Beet Sugar Industry

But the great example indicating the importance of the Continental System for industrial development that is usually cited is the manufacture of beet sugar; and there certainly is a kernel of truth in this, if one only recalls what was said above regarding the character of the effects distinctive of such times.

The fact is that it is far from true that the possibility of obtaining sugar from beets was a novelty dating from the time of the Continental System. As early as the year 1747, the German chemist Marggraf, of Berlin, had discovered that sugar beets contained the same substance as sugar cane; and from the close of the eighteenth century another German chemist, Achard, had worked incessantly on experiments in the production of beet sugar. In a raw-sugar factory located on his Silesian estate, Kunern, Achard had even succeeded in producing sugar and had published his results in 1809; but no manufacture of importance had arisen in consequence of all this. Achard's fate exhibits a great resemblance to that of Leblanc some ten years earlier, in spite of the fact that a domestic production of sugar had also been the subject of investigation in France, through a committee appointed by the Institut de France in 1800. Thus the matter was technically in a fairly advanced state, though it served no economic purpose as long as it was possible to procure colonial sugar under something like the old conditions. When those conditions were changed, therefore, it is not at all surprising that advantage was taken of the theoretical results already attained; on the contrary, there is more reason to be astonished that there was so long a delay before it was determined to replace colonial sugar in this way. Before that the shortage of sugar had had time to make itself very perceptible. At Leipzig the price of sugar rose almost uninterruptedly until 1813, when it was approximately three and one-half times the amount it had been seven years earlier; and in Paris the price rose first (1810) to four francs per livre, and later (1812) to six francs, or approximately eight and twelve francs, respectively, per kg. Meanwhile, the London quotations for even the best qualities of sugar during 1812 corresponded to between 1.35 and 2 francs per kg., that is to say, from one-fourth to one-ninth of the French price.

Naturally enough, therefore, people had at a much earlier date begun to search the Continent for a substitute, and there was scarcely any substance containing sugar that was not employed before they came to the beet. Honey, whey, chestnuts, pears, apples, maize, maple, potatoes, figs, cherries, plums, sea-weed, and finally grapes were tried. Grape sugar was the first stage, and as much as 2,000,000 kgs. were manufactured in the years 1810-11 and given a bounty; but this syrup, which was black and did not crystallize, was repulsive and had an unpleasant odour.

At this time, however, the cultivation of sugar beets had already been started, and the manufacture of beet sugar had begun at several places, especially at Passy by the firm of Delessert. It is only natural that enthusiasm was great when the result appeared; and it was alleged, assuredly for that time with great exaggeration, that the product could not be distinguished from cane sugar. There followed a visit (dramatically described by Chaptal in his Memoirs) by Napoleon to Delessert, who was decorated by the Emperor and regarded as a pioneer. The imperial administration took the matter in hand, in accordance with its usual methods, by means of measures which ran exactly parallel with the treatment of the manufacture of indigo, and which followed one another in rapid succession. A prohibition was established on the importation of colonial sugar, and it was ordered that beets should be cultivated first on 32,000 hectares and afterwards on 100,000 hectares, which order, it is true, was never carried out. It was ordered further that there should be four imperial sugar factories, and a special one in Rambouillet. There is no question that this gave rise to a lively development of both the culture of sugar beets and the manufacture of sugar, not least among the German-speaking people residing within and without the borders of the empire, and experimentally as far north as Denmark. And Napoleon's organs made all that could be made of this success in the work of becoming independent of the supply by sea. Thus the home secretary, in his survey of the condition of the empire submitted to the Corps législatif in February 1813, stated how it had seemed an impossibility to find anything to replace sugar, indigo, cochineal, soda, and cotton; but 'we have exercised a strong will, and the impossible has been accomplished through our efforts'. From the year 1813 onward, he held out prospects of a manufacture of 7,000,000 livres (nearly 3,500,000 kgs.) of sugar in 334 factories, which were stated to be 'almost all' at work; and this he considered to correspond to at least half of the demand, which had diminished greatly owing to the rise of price.

As usual, the reality was somewhat less brilliant. According to the home secretary's own report to Napoleon later in the year, it turned out that, owing to ignorance and unfavourable weather, they had only got 1,100,000 kgs. of sugar and that of the 334 licences issued only 158 had been actually used; and if one may believe a statement made by the director-general of manufactures and trades immediately after the Restoration, the quality of the sugar placed on the market was so bad that it had created a prejudice against the home product. As a matter of fact, the retrograde tendency began as early as that same year (1813), and afterwards the fall of the empire drew with it the decline of the industry, so that not a single one of the sugar factories held its own. But after only two years two new factories were started, one of them by Chaptal on his estate at Chanteloup. A high duty on colonial sugar set the manufacture of beet sugar on its feet toward the close of the 'twenties, so that the contribution of the Continental System on this point turned out to bear fruit after the lapse of a decade and a half. Thus the sugar beet industry stands, by the side of the Leblanc soda, as an evidence that a blockade may, in certain cases, remove some of the obstacles that stand in the way of an important economic development.