The Shadow of Great Britain

In a sense, placing The Sun newspaper, which has a forty-year publication history, alongside those truly obscure tabloids is a bit insulting to this paper, which once ranked as the second largest in circulation across Britain.

As one of the earliest penny papers in Britain, The Sun and The Times were once hailed as the twin stars of the British press in the early 19th century, with The Times dominating the morning papers, while The Sun was the leader among the evening papers.

But it is well known that due to the existence of stamp taxes, advertisement taxes, and paper taxes, most of these self-proclaimed low-priced newspapers had issues with tax evasion. The Times could maintain its long existence because they were very clean on tax matters and they did not take a low-price route.

When The Sun was founded, apart from effective and timely news reports, it relied on the low-price advantage derived from not paying stamp taxes.

Logically speaking, a newspaper company like The Sun, with such large circulation and public influence, should have been targeted by the Treasury’s tax officials long ago.

But...

How did this newspaper manage to operate for forty years under the premise of tax evasion without any harm?

Is it a miracle?

Or magic?

Of course not!

It was because The Sun was co-opted from the very beginning.

To describe it as co-opted might be inaccurate. Precisely, the founding of The Sun was initiated by John Herryot, who was recruited by the Treasury to establish it. Moreover, during Herryot’s tenure, The Sun’s operating funds were secretly provided by members of the Tory Party government in the form of private donations.

Herryot founded the evening paper The Sun on October 1, 1792, and with government support rapidly rose to become the second-largest newspaper in Britain, only after The Times. By 1793, he used the same trick again to launch the morning paper Pure British, which also received funding from the Treasury and retained a strong pro-government stance. Pure British continued to publish for eleven years, ceasing in 1804.

Mr. Herryot resigned from his role as editor-in-chief of The Sun in 1806, and the Tory Party, to recognize Herryot’s outstanding contributions to the conservative cause on the media front, appointed him to the Lottery Committee shortly after he announced his departure from the news industry.

For Herryot personally, this was undoubtedly a career leap, but for The Sun, it was nothing short of a disaster.

During the critical phase of the Napoleonic Wars, The Sun could still receive payments from the Tory Party, but when the news of Napoleon’s defeat came from Waterloo, this newspaper, which long fed off the state, was utterly distraught, not less than the most patriotic citizens of the French Empire.

The sources of government funding dwindled, and The Sun’s social reputation had long been ruined by its extremely pro-government articles. Not to mention that since the war ended, they couldn’t even raise the banner of "patriotism" to embellish themselves anymore.

After ten more struggling years, the declining sales forced The Sun to make the decision to sell.

In 1825, newspaper veteran Patrick Grant and seasoned editor Mordo Yang announced they had officially completed the acquisition of The Sun.

New officials bring new policies. To change the notoriously bad social reputation of The Sun, the two new bosses decided to change the newspaper’s stance—since the Tory Party government wouldn’t send money anymore, why write articles for them? From now on, we are a pro-Whig Party newspaper!

Under the decision of the new bosses, The Sun heavily invested in establishing a resident reporter team covering Parliament and the entire country and demanded that The Sun, though an evening paper, print late at night like morning paper companies, using riders and the stagecoach system to ensure The Sun surpassed competitors in news gathering and release speed.

Although it was costly, Grant and Yang’s new policy was indeed effective. As an evening newspaper, The Sun could sometimes report on parliamentary developments, local political gatherings, and sports events twelve hours earlier than morning papers.

Take last night’s Buckingham Palace concert report; the concert clearly ended at 8:30 p.m., followed by a ball. However, The Sun’s article was printed by 1 a.m. and immediately delivered to the British Post Office located at St. Martin Le Grand for nationwide distribution.

Sir Arthur Hastings could read the news he wanted right after waking up every day, all thanks to these diligent British press moguls.

The Sun’s news was highly timely and accurate, and Sir Arthur was pleased.

But publishing everything so fast, well, that’s The Sun’s fault.

Even the largest paper in Britain, The Times, would give prior notice when potentially covering news involving Sir Arthur.

Although sometimes Arthur opposed it, The Times, relying on its own strength, might not necessarily listen, but they would still give a perfunctory notice.

But how dare The Sun, a fallen phoenix, act so audaciously?

Bold!