project menacing

Gilderoy Lockhart is a character from J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. He is introduced in the second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and is portrayed as a charming and charismatic wizard who claims to have accomplished numerous heroic deeds and published several bestselling books on the subject. Lockhart is the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry during Harry's second year. He is known for his extravagant and flamboyant personality, as well as his vanity and self-absorption.

As Hawksley writes, most European governments were aware of the necessity to act by the second half of the 19th century. She thinks that the reason why Britain acted in different way might be as a result of reluctance to “restrict British manufacturing growth and the considerable profits from arsenic mining”.

Hawksley mentions in the book two manufacturers that wanted to improve the conditions of their workers, other one being William Morris s Merton Abbey Mills and the other was Sanderson in Chiswick. Not least of which was the UK s largest mining plant, DGC whose owner was William Morris, originator of the British Arts and Crafts movement and arguably the finest wallpaper designer of his generation.

He is known for his extravagant and flamboyant personality, as well as his vanity and self-absorption. Lockhart constantly seeks attention and adoration from others, making grandiose and often exaggerated claims about his courage and achievements. Despite his fame and reputation, it becomes clear throughout the book that Lockhart is actually a fraud.

Lucinda Hawksley: Bitten by Witch Fever (Thames & Hudson, 2016)

I am a bit late with this book introduction, but even though it was published already in 2016, it’s still available. The subtitle “Wallpaper & Arsenic in the Victorian Home” tells what this book is all about. If you are interested in design, Victorian era, medical history or all kind of sinister stuff, then this award-winning book is for you. It’s also one of the most beautiful books I have seen for a while. After the book introduction I will continue the wallpaper story beyond the book.

I bought the book already a couple of years ago, and the idea of writing about it has been in my mind for some time now. The author, Lucinda Hawksley, is related to Charles Dickens, who is author’s great great grandfather. No wonder that Hawksley has written several books about Dickens, too. She is an expert on Pre-Raphaelite and Aestheticism and a lecturer.

Bitten by Witch Fewer. Wallpaper & Arsenic in the Victorian Home is a beautiful book that has received recognition of its design. All the wallpaper plates are full size pages and the much narrower text pages are interleaved with the wallpaper pages. The book is presenting beautiful wallpaper designs one after another from many companies. They have one thing in common: they contain arsenic. The name of the book is a quotation from William Morris: “As to the arsenic scare a greater folly it is hardly possible to imagine: the doctors were bitten as people were bitten by the witch fever.”

The book is published in association with The National Archives. The wallpaper samples are from their collection. All the 275 samples were tested for arsenic content and proven positive. The samples were analyzed using a portable X-ray Fluorescence (p-XRF) analyser. You can read more about that project on the National Archives’s blog.

The toxicity of the wallpapers is presented, too. I have amused myself by choosing the wallpaper I like most in each section and then looking how unsafe my choice had been!

But this book is not only about wallpapers. It’s also about arsenic as murder weapon, arsenic in culture (for example the short story, The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman), arsenic in a home in general; it’s a book about the health problems it caused, legislation concerning arsenic and other toxic substances, and then naturally it talks about everything related to wallpapers like wallpaper manufacturers, wallpaper designers etc.

The first chapter concentrates on arsenic as a murder weapon introducing some murderers or serial killers and their victims. Not all the deaths mentioned in the book are straightforward arsenic deaths, one of them being the death of Napoleon Bonaparte. There have been speculations about his death as arsenic was found in his body, and even wallpapers have mentioned. Hawksley writes:

From the 1850s, the dangers of wallpaper impregnated with arsenical pigments became an important issue in British newspapers, and much was made of the fact that Napoleon had slept in a wallpapered room, leading many to contend that the British deliberately poisoned the former emperor by this route. In the 1980s, tests were carried out on a sample of wallpaper said to have been removed in the 1820s from the room in which Napoleon had died. The paper did contain arsenical pigments, but it is unlikely that this alone brought about Napoleon’s death.

Hawksley is also telling about the ways to test the arsenic content, including the test that chemist James Marsh improved from older tests. “His test changed legal history”, writes Hawksley.

Until the mid-nineteenth century access to arsenic was easy, it could even be ordered by post.

The cartoon The Age of Drugs (1900) by Louis Dalrymple was published in the satirical American magazine, Puck. Here you can see a pharmacist dispensing drugs. On the counter there are bottles and packets of Arsenic, Strychnine, Opium, Cocaine and so on. An ad on the wall tells that this is a “The Kill ‘em Quick Pharmacy”. Source.

The Sale of Arsenic Regulation Act was brought into effect in 1851 to prevent selling arsenic over the counter. And now, for the first time, it was forbidden to sell arsenic to children. “Would-be poisoners now had to be more resourceful in the way they obtained arsenic”, writes Hawksley.

The second chapter, ‘Madness in the Method; Poison in the Process’ starts with describing how the mining exposed workers to arsenic in different forms depending on the method using in mining. Also female workers and children, who were working above ground, were not safe. Most of them were slowly poisoned. But the illnesses and deaths couldn’t be linked with the mines.

William Morris is a household name. Everyone who is interested in design have heard about him and the Arts and Crafts Movement. But “the personal wealth of his family was derived from one of the world’s largest producers of arsenic: Devon Great Consols.” He became one of the directors of the company in 1871. But he never visited the mines. Hawksley writes that Morris must have been aware of the working conditions.

Accidents caused by the use of green arsenic dyes. From the periodical ‘Annales d’hygiène publique et de médecine légale’ (1859). Lithograph is attributed to P. Lackerbauer. Wellcome Collection. CC BY 4.0.

Physical effects of arsenic exposure could be terrible. But even though arsenic was so dangerous stuff, it was quite a common thing in the households. It was used in many ways (see below), so it was not just the unseen stuff in the wallpapers.

It was, however, known that arsenic was toxic. But why it was anyway used in domestic decoration? Hawksley tells about the vivid green pigment developed by Swedish chemist Carl Scheele in 1775 and thus known as Scheele’s green), and how it became highly sought after by clothing and interiors manufacturers. But already in 1815, German chemist Leopold Gmelin wrote that the use of arsenical pigments in wallpaper was dangerous. Later he published an article. But his warnings were not responded among British manufacturers. Even Scheele himself had expressed his concerns.

Scheele’s green was improved and now so called emerald green, also known as Paris green, became extremely popular. And the more and more arsenical pigments were developed in the 19th century. Hawksley writes that “by the 1890s, yellows, golds, golden browns and whites were equally rich in the poison”.

Hawksley is also dealing in this chapter with the social issues like the conditions in the factories and the development of wallpaper industry.

The next chapter is about arsenic at homes. By the mid 19th century nearly every household had arsenic powder for mouses and rats, but that was not all, far away from that. Arsenic was everywhere, from cosmetics to clothes, from paints to colouring of certain foods. Dr. Mackenzie’s Arsenical Soap (on the right) was said to contain “a very small quantity of arsenic”. It was also “guaranteed absolutely harmless”.

Health remedy known as Fowler’s solution was the start of arsenic sneaking into the homes in the 18th century. Doctor Thomas Fowler’s Medical Reports of the Effects of Arsenic in the Cure of Agues, Remitting Fevers and Periodic Headaches (1786) made him famous. It was used well into the 20th century when its use started to diminish after learning more about its carcinogenic nature.

It’s not surprise that people were killed by accident when arsenic was easily available and many people were still illiterate. Caricaturist John Leech produced a number of cartoons in Punch to convey information and tell about the dangers of the poison.

Death as a lethal confectioner making up sweets using arsenic and plaster of Paris as ingredients; representing the toxic adulteration of sweets in the 1858 Bradford sweets poisoning. Wood engraving after J. Leech, 1858. Wellcome Collection. CC BY 4.0.

Hawksley is then dealing with the dangers facing people using clothes or accessories containing arsenic as well as those manufacturing them. She closes the chapter with a beer scandal that took place in 1900. If you became interested in the scandal, you can read about it here. Hawksley writes:

That same year, The Lancet reported test results confirming that whisky did not contain arsenic. Sales of whisky rapidly increased, while those of beer plummeted. Finally, in 1903, a Royal Commission report recommended safe levels of arsenic for food and drinks. Unfortunately, its remit did not extend to paint or wallpaper.

Wallpapers

In the fourth chapter Hawksley enters into the world of wallpaper design and designers concentrating mainly on France and Britain. She writes that British wallpapers had reached their zenith in the 18th century. “British wallpaper manufacture was then so highly esteemed that the French court started to substitute its tapestries with British wallpapers.” But the whole situation changed by the early 19th century and British wanted to have now French wallpapers. So much, that by 1837, the British government felt forced to intervene, writes Hawksley. The design schools were financed by the state, and “during the following decade, it paid for string of exhibitions that, it was hoped, would educate the public in the mysteries of good taste”. As it was noticed, public and critics didn’t have similar taste.

The tactics didn’t seem to be very fruitful, but in the middle of the century a campaign for design reform helped and at “the International Exhibition in London in 1862, British wallpapers were, at long last, lauded and won most of the prizes, while French papers were criticized for their over-elaboration and illusionism”. “British decorative arts designers led the world in the mid-nineteenth century”, writes Hawksley. And many of those names are still very well known, William Morris in front, being the most renowned designer of that time. But, like many of his contemporaries, most of his well-known early designs contained arsenic-based colours. But Morris refused to believe – at least publicly as Hawksley notes – until the end of his life that his arsenical wallpapers were dangerous.

Social reformer Harriet Martineau wrote in the 1850s in Charles Dickens’s magazine Household Words about modern industries, and in one of them she wrote about the green dust that was falling from the arsenical wallpaper and fading the colours. The core of her text was not arsenic but, according to her, the size that seemed to be of poor quality.

But the reports of the wallpaper poisonings started to appear in that decade. Doctors were writing about the danger in medical literature as well as submitting letters to national press. Some of the writers had first hand experiences in their own homes. Essays and newspaper articles were published and cartoons and even prose texts were dealing about toxic wallpapers.

The Medical Society of London set up a committee in the 1870s and its Chairman Jabez Hogg, an ophthalmic surgeon, had noted that in the course of a few weeks no less than fifty-four reports of cases reached him of arsenic poisoning by wallpapers. But, as Hawksley writes, the committee was disappointed by the lack of attention paid to the problem by the medical community. It was also bringing to the public’s attention the news that green was not the only pigment colour that contains arsenic. In 1885 Hogg published a report called Arsenical Poisoning by Wallpapers and Other Manufactured Articles.

In the 1880s italian Bartolomeo Gosio continued the work that above mentioned Leopold Gmelin had started. Gmelin had worked on the gas released by arsenical pigments. Gosio’s experiments confirmed that it was a gas, especially produced in damp conditions, that made wallpapers poisonous.

And, as mentioned earlier, it was not just wallpapers. People got poisoned of various things from playing cards to clothes. This is what is said about the image below, probably by John Leech, on the Wellcome Collection website: “The previous week, the chemist A.W. Hoffman had published an article ‘The dance of death’ in The times, 1 February 1862, in which he disseminated the finding that green dresses, wreaths, and artificial flowers, made with copper arsenite or coppper acetoarsenite (Scheele’s green, Paris green), were toxic.”

A skeleton gentleman at a ball asks a skeleton lady to dance; representing the effect of arsenical dyes and pigments in clothing and accessories. Wood engraving, 1862. Wellcome Collection. CC BY 4.0.

There were different opinions concerning the dangers of arsenical wallpapers, and the symptoms of the poisoning were not clear. And why one in the family had symptoms, when the rest of the family did not have them? An escape to a holiday resort to recover from health problems didn’t necessarily made people to think that the problem was lurking in their arsenical wallpapers at home, but the health improvement happened solely because of the fresh air of the seaside. Hawksley writes that the accommodations in these holiday resorts were more likely than private homes be decorated inexpensively, maybe just with painted walls. She continues: “Similarly, a jaunt abroad, to countries where the use of arsenic and other poisonous elements was more strictly regulated, would also have been a tonic.”

A couple of words about these holiday resorts as arsenic was present there, too. Mineral waters of the spas could have contained arsenic, but usually in harmless doses, she notes. “Ever since the Romans had arrived in Britain during the first century, arsenical baths and the drinking of natural arsenical mineral waters had been advocated by health spas.”

In the 18th century, the Britons most likely visited a spa town such as Bath, Cheltenham, Llandrindod Wells, Buxton, Royal Turnbridge Wells or Harrogate. I learnt from the book that in 2012 Harrogate spa water exceeded EU safe arsenic levels. (The springs in Harrogate have a high sulfur content. I know as I have tasted it. That was in 2001.) It has to be noted that arsenic in mineral baths is a different form of arsenic from the one for example in rat poison or colour pigments.

To the right direction

In the end of the chapter ‘Getting Away from It All’ Hawksley deals a bit with the working conditions in the wallpaper manufacturing. She writes:

It was not until 1895, and a new Factory and Workshop Act, that regular inspection of factories manufacturing lead, phosphorous and arsenic was made law. It proved effective: arsenic was responsible for a mere 1 per cent of the cases involving industrial poisoning by the twentieth century.

Hawksley mentions in the book two manufacturers that wanted to improve the conditions of their workers, other one being William Morris’s Merton Abbey Mills and the other was Sanderson in Chiswick. Architect Charles F. A. Volsey’s new building was opened in 1902. It had large windows to give enough light for workers and proper ventilation. You can read more about Sanderson here. But even though working conditions improved, it didn’t mean that the arsenic was something that belonged in the history.

Woollams & Co. advertized arsenic free wallpapers around 1890. © Wellcome Library. CC.

In Britain there was no legislation for preventing the use of arsenical pigments in the wallpapers. But in the rest of Europe the things were different. For example Bavaria’s government issued already in 1845 an edict to ban the manufacture or sale arsenical wallpapers. Hawksley gives examples from several countries, from German to Sweden, from Austria to Italy, and so on, and how these countries prohibited the use of poisons in manufacturing not only wallpapers, but many other things, too. For example in Sweden the government had passed an act to regulate “the manufacture, storage and sale of poisons of all kinds, unconditionally prohibited the use of arsenic in wallpapers, cloths, blinds, artificial flowers and wares of all kinds, as well as in lampshades, sealing-wax, wafers and candles”.

As Hawksley writes, most European governments were aware of the necessity to act by the second half of the 19th century. She thinks that the reason why Britain acted in different way might be as a result of reluctance to “restrict British manufacturing growth and the considerable profits from arsenic mining”.

Hawksley writes: “Remarkably, no legislation was passed in Britain – in the nineteenth century or since – prohibiting the use of arsenic to colour wallpaper.” But the public wanted to have arsenic-free wallpapers. General opinion had turned against companies that produced arsenical wallpapers.

William Woollams & Company had produced arsenic-free wallpapers already in 1859, but received very little public recognition. But when Morris & Company did the same later, it was a big news. But as there was no effective legislation, also arsenical wallpapers were advertized as arsenic-free. But

[i]n the absence of government intervention, the people in Britain had used the power of their pocketbooks to make the presence of arsenic in wallpapers obsolete, and as a result, their homes no longer held a fatal secret.

That’s how Lucinda Hawksley concluded her book.

As I mentioned in the beginning, the book is full of wallpaper samples. They have been grouped after the colours. Unfortunately I am not able to show any of these plates, but please go to check the publisher’s website to see some shots of the pages. And like I noted, the book is still available.

I enjoyed reading the book, but reading the captions was a bit hard as the text was way too small for my old eyes. The other thing that was disturbing was text jumping a bit too much from one thing to another and then coming back to the same thing much later. Some paragraphs seemed to be a bit loose from the main text. When I decided to write my introduction following the book, I realized the same problem here! But otherwise this is a lovely, lovely book. It looks good and the way how the wallpaper plates and the text pages are taking turns between the covers, is a great idea.

The illustrations above can be found in the book.

My wallpapers

This beautiful image of Walter Crane’s (1845–1915) famous wallpaper design called Swan, Rush and Iris can now act as an awkward transition from Lucinda Hawksley’s fantastic book to the two wallpapers in my flat.

The image is not included in the book even though Walter Crane is mentioned there. And no, I don’t have this kind of wallpaper on my walls. But when I visited first time (I guess) Victoria and Albert Museum I bought a tea towel with this image (or, to be precisely it was this) to my Mother as a present. But she didn’t like it too much (maybe because the swans look quite angry?) and gave it back to me. I still have it hanging in my study.

Art Nouveau has been my favourite style (or one of them) since my teenage years, but the wallpapers that I have in my flat (only a tiny part of the walls, rest is painted) are far away from Art Nouveau. But I definitely had my reasons to select these.

Marimekko’s wallpaper Korsi (culm or cane) in my study. Christmas 2019.

I have a papered wall in the study and in the living room. In fact I hadn’t planned to cover any of my walls with a paper, but they (the wallpapers and the ideas) just “came” to me. The idea for the wallpaper in my study came from a tie! And not any tie, but the tie wearing by certain Walter Lure.

The red and white striped tie is an essential part of Walter Lure’s stage appearance. (Check here.) I was photographing his UK tour in September 2015. Just before leaving for the tour I had got my new flat that needed to be decorated after being back home. I guess that on the tour or when planning it, I got this idea of a red and white striped wallpaper. I mentioned about it to Walter, who thought that that kind of wallpaper would made me mad. Well, it hasn’t (I believe) as when working in my study, it’s behind my back. But the decorators said that the wallpaper made them dizzy! And it’s arsenic-free, for sure.

The striped wallpaper is made by a Finnish company Marimekko. But the living room’s wallpaper came from Leeds, England. The designer is called Anthony Hughes.

The Gasholder wallpaper by Leeds based designer Anthony Hughes. Christmas 2017.

I happened to see the gasholder themed wallpaper on internet. And I couldn’t forget it as I am interested in industrial heritage and gasholders have been for years a structure that I have loved to photograph. But after deciding to cover already one wall with a paper in a study, I almost gave up getting this gasholder wallpaper. It was quite expensive, too, as it was not something you can pick in a wallpaper store shelf. But a friend of mine got me finally talked into contacting the designer. I ordered one roll of gray gasholder wallpaper from him.

A part of the long wall is covered with the paper and the rest of it is painted with a gray paint. It’s hard to see the difference of the colours of the wallpaper and paint. When the paper was up on the wall, I knew I had made a right decision when ordering it. It looks fantastic. And even though the design is very modern, it matches perfectly with my old furniture.

I am more than satisfied with my both choices. The designs also reflect my interests, music and industrial heritage.

Text and the photos of the book cover and my rooms © Katriina Etholén

Orders between £30.01 and £50 are charged a flat fee of £6.95.

He lacks the skills and knowledge necessary to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts, relying instead on memory charms to steal the accomplishments of others and claim them as his own. This is discovered when Lockhart attempts to erase the memories of Harry and his friend Ron Weasley, only for it to backfire and result in Lockhart erasing his own memories instead. Lockhart's true nature is further revealed in later books, where it is mentioned that he is currently residing in St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, a wizarding hospital, due to the mishap with his memory charm. It is suggested that Lockhart's persona as a heroic and talented wizard was nothing more than an act to cover up his lack of true skill and talent. Gilderoy Lockhart serves as a cautionary tale of the dangers of vanity and seeking recognition solely for personal gain. Despite his initial charm and popularity, Lockhart ultimately proves to be a shallow and deceitful character. He represents the importance of authenticity and integrity, as well as the consequences of living a life based on illusions and falsehoods..

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