The real history of India pale ale and the voyage myths

The popular story

The usual version goes like this. British troops in India wanted beer. Ordinary beer spoiled on the long voyage. A clever brewer invented a strong, heavily hopped ale that survived the trip. IPA was born. It is a neat story. Parts of it are true. Much of it is not.

Beer was shipped to India long before IPA

British beer was exported to India from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Ships of the East India Company carried many kinds: porter, pale ale, small beer and strong ales. Some arrived in good condition and some did not. The voyage around the Cape of Good Hope took four to six months, through tropical heat. It was hard on every beer.

Brewers already knew that well-hopped, well-made beer travelled better. Hops have mild preservative properties. Strong beers resist spoilage. That knowledge predates any beer called India pale ale.

Hodgson and the Bow brewery

George Hodgson's Bow brewery in east London, near the East India Company's docks, became a major supplier of beer to India in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His pale ale, often a type of strong, well-hopped October beer intended for keeping, did well in India. The voyage seems to have matured it, much as months in a cellar would.

Hodgson did not invent a new style for India. He sold a type of beer that already existed. He sold it well, helped by his location and his credit terms with the ships' officers.

Burton takes over

In the 1820s brewers in Burton upon Trent, who had built a trade exporting beer to the Baltic, lost much of that market to Russian tariffs. Looking for new trade, they turned to India. Burton's water is hard and rich in gypsum, which gives a clean, firm bitterness and helps pale beers clear well. Burton pale ales did very well in India and in Britain.

The name India pale ale appears in print from around the 1830s. By then it described pale, well-hopped ales associated with the Indian trade. The beers were becoming popular at home too. Our guide to English IPA describes the style that grew from this.

The myths, one by one

IPA was invented for India. Not really. It grew from existing pale and October beers that happened to travel well.

It was brewed much stronger to survive the voyage. Historians have found that India ales were often not dramatically stronger than other pale ales of the time. Their hopping was high. They were well attenuated, which helped stability.

Troops drank it. Ordinary soldiers mostly drank porter and cheaper beer. Pale ale was more often drunk by officers and civilians who could afford it.

One brewer did it all. Hodgson was important. Burton made the style famous. Many brewers shaped it over several decades. None of them set out to create a famous style.

Why the myths stuck

The neat version is a good story. Good stories travel. They are easier to fit on a label than a shipping ledger. In the late twentieth century, as American craft brewers revived and transformed IPA, the voyage legend became part of the style's marketing. Some of this history has been carefully corrected by beer historians working from brewery records, shipping logs and newspapers, though the old version still appears on labels and menus.

From Burton to modern IPA

Modern IPA has travelled a long way from those Burton pale ales. American brewers turned it into a showcase for citrusy, piney and tropical hops. Our guides to West Coast IPA and New England IPA describe what came next. In India, IPA has come home in a sense, now brewed fresh in brewpubs from Bengaluru to Gurugram rather than shipped for months around Africa. Many Indian brewpubs keep one on tap year round. The hop varieties in them would have astonished the Burton brewers.

Tasting an English IPA next to a West Coast IPA is the quickest way to feel two centuries of change in a single sip: earthy and bready against bright and resinous. Learning to describe those differences is a skill and a rewarding one.

Common questions

Was IPA invented for India?

Not exactly. Pale, well-hopped beers were already being shipped to India. The name India pale ale appeared later, around the 1830s, for pale ales associated with the Indian trade.

Was IPA much stronger than other beers?

Historians have found that India ales were often not dramatically stronger than other pale ales of their time. Good hopping and attenuation helped them travel.

Why was Burton important to IPA?

Burton brewers turned to India in the 1820s after losing Baltic trade. Their hard, gypsum-rich water suited pale, bitter ales, which became famous.