Michael Thomas Bass, DL (6 July 1799 – 29 April 1884) was an English

brewer Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brewer ...

and a

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

. Under his leadership, the

Bass Brewery The Bass Brewery () was founded in 1777 by William Bass in Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire, England. The main brand was Bass Pale Ale, once the highest-selling beer in the UK. By 1877, Bass had become the largest brewery in the world, with ...

became the largest brewery in the world, and Bass the best known brand of beer in England. Bass represented

Derby Derby ( ) is a city and unitary authority area in Derbyshire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Derwent in the south of Derbyshire, which is in the East Midlands Region. It was traditionally the county town of Derbyshire. Derby g ...

in the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

as a member of the

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. __TOC__ Active liberal parties This is a li ...

between 1848 and 1883 where he was an effective advocate for the brewing industry. He was a generous benefactor both in

, and in

Burton-on-Trent Burton upon Trent, also known as Burton-on-Trent or simply Burton, is a market town in the borough of East Staffordshire in the county of Staffordshire, England, close to the border with Derbyshire. In 2011, it had a population of 72,299. Th ...

where his company was based.''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', "Michael Thomas Bass"

Early life and career

Bass was born at Burton-on-Trent in Staffordshire, the son of Michael Thomas Bass, who had expanded the brewery founded by his father

William William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

and made it a major exporter to Russia. Michael's mother, Sarah Hoskins, was the daughter of Abraham Hoskins, a prominent Burton lawyer. Bass attended what was then known as The Grammar School in Burton and finished his schooling in

Nottingham Nottingham ( , locally ) is a city and unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east of Sheffield and north-east of Birmingham. Nottingham has links to the legend of Robi ...

. At the age of 18, he joined the family business as an apprentice when business was not going well because the

Napoleonic Wars The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...

had disrupted trade with Russia. However, the sales of India Pale Ale in India and southeast Asia were taking off by the 1820s.

Master brewer

Edouard Manet, A Bar at the Folies-Bergère

Bass took over control of the company in 1827 and continued the export focus on Asia. By 1832–33, the company was exporting 5,000 barrels of beer representing 40% of its output in that year. The coming of the railway to Burton in 1839 helped the growth of the business by reducing transport costs. The company had four agents in the 1830s in London,

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

, Stoke-on-Trent and

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1. ...

. By the 1880s, this had grown to twenty-one in Britain and another in Paris. The export trade was supplied by the agencies in London and Liverpool. Under Bass's leadership, company production and sales had grown enormously. Production of ale had grown to 340,000 barrels in 1860 and to almost a million barrels in the late 1870s. By 1881, the company had three breweries and 26

malthouse A malt house, malt barn, or maltings, is a building where cereal grain is converted into malt by soaking it in water, allowing it to sprout and then drying it to stop further growth. The malt is used in brewing beer, whisky and in certain food ...

s covering in Burton upon Trent. The company was Britain's biggest brewery and was one of its best known companies.

Member of Parliament

Statue to Michael Thomas Bass, Wardwick, Derby (6)

Bass was first elected as the member for

in 1848 and served until 1883. His obituary in the ''Brewers Journal'' stated that he was known more "in the House of Commons for his regular attendance than for any feats of oratory." He focussed on being a national advocate for the brewing industry against efforts by nonconformists within the Liberal Party to legislate against alcohol. Bass was an orthodox Liberal supporting

free trade Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. It can also be understood as the free market idea applied to international trade. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold econ ...

, low taxes and improving living standards for the working class. He promoted legislation to abolish imprisonment for small debtors. His legislation against

organ grinder A street organ (french: orgue de rue or ''orgue de barbarie''; german: Straßenorgel) played by an organ grinder is a French-German automatic mechanical pneumatic organ designed to be mobile enough to play its music in the street. The two most com ...

s on the grounds that they were street nuisances was less successful. Bass was a philanthropist both in Burton and Derby. His obituarists claimed that his contributions totalled £80,000, and that he had given Derby a new

library A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...

museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...

, school of art, recreation ground, and swimming baths. He was instrumental in the creation of the

Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants Amalgamation is the process of combining or uniting multiple entities into one form. Amalgamation, amalgam, and other derivatives may refer to: Mathematics and science * Amalgam (chemistry), the combination of mercury with another metal ** Pan am ...

. Bass represented Derby until the final years of his life.

William Ewart Gladstone William Ewart Gladstone ( ; 29 December 1809 – 19 May 1898) was a British statesman and Liberal politician. In a career lasting over 60 years, he served for 12 years as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, spread over four non-conse ...

offered Bass a peerage, which he declined, preferring to stay in the House of Commons.

Personal life

Bass married Eliza Jane Arden in 1835. They had two sons and two daughters. His elder son Michael Arthur took over the responsibility for running the company, represented Stafford in Parliament, and was elevated to the peerage in 1897 as Lord Burton. His other son Hamar Alfred also served as a member of Parliament (for Tamworth) but had gambling problems and was excluded from involvement in company affairs. One daughter, Emily, married Sir William Plowden, MP for Wolverhampton West, and the other, Alice, married Sir George Chetwode being the mother of Philip Lord Chetwode. – Biography of junior

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bass, Michael Thomas 1799 births 1884 deaths People from Burton upon Trent Liberal Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies English brewers Deputy Lieutenants in England UK MPs 1847–1852 UK MPs 1852–1857 UK MPs 1857–1859 UK MPs 1859–1865 UK MPs 1865–1868 UK MPs 1868–1874 UK MPs 1874–1880 UK MPs 1880–1885 19th-century English businesspeople