Chester Temperance Union

From London Midland & Scottish Railway Collection. Chester Temperance Union conference at Eaton Hall, Cheshire, photographed by a London & North Western Railway photographer, 1913.

The temperance movement, which advocated abstention from alcohol, exercised a strong influence in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in Britain. Many people were encouraged to "take the pledge" and give up alcoholic drinks, although the promise was often swiftly broken!