INTRODUCTION
What is the Punch Club? In the early 1800s, a group of gentlemen of means styled themselves “The Jolly Cocks” and used to regularly meet to wine and dine, sing songs, recite poems and tell stories of the day, in what became a traditional Victorian way of recreation, creating an atmosphere of geniality and good fellowship. No doubt many partnerships were formed in collaboration of new works of art and the composition of music, as can be proven by the histories of the great men that attended the Club.
It has often been considered that a regular guest of the Punch Club, Charles Dickens, used the ideology of this Club for his book “Pickwick Papers”, as shown in the above sketch by a Founder Member, Robert Seymour.
In 1858 the name was changed to “The University Punch Club” as they had met weekly in the “University Hotel”, London, but following some apprehension concerning the word “Punch” it became “The Universal Club”, as it had often been designated. Following the death in 1867 of the Founder President Mr. John Duff, many changes occurred to the Club’s constitution and the venue where the Club met. Further re-naming to “The Punch Club” also took place.
So the Club remains to this day, with similar aims and aspirations to those of our Forebears.