|
 |
Introduction | Leicester Breweries | Leicestershire Breweries | Rutland Breweries | Notes | Sources and Postscript
Introduction
The 1890s and 1900s saw the
rapid disappearance of home-brew pubs and the demise of many
small breweries in the city and counties of Leicestershire and
Rutland. At the same time there was a rise in the number of countywide
concerns. The complexities of the excise system of taxation,
the lack of interest in investment in new brewing equipment and
the savings brought about by large-scale production forced many
small concerns out of business. The shortage of raw materials
during the First World War and the immediate post-war period
also took its toll, including notably the brewing side of the
All Saints
Brewery Co. It was forced to turn to the Leicester Brewing and
Malting Co. for its draught and Ind Coope for its bottled beer.
The manpower shortage caused by the "Great War" cannot
be ignored either. The Geeston Lodge Brewery at Geeston (Rutland)
was forced to close in 1914 when the head brewer "Mr Walker
… went to war" and presumably never came back.
Leicester
Breweries [Top]
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 only Hoskins (of these five), a latecomer on the scene, brews within the city boundary. 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. It still survives despite several further changes of ownership.
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)
Leicestershire Breweries [Top]
Breweries flourished in practically all the large town and villages of the county. Loughborough had several breweries in the 19th century and one had flourished in Derby Road since before 1791. In 1865 this became the Midland Brewery Co. with stores in Humberstone Gate, Leicester. Around the turn of the century the brewery took over Thomas Nuttall’s North Leicestershire Brewery Co. at Beeby. The M.B.C. ceased brewing at the end of the First World War. Brewing also took place in Wellington Street between the early years of this century and Frederick Stenson brewed and bottled in King Edward Road from 1910 until 1958. Leicestershire’s last homebrew pub, the Britannia Inn (Pinfold Gate) ceased brewing in 1972.
Melton Mowbray had seen the establishment of several breweries during the 19th century – the most celebrated being Adcock, Pacey and Co. at the Egerton Brewery and Langton and Sons at Thorpe End.(5) Adcocks dated back to about 1855 but were bought and closed by Ind Coope in 1919. The brewery of George and Henry Langton at Thorpe End was founded by a George Adcock in 1865. Langton and Sons, brewers of the "Celebrated A.K. Ale", took over the premises in 1890 but went out of business in 1910.(6)
Hinckley’s brewery, Beardsmore and Co., succumbed to Marstons at the turn of the century. Members of the Beardsmore family (who were also brickmakers) had brewed at Stockwell Head since about 1850. Daniel Pettifor’s Old Brewery at Anstey, dating back at least to 1846, was also purchased by Marstons (in 1900). Part of the brewery today acts as a carpet showroom. The Market Harborough firm of Eady and Dulley (dating back to 1881-1884) was taken over by the Northampton Brewery Company in 1929 and was closed in 1938.
Thomas Palmer Buck started brewing behind the Windmill P.H. (near Kimcote) in the late 1880s. During the first decade of the twentieth century he moved to George Street, Lutterworth. In the 1930s the firm concentrated on bottling and finally went out of business in the early 1980s. Egbert Lavender, amongst other things, brewed and stored beer (for the Northampton Brewery Co. and T. Salt of Burton), first in the High Street and then in Station Road Lutterworth between 1894 and 1930.
Brewing at Castle Donington dates back to about 1828 when Fletcher and Son were producing beer at Cavendish Bridge on the Leicestershire/Derbyshire border. In the 1840s George Trussell Eaton took over the business and Offilers of Derby bought the brewery in 1896, continuing here until 1922. Extensive remains of the brewery survive by the side of the River Trent. It is now the home of the Shardlow microbrewery.
Brewing at Kegworth followed a similar pattern to Castle Donington and dates back to 1828/9 when Thomas Crane and Robert Osbourne were active in the village. About 1850 the Wells family started brewing here and Sidney Wells' Market Place brewery survived until 1924 when Worthington’s bought the business. A "Steam Brewery" in Derby Road, Kegworth offered Wells’ brewery competition in the 1870s and 1880s. This brewery was first operated by the Barrow Brothers but from 1875 Peter Sullins and Sons were in command. In 1885 Hugh Wilson was the proprietor of the brewery now known as the "Springs well" or "Springwell" Brewery. By 1895 the site was storing beer for Marstons who had presumably bought the company. The brewery eventually became a hosiery factory which was burnt down in the 1920s. The brewer's house survives on Derby Road.
Ashby-de-la-Zouch did not possess a brewery of any note, though the Burton Brewery Co. malted there until the mid-1920s. William Sharpe started brewing behind the Duke of York P.H. in Sileby about 1870. In 1920 the Sileby Brewery was taken over by the Derby firm of Strettons, who themselves were acquired by Samuel Allsopp and Sons in 1927. The Sileby Brewery was famed for its stout and its buildings were used until the 1980s by a maltster.
John Harley Berry started brewing at Acresford near Donisthorpe (on the Derbyshire border) about 1860. The Cooper family operated the plant from 1876 until 1900 when Sidney Evershed of Burton purchased and closed the brewery. The Coopers then turned their attention to milling. The brewery survives (altered) as a depot for Staffordshire Farmers (1985). Smaller breweries operated in Rearsby, Huncote, Harby, Belton, Cropston, Syston and Mountsorrel during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Rutland Breweries [Top]
During the 19th century the Vale of Belvoir produced barley suitable for malting and the proximity of Rutland to this area encouraged the establishment of a number of small breweries in the county. Oakham had the largest brewery known appropriately as the "Rutland Brewery". The brewery was founded in 1842 by John Crowson but in 1866 the Morris Brothers acquired the Cross Street site. (7) In 1905 Morris & Co. sold the brewery to Warwicks and Richardsons of Newarke who ceased brewing here in 1907. The brewery was used as a distribution depot until the late 1920s and has now been demolished.
The Whissendine Brewery Company famed for its "Cottesmore Hunt Ales" had a much shorter history. Founded in the early 1870s the brewery had failed by 1893 when it was converted into a dwelling known as the "Red House". The Langham Brewery was established in 1858 by Richard Westbrook Baker. Three years later Edward George Baker, who described himself as a brewer and farmer, inherited the brewery from his father. In 1876 the firm was bought by George Harrison, a prominent Leicester maltster. His stay was short because by 1881 the firm was being run by the partnership of Boys and Style who also brewed at the Shakespeare Brewery behind the Shakespeare’s Head in Southgate Street, Leicester. A further takeover in 1886 gave the brewery to Henry H. Parry. Parry also owned the Brunswick Brewery in Christow Street, Leicester.(8) In 1896 George Ruddle became the brewery manager and eventually purchased the brewery in 1911. Ruddles beers gained countrywide fame in the 1970s but after several changes of ownership brewing at Langham has now come to an end.
Three other Rutland breweries are worth noting and all operated in the Ketton area. Thomas Molesworth started brewing in Ketton around 1860; by 1877 this had become the "Rutland Brewery" and in the late 1890s William Bean was taken into partnership. There is no mention of the brewery after 1908 and in 1926 the buildings were demolished. Behind the Northwick Arms P.H., the Ketton Brewery Company was operated from the mid 1870s until about 1900 by first the Whincup family and then the Wilde Brothers (Frederick and Henry). Around the turn of the century it amalgamated with the King's Cliffe Brewery in Northants.(9)
Just over the River Chater from Ketton is the tiny hamlet of Geeston where Francis Whincup started brewing in the early 1860s. The last recorded brewer on these premises, Claude Walker, went to war in 1914 and presumably never came back as brewing had definitely ceased here by 1916. Until 1970 the charming brewery buildings served as the Geeston Tap P.H. and today they form, much altered, a private residence.
Notes [Top]