highly toxic and led some workers in match factories to develop ‘phossy jaw’, a bone disorder. It became a scandal in North America and Europe; and in July 1888 there was a high-profile strike at the Bryant and May factory in east London, supported by some prominent figures from British society. Legislation to ban white phosphorus in matches made in the United Kingdom was passed in 1908, but to give the industry time to develop alternatives the ban did not come into affect until after December 31st, 1910.