Up until the 20th Century bread had long been the staple food of the British Poor in both the city and the country: From the middle-ages black, brown and white bread were ever present through plenty and want and little was to change for centuries, especially for the better. Even as late as the 1890's bread was the only solid food in over 80% of the meals for the majority of children in Bethnal Green.
As the primary food of the people, the “staff of life”, bread has proved to be a hugely important not just as cause, but as buffer, to social unrest and revolution: In 1789 French women marched on Versailles driven by the price of bread; in 2011 millions took to the streets across North Africa and the Middle-East under the slogan 'bread, freedom and dignity; yet in 1848 English bread prices and its political structure were stabilised by cheap wheat as a wave of revolutions swept through Europe; and today...
