Frederic Richard Lees (15 March 1815 – 29 May 1897) was an English temperance advocate and

vegetarian Vegetarianism is the practice of abstaining from the consumption of meat (red meat, poultry, seafood, insects, and the flesh of any other animal). It may also include abstaining from eating all by-products of animal slaughter. Vegetarianism m ...

Biography

Lees was born in

Meanwood Meanwood is a suburb and former village in north-west Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. The area sits in the Moortown ward of Leeds City Council and Leeds North East parliamentary constituency. Origins and history The name Meanwood goes back t ...

, near

Leeds Leeds () is a city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the third-largest settlement (by populati ...

. Lees signed the antispirits pledge in 1832 and became

teetotaller Teetotalism is the practice or promotion of total personal abstinence from the psychoactive drug alcohol, specifically in alcoholic drinks. A person who practices (and possibly advocates) teetotalism is called a teetotaler or teetotaller, or is ...

in 1835.Blocker, Jack S. Fahey, David M; Tyrrell, Ian R. (2003). ''Alcohol and Temperance in Modern History: An International Enclyopedia, Volume 1''. ABC-CLIO. pp. 364-365. He worked as a teetotalism activist and authored books on the subject. In 1837, he became the Secretary for the British Association for the Promotion of Temperance (British Temperance League) and edited its journal from 1840–1844. He edited ''Truth-Seeker'' from 1844–1850, the ''Teetotal Topic'' in 1847 and the ''Temperance Spectator'' in 1859. He was a founding member of the

United Kingdom Alliance The United Kingdom Alliance (UKA) was a temperance movement in the United Kingdom, temperance movement in the United Kingdom founded in 1853 in Manchester to work for the prohibition of the trade in alcohol (drug), alcohol in the United Kingdom. ...

in 1863. Lees was a vegetarian and occasionally lectured on vegetarianism. In 1857, he won a

Vegetarian Society The Vegetarian Society of the United Kingdom is a British registered charity which was established on 30 September 1847 to promote vegetarianism. History In the 19th century a number of groups in Britain actively promoted and followed meat ...

essay competition which was republished in 1884. He became an associate member of the Vegetarian Society in 1874. Lees obtained an honorary doctorate from

University of Giessen University of Giessen, official name Justus Liebig University Giessen (german: Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen), is a large public research university in Giessen, Hesse, Germany. It is named after its most famous faculty member, Justus von L ...

for his writings against

Owenism Owenism is the utopian socialist philosophy of 19th-century social reformer Robert Owen and his followers and successors, who are known as Owenites. Owenism aimed for radical reform of society and is considered a forerunner of the cooperative mov ...

. Lees married Mary Jowett in 1838, they had two children; she died in 1870. In 1878, he married Sarah Barnesley (née Brooks), who died in 1889. Lees died on 29 May 1897, in

Halifax, West Yorkshire Halifax () is a minster and market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale in West Yorkshire, England. It is the commercial, cultural and administrative centre of the borough, and the headquarters of Calderdale Council. In the 15th cen ...

Selected publications

''Owenism Dissected''
(1838)
''An Argument on Behalf of the Primitive Diet of Man''
(1857)
''Essays Physiological and Critical on the Principles of Temperance''
(1857)
''National Temperance Testimonial of One Thousand Guineas to Dr. Frederic Richard Lees''
(1860)
''An Inquiry into the Reasons and Results of the Prescription of Intoxicating Liquors in the Practice of Medicine''
(1866)
''Textbook of Temperance''
(1869) *
The Temperance Bible-commentary: Giving at One View, Version, Criticism, and Exposition, in Regard to All Passages of Holy Writ Bearing on 'wine' and 'strong Drink', Or Illustrating the Principles of the Temperance Reformation
' (1870)
''The Science Temperance Text-Book''
(1884)
''The Temperance Movement and its Workers: A Record of Social, Moral, Religious, and Political Progress''
(with Peter Turner Winskill, 1891)

Biography

Selected publications

References

Further reading