League table of London Burton Ales in the 1920's

Did I remember to tell you how much these Burton Ales cost? 9d a pint falling to 8d in 1923. By comparison, the different strengths of Mild were 7d, 6d and 5d, falling to 6d, 5d and 4d. just thought I'd get that out of the way.

Lots of tables is what you're in for. Tables which will prove . . . . I'm not quite sure. Let's take a look at the numbers and see if anything jumps out as at us.

To start, let's recap the Mild results:

League table of London Milds in the 1920's by score
Brewery	Beer	No. examples	no. bright	% bright	no. good flavour	% good flavour	average score
Mann	X	15	10	66.67%	11	73.33%	1.33
Watney	X	17	16	94.12%	15	88.24%	1.25
Wenlock	X	12	8	66.67%	10	83.33%	1.17
Whitbread	MA	3	0	0.00%	2	66.67%	0.67
Cannon	X	14	9	64.29%	9	64.29%	0.54
Truman	X	14	11	78.57%	9	64.29%	0.5
Lion Brewery	X	10	5	50.00%	6	60.00%	0.40
Courage	X	16	15	93.75%	11	68.75%	0.38
Hoare	X	10	7	70.00%	7	70.00%	0.30
Huggins	X	10	6	60.00%	7	70.00%	0.20
Meux	X	11	6	54.55%	6	54.55%	0
Whitbread	X	5	3	60.00%	2	40.00%	-0.2
Meux	MA	7	4	57.14%	2	28.57%	-0.57
Truman	MA	8	4	50.00%	2	25.00%	-0.63
Barclay Perkins	X	14	1	7.14%	5	35.71%	-0.64
Charrington	X	10	3	30.00%	5	50.00%	-0.70
City of London	X	12	4	33.33%	3	25.00%	-1.25
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001

A good showing for Mann, Watney and Wenlock. Disappointing from Charrington, Barclay Perkins and, Truman and Meux. The number of beers with negative score was 6 from 17, or 35%. The average of all scores was just positive, 0.16.

You can see that the scores for Burton were generally higher:

League table of London Burton Ales in the 1920's by score
Brewery	FG	OG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	score
Whitbread	1010.6	1053.2	5.56	80.26%	1.33
Courage	1012.1	1052.5	5.25	76.95%	1.25
Mann	1011.7	1053.9	5.49	78.31%	1.25
Meux	1009.7	1053.3	5.69	81.69%	1.11
Charrington	1014.6	1054.5	5.19	73.28%	1.00
Wenlock	1011.2	1052.5	5.38	78.69%	1.00
Lion	1012.6	1053.7	5.35	76.47%	0.78
Watney	1013.4	1058.7	5.90	77.11%	0.77
Truman	1013.4	1058.7	5.90	77.11%	0.77
Hoare	1017.2	1054.9	4.89	68.70%	0.67
Huggins	1012.5	1054.2	5.42	76.88%	0.67
City of London	1010.2	1051.3	5.36	80.03%	0.09
Barclay Perkins	1010.8	1052.4	5.42	79.41%	-0.18
Cannon	1013.3	1052.8	5.13	74.77%	-0.73
Average	1012.4	1054.0	5.42	77.12%	0.70
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001

Only 2 from 14, or 14%, of the beers had negative scores. And the average of all scores was a reasonable 0.70.

I think we can ignore Whitbread because of the small sample size. Mann and Wenlock both place high again, while there's a big improvement for Meux and Charrington. City of London and Barclay Perkins again do badly. This is really sad. It's starting to look as if Barclay's beers were mostly shit.

I've combined the placings for Mild and Burton to come up with an overall league table:

Brewery	Burton	Mild	Total
Mann	3	1	4
Whitbread	1	4	5
Wenlock	6	3	9
Courage	2	8	10
Watney	8	2	10
Lion	7	7	14
Meux	4	11	15
Truman	9	6	15
Cannon	14	5	19
Hoare	10	9	19
Charrington	5	16	21
Huggins	11	10	21
Barclay Perkins	13	15	28
City of London	12	17	29

Mann is the clear winner, followed by, if we ignore Whitbread, by Wenlock, Courage and Watney. This is odd. Three of the top four later became Big Six breweries. I really don't know what that tells us.

Time for the next table. This includes details of the number of bright and well-flavoured examples:

League table of London Burton Ales in the 1920's by score
Brewery	No. examples	no. bright	% bright	no. good flavour	% good flavour	average score
Whitbread	3	1	33.33%	3	100.00%	1.33
Courage	12	6	50.00%	9	75.00%	1.25
Mann	12	6	50.00%	10	83.33%	1.25
Meux	9	4	44.44%	6	66.67%	1.11
Truman	11	6	54.55%	9	81.82%	1.09
Charrington	9	6	66.67%	7	77.78%	1.00
Wenlock	9	4	44.44%	7	77.78%	1.00
Lion	9	2	22.22%	6	66.67%	0.78
Watney	13	9	69.23%	9	69.23%	0.77
Hoare	9	2	22.22%	5	55.56%	0.67
Huggins	9	4	44.44%	7	77.78%	0.67
City of London	11	3	27.27%	5	45.45%	0.09
Barclay Perkins	11	3	27.27%	6	54.55%	-0.18
Cannon	11	5	45.45%	3	27.27%	-0.73
total	138	61	44.20%	92	66.67%
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001

As I suspected, the level of clarity is rubbish: fewer than 50% of the examples were bright. Flavour is much better, with two-thirds getting positive scores. Six breweries had 75% or more of their samples with good flavour. I think that's not bad going. Probably as good, if not better, than today.

Finally, the same table but ordered by the percentage of beers that were clear:

League table of London Burton Ales in the 1920's by clarity
Brewery	No. examples	no. bright	% bright	no. good flavour	% good flavour	average score
Watney	13	9	69.23%	9	69.23%	0.77
Charrington	9	6	66.67%	7	77.78%	1.00
Truman	11	6	54.55%	9	81.82%	1.09
Courage	12	6	50.00%	9	75.00%	1.25
Mann	12	6	50.00%	10	83.33%	1.25
Cannon	11	5	45.45%	3	27.27%	-0.73
Meux	9	4	44.44%	6	66.67%	1.11
Wenlock	9	4	44.44%	7	77.78%	1.00
Huggins	9	4	44.44%	7	77.78%	0.67
Whitbread	3	1	33.33%	3	100.00%	1.33
City of London	11	3	27.27%	5	45.45%	0.09
Barclay Perkins	11	3	27.27%	6	54.55%	-0.18
Lion	9	2	22.22%	6	66.67%	0.78
Hoare	9	2	22.22%	5	55.56%	0.67
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/001

There's some correlation between good scores and clarity, but not a complete one. Standing out is City of London, slightly above half way for clarity, in the bottom three for score.

My conclusions? That draught Burton was mostly in reasonably good nick in 1920's London, if not always perfectly bright. And draught Burton was a safer bet than draught Mild.