A Treatise on Adulterations of Food and Culinary Poisons

Frederick Accum (or Freidrich Christian Accum) was a German chemist who held immense faith in chemistry’s potential to benefit the general populace. As well as developing innovations in gas lighting, Accum strove to ensure that the public’s food supply was free from dangerous additions. Between 1793 and 1821, Accum lived in London, a firsthand witness to the deleterious effects of rapid industrialisation on working-class well-being. Starting his career as an apothecary, Accum later opened his own commercial laboratory enterprise.