Nine official orders from the Narberth Union Workhouse order book, on blue paper with the printer's name, Knight & Co, 90 Fleet Street, London, to James Williams. This was donated by Bridget Lee Davies (1915 -2009), a long-time supporter of Narberth Museum. 

The Workhouse was built at Upper Providence Hill on the outskirts of Narberth in 1838, opening on 16 January 1839. This came about as a result of the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 which introduced a system of workhouses to provide relief to the poor and saw parishes joined together in unions and poorhouses were replaced by a central workhouse run by an elected board of guardians. 

Narberth Poor Law Union was formed on 6 January 1837 and its board of 48 guardians represented 46 constituent parishes. The workhouse was built to house 150 inmates. The architect, William Owen, had designed the nearby Haverfordwest workhouse. In 1843 the workhouse was attacked by Rebecca Rioters who were campaigning against the introduction of road tolls. After 1930 the workhouse was redesignated at a Public Assistance Institution, later becoming known as Narberth Lodge Hospital. In the late 1940s it became an aged care home facility. Sold into private ownership in 1965, it finally closed in 1972. The building, now altered, still stands and is known as Allensbank. These orders date from 1865 and were addressed to James Williams to supply the workhouse groceries, which included tea, sugar, peas, sweeping and scrubbing brushes. These are filled in and signed by the clerk, John Miles. James Williams was established in his shop in Market Street, Narberth by this time. 

These bills reveal the vast reach of the British Empire, demonstrating how a product shipped from across the globe could become a staple in even the humblest of settings. Tea, once a luxury item, had become so engrained in British society that it was considered a necessity, even for the destitute. 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).