‘The True Story of HP Sauce… That’s the title of a new book – but the Nottingham man who produced the original recipe hardly gets a mention.’

‘Here Mr Garton’s son John reveals the fascinating story of his father to Andy Bucklow….’

For years Mr John Garton has lived with the knowledge that his father never received the credit he deserved for devising the original recipes for the legendery HP and Daddies Sauces.

Mr Garton who is 75 and lives with his wife at East Bridgford was content to let the matter fade into history – until actor Dinsdale Landen and his actress wife Jennifer Daniel decided to venture into prose to “uncover the real story.”

Their version of events does no justice Frederick Gibson Garton who, whatever tales you wish to believe, was the undisputed brains behind the stuff we pour over our eggs and bacon each moring.

Nickname

“Everybody in Nottingham knew he invented HP Sauce. But the old man wouldn’t speak about it with anyone because it had gone to the Midland Vinegar Company.” said Mr Garton, who was even nicknamed  ‘HP’ during his days at Nottinghan High School.

“As far as I was concerned, it was history and that was the end of it. But now I think the record should be put straight.”

From an article appearing in the Nottingham ‘Evening Post’ on Wednesday, January 15, 1986.

Attached to the basket cart was a board, bearing in clumsily painted letters, the magic words ‘Garton’s HP Sauce.’

Mr Garton called the sauce HP because he had heard that his product had been used in the Houses of Parliament.

The book continues: Samson’s excitement knew no bounds. The Houses of Parliament! What more appropppriate symbol could be found for a sauce of national appeal? Within minutes, Mr Garton’s debt had been cancelled and £150 paid for the name and recipe of his sauce.

The jubilant Moores departed for Aston where a week later the little basket cart also arrived.

Mr garton himself leaves our story. Did he, one wonders, regret lacking the means to exploit  the own potential of his sauce.

Or did he perhaps, bask in the self-reflected glory on seeing his own name prominently displayed on the soon-to-be-famous bottles?

If the authors had taken the trouble to consult Mr John Garton of East Bridgford then they might  have found out.

Samson Moore, “launched” HP Sauce on the world.

In 1899, Mr Garton owed money to Mr Moore and his Midland Vinegar Company.

Samson and Eddie Moore, on a quest for a sauce, decided to pay Mr Garton’s Arkwright Street shop a call. There then followed a “meeting” in the back room.

The book says: Entering the store they were met by a shamefaced Mr Garton. But Samson was no ogre and tactfully suggested that they talked in the back of the shop away from any curious customers.

Mrs Garton was bidden to mind the shop and the Moores were ushered to the rear of the building. Here, in a washhouse cooper, a sauce was brewing, a sauce that smelled uncommonly good. It promised to fulfil Mrs Beeton’s dictum that a sauce should not be ‘too piquant on the one hand, or too mawkish on the other.’

Small Basket

Suddenly Samson’s attention was caught by a small basket cart standing lopsidedly in the yard. In a blinding moment of revelation he knew that his quest was at an end.