John Boston was an early Australian migrant who was known for plying his hand at a number of different trades including salt farming and

brewing 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, fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with Yeast#Beer, yeast. It may be done in a brewery ...

. Boston opened a brewery in 1796 making a form of

corn beer Corn beer is a beer style made from corn (maize). The drink is a traditional beverage in various cuisines. Chicha, the best-known corn beer, is widespread in the Andes and local varieties of corn beer exist elsewhere. History Corn beer in the ...

Early life

Australia bound

As a young man Boston hovered on the outskirts of the

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

circle of radicals and, like

Joseph Priestley Joseph Priestley (; 24 March 1733 – 6 February 1804) was an English chemist, Unitarian, Natural philosophy, natural philosopher, English Separatist, separatist theologian, Linguist, grammarian, multi-subject educator and Classical libera ...

, became a staunch republican. Perhaps because of his political opinions he decided to leave 'reactionary England' in 1793, and in December recommended himself to the

Colonial Office The Colonial Office was a government department of the Kingdom of Great Britain and later of the United Kingdom, first created in 1768 from the Southern Department to deal with colonial affairs in North America (particularly the Thirteen Colo ...

as a trained surgeon and apothecary, versed in the arts of brewing and with 'theoretical and some practical knowledge of agriculture'. The secretary of state agreed to his going, hoped he would prove useful, and urged Governor John Hunter to keep him. He sailed with his wife and three children in the ''Surprize'' which left Spithead (1794 May 2) going via Rio de Janeiro to Sydney (1794 Oct 25).http://www.blaxland.com/ozships/year/arrive/1794/8.htm Convictions (Australian shipping 1788–1968) Having been sent out by government to supply the

colony A colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule, which rules the territory and its indigenous peoples separated from the foreign rulers, the colonizer, and their ''metropole'' (or "mother country"). This separated rule was often orga ...

with salted fish, Boston had at some time offered to procure and salt fish for the settlement; but he required boats and men, and more assistance than it was possible to supply. He proposed to try his trade at

Broken Bay Broken Bay, a semi-mature tide-dominated ria, drowned valley estuary, is a large inlet of the Tasman Sea located about north of Sydney on the Central Coast (New South Wales), Central Coast of New South Wales, Australia; being one of the bodies ...

.https://www.gutenberg.org/files/12565/12565-8.txt An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Volume 1, By David Collins

In Sydney town

In August 1795 due to the insufficient supplies of salted provisions, salt became scarce. Amongst other useful knowledge Boston professed to possess, he offered his skills at making salt from seawater. As it was much wanted, his offers were accepted and an eligible spot at Bennelong's Point (as the east point of the cove had long been named) had been chosen. He began his operations, for which he had seven

convict A convict is "a person found guilty of a crime and sentenced by a court" or "a person serving a sentence in prison". Convicts are often also known as "prisoners" or "inmates" or by the slang term "con", while a common label for former convicts ...

s assigned to him, whose labour, however, only produced three or four

bushel A bushel (abbreviation: bsh. or bu.) is an Imperial unit, imperial and United States customary units, US customary unit of volume, based upon an earlier measure of dry capacity. The old bushel was used mostly for agriculture, agricultural pr ...

s of salt in more than as many weeks.

Brewing

In 1796, with the aid of an encyclopedia, Boston produced the first fermented alcohol beverage made at Sydney, which sold for 1s 6d (1

shilling The shilling is a historical coin, and the name of a unit of modern currency, currencies formerly used in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, other British Commonwealth countries and Ireland, where they were generally equivalent to 1 ...

, 6

pence A penny is a coin (: pennies) or a unit of currency (: pence) in various countries. Borrowed from the Carolingian denarius (hence its former abbreviation d.), it is usually the smallest denomination within a currency system. At present, it is t ...

). The

, being made by Boston, was brewed from properly malted

maize Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from wild teosinte. Native American ...

and bittered with the leaves and stalks of the love apple, ( Lycopersicum, a species of Solanum), or as it was more commonly called in the settlement, the Cape gooseberry. Boston found this succeeded so well, that he erected at some expense a building for the business and was engaged in brewing and making soap.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Boston, John History of New South Wales English emigrants to colonial Australia 1804 deaths Australian brewers Australian company founders 18th-century Australian inventors Year of birth unknown Australian beer brands

Early life

Australia bound

In Sydney town

Brewing

See also

References