Metal tin from the early 20th century that originally contained 3lb of Mazawattee tea. 
The tin is illustrated with the story of Dick Whittington. John Boon Densham was a Plymouth based chemist in the 1850s, where he sold loose leaf tea under the slogan ‘the cup that cheers but does not inebriate.’ He left the chemists to pursue a career in tea. By 1865 the family business had grown into an important tea firm by the name of Lees and Densham. By 1873 the firm became Densham and Sons, based in London. The firm’s fortunes specialised in selling loose leaf tea that was blended and packed by individual family grocers. 

The younger son, John Lane Densham joined the company in 1881, taking over the running of the firm. John Boon Densham died in 1886. Mazawattee Tea Company, registered in 1887, became one the most important and widely advertised tea firms in Britain in the late 19th century. By 1898 it was the largest tea company in the world. They were famous for their advertising slogans and gimmicks, even using a small team of zebras to pull one of their vans in Kent in the early 1910s, along with a young driver in black face. Mazawattee tea takes its name from the Hindi word mazatha (luscious) and the Sinhalese word wattee (garden). Their advertising was sometimes of a racist nature. They used tea imported from Ceylon (Sri Lanka). Mazawattee boasted that its: “Teas from the choicest gardens of India and Ceylon - Empire grown throughout and brought by Empire ships - are dealt with by a British firm employing British labour.” Although, unlike Lipton’s, Mazzawattee Tea Company did not own any plantations, the brand became strongly associated with the British Empire. 

One of the main ways in which people came into contact with the Empire was through foodstuffs directly imported to Britain from the Empire. However, the company, which also branched out into coffee and hot chocolate, declined, and with the increased taxes on tea during WWI, rationing and the destruction of their head office through bombing in 1940, the company closed its doors in the 1960s. It was re-established in the 21st century, collaborating with Fairtrade producers and the Rainforest Alliance. Tea rose in importance with the Temperance Movement in the 19th century and items such as this show the importance of tea and cocoa in the anti-alcohol stance. In 1882 tea-loving Prime Minister William Gladstone told Parliament “The domestic use of tea as a powerful champion able to encounter alcoholic drink in a fair field and throw it a fair fight.” The Dutch started to import tea in the 16th century – it spread from there to western Europe but remained a drink for the wealthy. Catherine of Braganza, wife of Charles II, made it fashionable in the UK. 

The East India Company seized on this and began to import tea into Britain, shipping it from Java. The East India Company (founded in 1600 and who had begun using and transporting enslaved people in Asia and the Atlantic in the early 1600s) had the monopoly on all trade from the East. When tea came into Britain, their ships transported it and by the 18th century tea had replaced spices and silk as their most important cargo. By 1760 they were carrying 4.5 million tons a year into Britain. It had a high tax due in part to smuggling and tea was often adulterated with substances such as sheep dung to give it the necessary colour. William Pitt the Younger reduced the tax on tea in the 1784 Commutation Act, acting on advice of Richard Twining of Twining’s Tea Company (who were importing through the East India Company who had gained control of large parts of the Indian sub-continent where they initiated the beginnings of the British Raj and Hong Kong) making legal tea affordable. The trade in tea helped to strengthen and promote British Imperialism in Asia. 

Increase in popularity was also in a major part to sugar. Increase in sugar consumption led to more tea and increased the enslavement of African people multi-fold in the West Indies. By 1760s the annual duties on sugar imports were enough to maintain all the ships in the navy – a navy that helped to secure British dominance overseas. So, the increase of trading in enslaved people grew. Due to the increase in plantation agriculture, tea drinking also changed the economy and ecology of areas of India and Ceylon (Sri Lanka). The origins of blackface can date back to 18th century European theatrical performances, although it became a phenomenon in America post-Civil War (1861- 1865). The performances of white players with blackened faces wearing clothing that mimicked and mocked enslaved Africans on Southern plantations, characterizing them as lazy, ignorant, superstitious, hypersexual and prone to thievery and cowardice, were racially derisive and forced stereotypes that many white people came to accept. It continued to became popular in early 20th century culture, from Al Jolson through to Shirley Temple. 

In the UK the Black and White Minstrel Show ran for twenty years from 1958 and was seen by anti-racist groups such as the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (founded 1964) as being both racist and perpetuating racial stereotypes. However, the blackening of faces in the UK has not always been associated with racial stereotyping such as the Rebecca Rioters (1839-1843) who operated around Narberth and used to blacken their faces to avoid identification and some forms of folk dancing which are historically linked to chimney sweeping.