From books and baby bottles to makeup and billiard balls, even common household objects could be lethal in the 19th century.
However, it could cause health issues like anemia, bone fractures, necrosis of the jaw, and leukemia.Alf van Beem/Wikimedia Commons
The Victorian Era was one of elegance and sophistication. It was a time of exciting new inventions, like the telegraph and the telephone. And, thanks to these deadly Victorian objects, it was a dangerous time to be alive.
Victorians loved color — which meant that clothing, books, bottles, and glassware were often steeped in arsenic, which produced an electric shade of green when mixed with copper. They cared about their appearance — but cosmetic items like face powders, hair restorers, and soap contained dangerous chemicals. And even newly-discovered materials, like radium and Parkesine, turned out to be lethal.
In the gallery above, look through some of the most dangerous Victorian objects that people actually kept in their homes, used on their bodies, or gave to their children. And read on below to learn more about some of the dangers that Victorians faced in their everyday lives.
The Deadly Victorian Obsession With Emerald Green
Metropolitan Museum of ArtGreen dresses were very popular among Victorian women, but many of them contained arsenic — which could cause health problems or even death.
At the end of the 18th century, inventor Carl Wilhelm Scheele created a vibrant shade of green by mixing arsenic and copper. Previously, this color could only be produced by overlaying yellow with blue (or blue with yellow). But Scheele had produced a brand new color, "emerald green" or "Paris green," which Victorians eagerly incorporated into their daily lives.
The lively green color appeared on dresses, wallpapers, books, paints, artificial flowers, and other objects. Victorians especially liked that it retained its bright shade in natural light and under gas light. Even Queen Victoria was a fan of the hue. However, items made with arsenic were highly toxic.
Not only could arsenic-tinged dyes could cause skin lesions, but the mere act of sweating could pull arsenic from the fabric and into the bloodstream. This, in turn, could cause the liver and kidneys to shut down. Women who wore arsenic dresses might also start vomiting up blood or losing their hair.
"Well may the fascinating wearer of it be called a killing creature," the British Medical Journal wrote in 1862. "She actually carries in her skirts poison enough to slay the whole of the admirers she may meet with in half a dozen ball-rooms."
Despite this, emerald green remained popular in the 1870s and 1880s. Deadly Victorian objects like wallpaper, book covers, and even bottles contained arsenic. They were beautiful — but lethal.
Wellcome CollectionThough people became aware of the dangers of arsenic as the Victorian Era went on, emerald green remained a popular color.
In fact, dresses made with arsenic dyes were hardly the only dangerous items of clothing that Victorians liked. Women often wore hats decorated with taxidermy birds — which also included arsenic — and men favored top hats that sometimes contained mercury nitrate. This chemical compound could cause heavy metal poisoning, and it's where the expression "mad as a hatter" originated.
When it came to the Victorian home, however, there was one room in particular that was full of dangerous objects: the bathroom.
The Dangers Of The Victorian Bathroom
Public DomainA bathroom from 1903.
Assuming you made it up the narrow stairs — another deadly object during the Victorian Era — to the bathroom, you would be faced with a number of dangers.
First, there was the soap. Just like emerald green dresses, books, and wallpaper, Victorian soap sometimes contained arsenic. Though some advertisers promised that the arsenic in their product was "absolutely harmless," the soap could cause skin lesions.
If you were a Victorian woman concerned about her complexion, you were in even greater danger. You might be tempted to pick up a box of "Safe Arsenic Complexion Wafers" at the pharmacy, which promised to treat freckles, blackheads, pimples, "muddy" skins, and other blemishes.
National Museum of American HistoryA box of "Dr. James P. Campbell's Safe Arsenic Complexion Wafers" from 1887.
Plus, the bathroom itself could be a dangerous place. Bathtubs were often filled with scalding water, which meant that Victorians could burn themselves if they weren't careful. And the BBC reports that some Victorian bathrooms even exploded because methane and hydrogen sulfide, which built up in the sewers, could be ignited with an open flame.
But these were hardly the only dangers facing Victorians in their day-to-day lives.
In the gallery above, learn more about other deadly Victorian objects. See how children's lives were threatened by both milk bottles — later dubbed "murder bottles" — and their lead-covered toys. Discover how new materials like Parkesine and radium proved to be dangerous. And, most of all, count your blessings that you live today and not back then — when even something as innocuous as a book or a paperweight could be full of deadly poisons.
After looking through this gallery of deadly Victorian objects, see 43 colorized photos of Victorian London. Then, go inside the disturbing history of Victorian death photos.
