The British Tin Can and the British Navy

The British are credited with inventing canned food. In 1810 a merchant named Peter Durand patented the design for a can that would preserve food. By 1813 John Hall and Bryan Dorkin opened the first real canning factory. The tins were made of heavy black wrought iron and sealed airtight. It took six hours to cook up the contents for just one can.

These early tin cans were so heavy and thick that they had to be hit with a hammer until they split open.  Later thinner cans would be made that could be easily accessed with a can opener.  Like now, canned goods had a typical shelf life of about five years. This ability to store food for the winter was a boon for industrial revolution England. The only problem is that only the rich could really afford to buy the precious preserved foods which would be also be put on British ships and used to feed the navy. In 1824 Sir William Edward Parry took canned beef and pea soup with him on his voyage to the Arctic in HMS Fury, during his search for a northwestern passage to India. In 1829, Admiral Sir James Ross also took canned food to the Arctic, as did Sir John Franklin in 1845.

It was also a Brit, named Henry Evans, who created a machine that would make tin cans fast. Before 1846 only six cans could be made an hour. He invented one that could spit out sixty cans in an hour. Food could also be cooked or preserved directly inside the can and thus make the entire process more hygienic and also easier to ship and handle.

Pasteurization, boiling, refrigeration, vacuum treatment, radiation and immersion in sugar or saline liquids are a way of preserving food in cans. Lead soldering, which was poisonous, was used to seal the cans initially and that was eventually blamed for the disastrous outcome of the 1845 Franklin expedition. By 1900 sanitary cans, which had double seams were invented and made food impervious to contamination and rot.  This process also helps preserve the vitamins and dietary fiber in the food.

Canned goods, first bought in bulk by the British navy from Peter Dolkin who reported selling three thousand pounds worth of the stuff, are now on the shelves of every British household and includes such goods as Spam, oysters, hotdogs, onion rings, ravioli, Irish stew, pork and beans and even coq au vin.