Background:
John Stow, the historian and map-maker of London around 1720, noted that:

"About the year 1544 refining of sugar was first used in England. There were but 2 sugar-houses; and the profit was little, by reason there were so many sugarbakers in Antwerp and thence better and cheaper than it could be afforded in London."

Sugar cane, from which the raw sugar was extracted in the 13th century by the Venetians, came from Egypt where it had been grown for thousands of years. But it was slavery and the 'triangle trade' which created a boon in sugar refining. The Portuguese, French & Dutch were into the business sometime before the British. In Britain, Bristol and London ships were first to take up the slave trade in the mid 17th-century. Liverpool's first slave ship sailed in 1709, and by 1720 outstripped its rivals. Liverpool's prosperity was built on sugar, tobacco and cotton.

Beginnings in Liverpool:
The first 'sugar house' in Liverpool was reputedly established in about 1673, by Allyn Smith (a notable sugar refiner of London), possibly on the bankside of 'the Pool' where it entered the River Mersey (near the present Redcross Street) as shown on the conjectural map for 1705 prepared by Henry Peet in 1905. Another sugar house is shown by Peet at Redcross Street/Preeson's Row on the south side of the castle then still in existence. This is known to have been built in 1670-3 by Richard Cleveland and Daniel Danvers - the latter originally came to Liverpool, in 1670, aged 23, on behalf of Allyn Smith, a relation by marriage.

Progress in the 18th century:
By 1768 there were 8 sugar houses. Five of these are shown on George Perry's map of 1769:

1. 'Sugar House Yard' - north of the Old Dock and east of Old Strand Street - this is obviously the site of the presumed first sugar house although by 1769 a long way from the water's edge with Salt House Dock built in front of it. By 1900 it had been redeveloped.
2. 'Sugar House near the Pig Market' - this is on the same site as the second sugar house in 1705 in Redcross Street although the castle has now been demolished and replaced by St George's Church. Both church and works had disappeared by 1900.
3. 'Sugar House in John Street' - now North John Street, it was on the corner of Harrington Street which was as far as John Street then extended. By 1900 the works had been replaced by office buildings which still exist.
4. 'Sugar House in Argyle Street' - which ran off Hanover Street southwards to the west of Duke Street. Redeveloped by 1900.
5. 'Sugar House in the Hay Market' - roughly where Victoria Street now meets the tunnel entrance. In 1900 this was a goods depot.

Sugar firms in mid-Victorian Liverpool:
By the mid Victorian era sugar refining was expanding into an industry on a much larger scale. None of the sites previously identified were then in existence.

Gore's Directory for 1872 (and Watson's book of 1982) lists the following sugar refiners:
1. Fairrie & Co - 253 Vauxhall Road (started 1847?)
2. George Jager & Co - Black Diamond St (off Vauxhall Road) & 77 Burlington St.
3. Henry Tate & Sons - 12 Love Lane.
4. James Leitch & Co - 14 Blackstock St (between Vauxhall & Scotland Rd) & 19 Wellington Rd.
5. Edward Crossfield & Co - 20 Blackstock Street.
6. MacFie & Co - Bachelor Street & Vernon Street.
7. Crosfield, Barrow & Co - 32 Vauxhall Road.
8. Sharp & Galloway - no address.
9. Sankey Sugar Co - 6 Dale Street (not the refinery).
10. Joseph Heap & Sons - Upper Pownall Street, Park Lane.
11. Liverpool Sugar Refining Co - Victoria Street.
12. The Liverpool's 'Saccharine' Co (Manbre's glucose)

In Gore's Directory of 1899 the following names had appeared as sugar refiners: (probably dealers)
13. Bostock & Co - Cook Street.
14. William E Criddle - 245 Vauxhall Road.
15 Freeman, Lloyd & Co Ltd - Limekiln Lane.
16. Reynolds Bros Ltd - North John Street.

Henry Tate & Consolidation in the 20th century:
John Wright & Co had a sugar refinery in Manesty Lane (to the east of Paradise Street) probably since 1809. In 1859, Henry Tate, a successful grocer in Liverpool, joined the firm as a partner, a relationship which lasted ten years. But Henry Tate also started his own refinery in 1862 at 1 Earle Street (east of Old Hall Street), and 2 years later added a molasses refinery at 1-3 Edmund Street (which crosses Earle Street). Moving to Love Lane in 1872, future expansion was achieved by buying out their major competitors, partly to eliminate competition and partly to acquire their sites for extensions. The dates of acquisition are:
1925 George Jager & Co
1929 Fairrie & Co
1938 MacFie & Son
In 1921 Tate's amalgamated with Lyle's of Greenock.

Growth of the Sugar Industry:
In 1704, some 27 years after the start of the industry in Liverpool, only 760 tons of raw sugar was imported through the port. By 1785 this had risen to 16,600 tons shared between up to a dozen sugar houses.
The abolition of the slave trade (by British ships) in May 1807 might have been expected to affect trade with the West Indies and United States, but this was not so and the growth of trade continued apace. Cotton imports from the American plantations became a greater proportion of the total imports but sugar imports were still on the increase.
When Henry Tate started his new refinery in 1872, production at this one plant alone was 20,000 tons a year. It reached at peak of 550,000 tons in 1972 and this had declined to 300,000 tons per year by the end of production in 1981. At its peak sugar consumption in Britain reached 2.6 million tons per year.

The Early Processes of Sugar Refining:
Sugar originally arrived in this country as a brown sticky substance. The production of the white crystalline sugar we know today is the result of a long period of development in sugar refining. In early Victorian England sugar would have been bought in lump form broken from 'sugar loaves' - granulated sugar did not exist. Sugar tongues were used to break up the lumps for adding to a cup of tea. 'Sugar loaves or lumps' as dispatched from the sugar house (refinery) were conical shaped and weighed from 25 to 150 pounds. The colour (and cost) depended on the number of stages of refining it had gone through. A great deal of water and steam was used in the boiling, casting, reboiling and baking to increase the purity and whiteness of the sugar. Temperatures up to 140°F were to be endured in parts of the refinery. From the first stage treacle was drained, and from later processing, syrup.

The German connection:
Work in the sugar house was heavy, hot and subject to a degree of hazard. Illness was common, and life expectancy short. It was not attractive to the English worker and was even shunned by the Irish labourers (although they eventually made up the largest proportion of unskilled workers). It was because of this refiners recruited German workers in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. In fact, some of the refiners themselves were of German origin. This firstly applied to the large sugar industry in London and then progressed to Liverpool in the middle of the 19th century with the opening of Jager's refinery.
It was usual for batches of about 2 dozen men to be brought over mainly from the Hamburg area. The pay was high, particularly if you were a skilled sugar boiler. The hours were long but there were perks - gallons of beer to replace the body moisture lost in the terrific heat!
In Liverpool there was a large German immigrant population in the second half of the 19th century, some being connected with the sugar industry. In 1851 census there were 44 German born sugar workers. By 1881 this had risen to around 200.

Family connections with sugar:
My great great grandfather, John Phillips, was a sugarbaker in Liverpool in 1849, a few years after he arrived from his birthplace in Hesse-Darmstadt - one of the many German Duchies & Principalities which eventually formed modern Germany in 1871. (Incidentally, there was a beet sugar industry in H-D). He became a 'sugar boiler' and a 'sugar refiner' and rose to be 'foreman in a sugar refinery' by 1871. From the various addresses, I suspect he started his career with Leitch's, went to Jager's, and then returned to Leitch's (as foreman?) by 1868. It was in that year the my great grandfather started as a warehouseman with Leitch's and, in the following year, married John Phillips's daughter. Was 'Johannes Philippi' brought over by one of the refineries? - or was he an economic migrant escaping famine in Europe following the failure of the potato crop? - both are possibilities. John Phillips died in 1878, aged 55, from a lung complaint, probably due to the working conditions.

Summary:
The sugar refining business started in London in the middle of the 16th century. In Liverpool the first sugar house was established in 1667. It was carried out in a modest way for some 40 years but really took off with the growth of the slave trade shipping operations from Liverpool after 1709. The abolition of the slave trade by British ships in 1807 did not halt the expansion of the business. Because of fierce competition from the Continent in the 1860's, Henry Tate, a successful Liverpool grocer, realised more efficient production on a much larger scale was needed if British sugar refining was to survive. By firstly, in 1872, building a new refinery using the latest technology, and later (by his descendants), taking over a number of their rivals and then amalgamating with Lyle's, the Tate family created the giant sugar company known today around the world.
It took the EEC's Common Agricultural Policy to bring to an end, in 1981, Liverpool's 314 year connection with the cane sugar refining business.

Neville H. King: Feb 1997; Revised Oct 2000.

Many thanks to to Mr Neville H. King and Mr Brian Mawer. They were so kind to give me their consent to the use of the above information.