As a target of drug manufacturers, impotence has stood the test of time.

In the late 19th century, mail order remedies and relatively anonymous purchases from a chemist were ways of avoiding the embarrassment of visiting a doctor – and judging by the amount of spam devoted to the subject today, there is still a lucrative market.

Traditionally reputed as an aphrodisiac, damiana (the shrub Turnera diffusa) attracted the attention of the medical profession and commercial vendors in the US in the 1870s, but it was not always promoted as a cure for sexual problems. Fleckenstein and Meyer of Portland, Oregon, advertised it as a remedy for kidney and bladder disease, while Michel Levy & Co of Los Angeles promised in 1884 that ‘you will never have a sour stomach if you drink Damiana Bitters.’

New York druggist F. B. Crouch, however, was more explicit about the herb’s potential to restore vitality and youthful vigour to those suffering ‘nervous debility’. His brand capitalised on the perceived virility of Mormons, inviting the customer to wonder if this product was the secret to keeping up with all those wives.

The British advertisement above appeared in The Chemist and Druggist (16 Nov 1889), so it’s not aimed at the end user but at pharmacists who might stock the wafers. Discretion, however, was required.

In 1893, John James Blissett Hay of Wellington Street, Covent Garden, was summoned to Bow Street Police Court for exhibiting indecent advertising cards promoting damiana wafers in his shop window. The full product name is not mentioned, but the Mormon Elder brand trademark showed a naked woman – perhaps it was she who offended the sensibilities of a passing policeman. Because Hay took the advertisements down as soon as he was asked to, his fine was ‘only’ 20s.

The picture below was also used on advertising materials, making it clear that the wafers would increase your chances of some action. Bookseller Rick Grunder has a great colour version of this image from a pamphlet so rare that he sold it for $1,750.

Detail from Mormon Elder's Damiana Wafers trade circular, courtesy of the NLM Images from the History of Medicine collection

A trade circular of 1888 described the product’s effect as follows:

Actually creates new Nervous Fluid and Brain Matter by supplying the Blood with VEGETABLE PHOSPHATES, its Electric Life Element, the very core and center of the Brain itself—Restoring the fullest and most Vigorous conditions of Robust Health of Body and Mind, so that all the Duties of Life may be pursued with Confidence and Pleasure, and whilst pleasant to the taste never fails to Purify and Enrich the Blood, and thoroughly invigorate the Brain, Nerves, and Muscles. Its energising effects are shown from the first day of its administration by a remarkable Increase of Nerve and Intellectual Power, with a Feeling of Courage, Strength and Comfort, to which the Patient has long been unaccustomed.

I don’t know the composition of the Mormon Elder’s Damiana Wafers, but other damiana products were not always what they seemed. In 1910, Henry Kaufman of New York was fined $100 for misbranding his Damiana Gin. The product contained strychine and brucine, but the extent of the misbranding was worse than that. Not only was the quantity of damiana negligible, but the product also had the unforgivable quality of not actually being gin.

WANTED!
An industrious and strictly honest man in each
County in the State to take orders by samples for
Velpeau’s Magnetic Agents.
Salary first year $800, and small commission,
payable monthly. For full particulars address
Dr. M. Velpeau, 422½ Broadway, N. Y., sending stamp.

Source: The Sauk County Standard, (Baraboo, Wisconsin) 18 July 1855

—————————————————————————————–

This advert might not leap out from the thousands of similar mid-19th-century US ads seeking salesmen for books, farming equipment, store goods etc., but the product behind it is quite unusual.

If the industrious and strictly honest man wrote for particulars, the reply wouldn’t tell him much about the job. Instead, it would ask him to send $2 for a sample of the product. Only on the arrival of the sample would he discover that he was expected to sell Dr Velpeau’s Magnetic Love Powders. At this point, most industrious and strictly honest men probably put the episode down to experience and went to look for a more reputable and less embarrassing business opportunity.

The particulars sent with the sample claimed:

These powders, properly administered, are warranted irrespective of age, circumstances or personal appearance, to win them the love or unchanging affections of any one they may desire of the opposite sex.

The enamoured person had to work out a way of getting the object of their affections to eat the powder, and then wait in anxious lovelorn anticipation until absolutely nothing happened. As one newspaper joked:

Only think of it! For two dollars, any enterprising young man – no matter if he is as poor as an editor, and as ugly as a baboon, can through the instrumentality of these powders, make himself “lord” of the most charming lass of “sweet sixteen” to be found within the limits of our friend’s agency, which comprises four counties!

Velpeau’s real name was J C Merrill – perhaps the pseudonym was an attempt to associate the powders with famous French surgeon Alfred Velpeau – and according to the New York Times, his scheme attracted up to 40 letters per day.

In late 1855, angry (and still single) customers began writing to the Mayor of New York to complain about ‘Velpeau’. Merrill was arrested for fraud but released when he promised to discontinue business and return the complainants’ money. Six weeks later, however, he was still selling the powders and pocketing the cash, so he was arrested again, charged with defrauding a variety of people, and locked up.

As for the spurned lovers, they presumably had to find another way of attaining their goal – the obvious solution being to become richer and better looking.

According to a correspondent of the Monthly Gazette of Health (vol 5 1825), the proprietor of Goss & Co was a former shop assistant going by the unlikely name of Mr Crucifix.

While Mr Crucifix insisted that his company had genuine surgical credentials, it had a terrible reputation among the medical profession. The Medical Adviser and Guide to Health and Long Life, edited by Alexander Burnett, particularly had it in for him, mounting a sustained campaign against Goss & Co in 1824:

Goss and Company! Good God! Was there ever such a heap of filth and infamy as this swindling firm of straw! Was there ever such a cancer upon society – such an adroit and plausible system of rapacious plundering!

The Adviser also remarked that the letters M R C did not stand for Member of the Royal College, but for MURDERING, ROBBING CHARLATAN.

                 ”Domus et placens uxor.”—HOR.
                  Thy house, and (in the cup of life,
                That honey-drop) thy pleasing wife.
H A P P I N E S S  “the  gay  to-morrow  of  the
mind,”  is  ensured  by  marriage;  ”the  strictest  tie
of perpetual Friendship” is  a  gift  from  Heaven,  cementing
pleasure with reason, by which, says Johnson, we approach
in some degree  of  association  with  celestial  intelligence.”
Previous,  however,  to  entering  into  the  hallowed  obliga-
tion of marriage, it becomes an impressive duty not only  to
regulate the passions, but to cleanse the grosser nature from
those impurities which the freedom of unrestricted  pleasure
may have entailed upon it. To the neglect of  such  atten-
tion, are attributable  many  of  those  hapless  instances,
which while they excite the commiseration of  the  behold-
er, should also impress him with the fear of self-reproach.
Luxurious habits will effeminate the body—a residence  in
the tropics will too much relax the elastic fibre—but more
especially does the premature infatuation of youth too fre-
quently reduce the natural dignity into a state of inanition,
from whence the agonized sufferer more than doubts the
chance of relief. To all such, then, we address ourselves,
offering  hope–energy–muscular strength–facility;  nor
ought our advances to appear questionable, sanctioned as
they are by the multiplied proofs of  twenty-five  years  suc-
cessful experience.
The easy cares of married life are sometimes disturbed
by the want of those blessings which twine the nuptial
wreath—for the female habit is often constitutionally weak
—yet it can be strengthened, and deficient energy improved
into functional power.
In every case of syphilitic intrusion, as well as in every
relaxation of the generative economy, we pledge our reputa-
tion to cure speedily and permanently. Earnestly solicitous
to  expel  the  unfeeling  empyric  from  the  position so pre-
sumptuously taken by him, we deviate  from  general   prin-
ciples  with  less  hesitation;  and   confident   in   our   own
honourable integrity as Members of the College of Surgeons,
we invite sufferers of either  sex,  (especially  those  entering
into  matrimonial  life)  at  once  to  our  house,  where  daily
attendance is given  for  personal  consultation;  and  imme-
diate answers are returned  to  country  letters,  which  must
minutely describe the  case,  and  contain  a  remittance  for
advice and Medicine, which can be forwarded  to  any  part
of the  world,  however  distant.  No  difficulty  can  occur,  as
the Medicine will be securely packed, and carefully protected
from observation.
                     GOSS & Co., (M.R.C. Surgeons).
7, Lancaster Place, Waterloo Bridge, Strand, London.
*** Just published (Twenty-First Edition), 1st, The AEGIS
of LIFE, a similar commentary on the above Diseases.—
2d. HYGEIANA, addressed exclusively to the Female Sex.—
3. The SYPHILIST, a Treatise on Lues Venerea, Gonor-
rhoea, &c. May be had at 23, Paternoster-Row, London; F.
Hobson, Leeds; and of all Booksellers, Price 5s.

Source: The Leeds Mercury, Saturday 29 April, 1837

A correspondent to the Medical Adviser described his experience thus: 

When I wrote to Goss & Co., I enclosed a pound bill, and asked their advice. I received a letter by return of post, asking all particulars, (useless to them), for example whether I was fair, tall, handsome, and many other things of little consequence. I was quite disgusted; they concluded with a request for 5l., and they would send me a box of medicine. I received the medicine and a modest request for 25l. and they would cure me … Their medicine I took to a Chemist, and he said I could have got it, bottles and all, for 5s.

Damiana is a shrub long reputed to have aphrodisiac effects, and is still used in herbal medicine to boost libido.

P.N. George sold a variety of products that were despatched with the utmost discretion. As well as the “Rubber Goods” advertised below, there was also a “Male and Female Combined Preventive Appliance,” and if you were having trouble deciding, you could consult the illustrated catalogue.

If the Damiana wafers weren’t enough to get you going, Mr George could also supply cards showing “The Sixteen Positions of Matrimony” or steamy popular literature such as The Honeymoon, and what occurred, The Confessions of a Lady’s Maid, or Boudoir Intrigue, and Confessions of a Gay Young Footman; or Secrets of High Life Exposed.

CAUTION!!—Men, Be Careful!

Use my Sanitary Rubber Goods. Men’s best Rubber Goods, 2s., 3s., 5s., 7s. per dozen, post free, with my 32 page Illustrated List of every known and up-to-date Rubber Appliance. “Men who are Weak” should send at once for my “Champion” Damiana Wafers. They restore the lost vigour, and are a remedy for Spinal Exhaustion and General Weakness. Send at once. Post free, 2s. 9d. per box; two boxes, 5s. “Men who are Strong” preserve and increase your strength by taking my “Champion” Damiana Wafers. The only genuine strength preservative. Send at once. Post free, 2s. 9d. per box; two boxes, 5s. Sandalwood or any other capsules sent post paid 2s. 9d. per box.

P. N. GEORGE, 10, HOLYWELL STREET, STRAND, LONDON.
N.B.—Any of the above goods sent privately at prices quoted
to any adult reader of this paper.
Write your name and address clearly.

.

Source: The Illustrated Police News, Saturday 25 March 1899

I have absolutely no idea what was in this medicine, so instead of a witty and/or informative comment, here is a picture of a fellow epitomising health and manly vigour. The image is from the Dictionnaire encyclopédique Trousset, published in Paris between 1886 and 1891, and is reproduced courtesy of Old Book Illustrations.

HEALTH and MANLY VIGOUR GUARANTEED
̶ The RENOVATING ESSENCE OF AZILICA. ̶ One
packet of this remedy will convince the most sceptical of its surprising
invigorating virtues; it may be taken with the greatest safety and
certainty by all who suffer from weakness, lowness of spirits, depres-
sion, nervousness, and debility. Females would do well to take this
remedy, as, by quickening the circulation and enriching the blood, it
imparts health and bloom to the most impaired constitution, and is a
remedy for relaxation, spermatorrhӕa, and all the distressing con-
sequences arising from early abuse, indiscriminate excesses, or too
long residing in hot climes. It has restored bodily and sexual
strength and vigour to thousands of debilitated persons, who are now
in the enjoyment of health and the functions of manhood; and what-
ever may be the causes of disqualification for marriage, they are
effectually subdued by this wonderful discovery. Parties taking the
above remedy are entitled to the advice of a Medical Man, Free of
Charge. Price 1s. 6d. per Package, to which are added advice and
directions for self-cure. ̶ Sole Agents : Winnall, High Street, Bir-
mingham ; Mander and Weaver, Victoria Street, Wolverhampton ;
Hutchings, Dudley; C. Britten, Wednesbury; W. Britten, Tipton
and Prince’s End; Osborn, High Street, West Bromwich.

Source: The Birmingham Daily Post, Thursday 23rd January 1868

This advert doesn’t specify whether you have to take the lozenges yourself in order to exert a magnetic influence on the object of your affections, or whether you’re supposed to give him or her one (a lozenge, that is) under the pretence that it’s a delicious bon-bon. But in either case, who could resist ordering the “extra-strong” version?

         MAY’S CELEBRATED LOVE LOZENGES.
SURE and safe, pleasant in taste, certain in effect; gains the
undying love and affection of any one you wish; none can
resist their magnetic influence. In boxes, post free, 9 stamps;
extra strong, 13 stamps. The best are the cheapest.—Mr. MAY,
Pharmaceutical Chemist (by diploma), 22, Heaton-road, Peck-
ham-rye, London. N.B.—Beware of Spurious Imitations.
Y.S.—Latin prescriptions translated into English, six stamps.

Source:  Reynolds’s Newspaper (London), Sunday 4th January, 1874.