Burton Ale during WW II

As a strong beer, it’s obvious that Burton was subjected to big cuts in its gravity during the war. As a quite a popular beer, the cuts were even more inevitable. Though the profile of gravity changes was very different compared to that in WW I.

In the first war, there was only a slight reduction in gravity up until April 1917. That the cuts – ever more drastic – piled up at an accelerating pace. While in WW II, there was a gradual reduction in gravity until the middle of 1942, after which things stabilised for a couple of years. Whitbread Burton Ale demonstrates this trend perfectly.

Whitbread’s Burton is slightly atypical of the style, in that it started rather stronger than the average, 1061º rather than the more usual 1055º. Which could explain why there was a name change in 1940 from 33 to XXXX. Neither of which is a standard name for Burton, which was usually called KK in the brew house.

Note the fall in the hopping rate in 1941. This was the direct result of intervention by the government, which in June 1941 cut by 20% the quantity of hops available to brewers.  Though in the case of XXXX the drop from 8.5 lbs to 6.5 lbs per quarter (336 lbs) of malt is a reduction of about 23%.

The table below is slightly deceptive as it makes it look as if XXXX remained unchanged in the latter war years. While the strength may have remained much the same, there were several changes to the recipe.

Whitbread Burton Ale 1939 - 1945
Date	Year	Beer	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
21st Sep	1939	33	1061	1020	5.42	67.21%	8.49	2.15
11th Apr	1940	33	1060	1019	5.42	68.33%	8.50	2.02
14th Aug	1940	XXXX	1052.8	1014.5	5.07	72.54%	8.50	1.83
16th Oct	1941	XXXX	1046.2	1012.5	4.46	72.94%	6.56	1.24
29th Jan	1942	XXXX	1044.4	1011.5	4.35	74.10%	6.55	1.18
28th May	1942	XXXX	1042.9	1013.5	3.89	68.53%	6.70	1.14
22nd Jul	1943	XXXX	1042.8	1013	3.94	69.63%	6.67	1.25
24th May	1944	XXXX	1042.9	1011	4.22	74.36%	6.64	1.19
8th June	1945	XXXX	1043.4	1014	3.89	67.74%	6.44	1.19
Sources:
Whitbread brewing records held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document numbers LMA/4453/D/01/107, LMA/4453/D/01/108, LMA/4453/D/01/109, LMA/4453/D/01/110, LMA/4453/D/01/111 and LMA/4453/D/01/112.