Leicester Breweries


Everards at Southgate St Leicester


Leicester had seen over thirty breweries come and go during the course of the 19th century, but it entered this century with only five active brewing concerns. Today none of these survive. The largest brewery at the turn of the century was the All Saints Brewery Company with its brewing plant next to the church (1) and offices in High Street (now a P.H.). The firm was the result of the amalgamation of two Leicester brewing business in the late 1880s both of which had been in existence for nearly a century. All Saints, at its height, owned more than 80 houses throughout the county, but Ind Coope bought up the company in 1928/9.

The Leicester Brewing and Malting Co. (2) could also claim a long history. It started in Northampton Square as a small brewhouse run by members of the Hannam family in the mid-1820s. The firm grew steadily and the Eagle Brewery, as it was known, moved into larger premises on the outskirts of the city in the 1870s (Charnwood Street). Room for expansion (not available to the All Saints Brewery) and go-ahead management allowed the company to survive the First World War and thrive in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1952, however, Ansells of Birmingham took over the firm and the brewery survived as a bottling plant and store until the early 1960s.

Everards started brewing in Leicester in 1849. Before long they bought a brewhouse in Burton (the main UK brewing town) and brewed in both towns until 1931, when they ceased brewing operations at Southgate Street, Leicester. Brewing at their third Burton brewhouse (occupied from 1898) continued until the 1983. Production was transferred to a new green-field site near Blaby in 1985. The Leicester bottling plant that replaced the 19th century tower brewery soon after 1931 was demolished in the late 1970s.

The Northampton and Leicestershire Clubs’ Brewery was one of several similar breweries set up after the First World War (to escape the strangle-hold of the big brewers who were seen as the bastions of the Tory Party). It started brewing in 1921 and occupied an old maltings building in Syston Street, Leicester (3). It became known as the Midland Clubs Brewery in 1960 but closed in 1969. The building survives as a food warehouse.

Hoskins Brewery was founded by a one-time blacksmith, Jabez Penn. Penn erected the present brewhouse in Beaumanor Road in 1895 and Tom Hoskins, a Worcestershire man, was taken into partnership in 1904. He took over sole control of the brewery in 1906 and before long Hoskins beers won a countrywide reputation winning many awards at brewing shows. The brewery left family ownership in 1983 and was purchased by the Saffron Walden Vineyard and Cyder Orchard Company. After further changes of ownership it closed in the 1990s.

The St Martins Brewery of Loseby Lane barely survived entry into the 20th century and was acquired in 1920 by the Leicester Brewing and Malting Co. Two companies had operated this brewery during the second half of the 19th century and early 20th century; Else and Froane and Welch Brothers. The brewery is now a listed building (next to the one-time Crown and Thistle P.H.). The maltings built for Welch Brothers in 1898 survive today in Millstone Lane.(4)

Notes
1. There was another brewery in High Cross Street at No. 86 – the High Cross Brewery founded in about 1850 by James Watson. Cornelius Gurden (1860s-1880s) and Henry Heys (1890s-1904) also brewed on this site.

2. Date stones on the L.B.M. premises in Charnwood Street reveal the different stages of the building viz. 1876/1890/1924 and 1938. The maltings were located in Gresham Street (off Belgrave Road). The "eagle" symbol was a common sight on many Leicester pubs.

3. The maltings were owned in 1866 by prominent Leicester maltster George Harrison. He had also owned the Gresham Street maltings of the L.B.M. Harrison also brewed at Langham (1876).

4. The Else and Froane maltings in Friars Road were demolished when the Great Central Railway was constructed in the 1890s. Brewing in the St. Martins area of Leicester dates back to the late 18th century.


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