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Guinness looks set to start brewing in London again, though on a much smaller scale than at its former Park Royal site, closed in 2005 and subsequently demolished.
The new site has an even older brewing history: the Woodyard Brewery, later known as Combe & Co, was once an important porter brewery, operating from at least the early 18th century to 1905 when it closed after merging with two other breweries to form Watney Combe Reid. Numerous historic buildings still stand as explained on the Watney page. Appropriately enough, the Watney group ended up in the hands of Grand Metropolitan, later a co-founder of Guinness owner Diageo.
The company announced on 31 January 2022 that it’s investing £75 million to create a microbrewery, bar-restaurant, shop, training centre, events space and “culture hub” called Guinness at Old Brewers Yard. Plans were delayed by planning issues but construction was underway in spring 2024. The building work was originally due to be complete by October but a spring 2025 date now looks more likely.
Whitbread’s well-known tankard logo on a beermat. The slogan might have rung hollow with fans of breweries that fell under the baleful shadow of the ‘Whitbread umbrella’.
Closed brewery 52 Chiswell Street EC1Y 4SD (City of London, Islington) First sold beer: by 1686 (as King’s Head) Brewing ceased: 1976
The earliest record of brewing at what became Whitbread is from 1686, when a Mr Bowes was making beer at the Kings Head Tavern, just inside the City of London on the southwest corner of Chiswell Street and Silk Street, then known as Grub Street. But it would be some decades before the Whitbread name became associated with the site.
Samuel Whitbread (1720-96), born in Cardington, Bedfordshire, was only 16 when in 1736 he apprenticed himself to John Wightman, then master of the Brewers’ Company, who likely brewed at a site known as Pye Corner, Smithfield, on what’s now the junction of Cock Lane and Giltspur Street (EC1A 9DD). This was famous as the location where the Great Fire of London stopped in 1666, as still commemorated by the Golden Boy statue in a niche on the northwest corner.
Six years later, Whitbread went into partnership with brothers Thomas and Godfrey Shewell at the Goat brewhouse at 88 Old Street, on the southwest corner of Whitecross Street (EC1V 9HU). This brewery was likely founded by a Mr Bucknall sometime before 1692 and had been operated by the Shewells since at least 1741.
Whitbread and the Shewells brewed porter here, with a separate brewhouse for ales, possibly dating from a couple of decades earlier, on the other side of Old Street at the corner with what’s now Central Street, formerly Brick Lane (EC1V 9HX). But it was porter that everyone wanted, prompting Whitbread and Thomas Shewell to seek a site where they could brew much more of it.
In 1749 they bought the then-derelict Kings Head and adjacent properties, only a short walk south from the Goat, and began creating what was likely the world’s first purpose-built porter brewery. Opened in 1750, the Chiswell Street brewery was by 1758 the biggest porter producer in Britain, with an output of 106,000 hl a year. That year, the facilities began expanding onto the north of Chiswell Street, just outside the City in Finsbury: the boundary with the London Borough of Islington still runs along the street.
The Goat closed once Chiswell Street opened, but brewing was later revived there. By 1774 it was operated by an ex-Whitbread brewer as More & Co, and by 1844 it was known as the Scottish brewery. Around 1890 it was absorbed by Watney and closed.
Back in Chiswell Street, Shewell retired in 1761 and Whitbread subsequently bought out his shares, becoming sole owner, as well as branching out into politics as an MP for Bedfordshire from 1768. By 1796, the year of his death, the brewery’s success had swelled to break further records, as brewing historian Peter Mathias recounted in 1959:
‘In 1796, Samuel Whitbread brewed, for the first time in any brewery in the world, over 200,000 barrels [327,320 hl, 57.6 million pints] of porter in a single season. This feat involved raw material costs of perhaps £200,000 [£17.9 million in 2023 prices], the upkeep of a plant which, with stocks, was worth over half a million pounds [£44.75 million], maintaining over 100 horses, and holding to account 500 publicans or more, and perhaps 1,000 other customers, for business which represented nearly thirty million retail transactions (at one quart) from a single unit of production.’
The celebrated Porter Tun Room was built between 1776-84 after fire destroyed its predecessor, at a scale sufficient to house the increasingly large vats used for maturing the beer, with a floor area of 778 square metres and the exposed timbers of a king-post roof, the widest unsupported timber span in London after Westminster Hall, over 18 m above.
Even more remarkable were the vaults below, conceived by Whitbread as a more efficient and oxygen-proof alternative to the tuns: vast watertight cisterns lined with a special cement capable of resisting the beer’s acidity, applied by ship’s caulkers, with a total capacity of 20,000 hl or almost 3.4 million pints.
The brewery was an early adopter of steam power, ordering its first engine in 1784. Microbiology pioneer Louis Pasteur (1822-95) visited in 1871, and impressed staff by using his microscope to spot a spoilage organism in a sample of a yeast culture which, it turned out, had already been identified as troublesome and taken out of use. The company subsequently invested in its own microscope.
Inevitably tastes moved on and Whitbread diversified into other styles of beer, with a fresher ‘running’ mild accounting for 10% of production by 1839. Bottling activities expanded in 1870 with the launch of a new plant not far away in Grays Inn Road (closed 1965). The last of the famous tuns was removed in 1900, though porter production, now by different methods and at declining strengths, continued until 1940.
Whitbread’s expansion was also fuelled by takeovers and mergers. Prior to World War II it absorbed at least 10 other brewing businesses, beginning in 1812 with Martineau & Bland of the Lambeth Brewery, founded in 1783: brewing at that site ceased but was later revived independently until the brewery was eventually taken over and closed by Manns.
Other Greater London acquisitions were Nicholl’s Anchor Brewery, Lewisham (founded c1800, bought and closed 1891, used as a bottling and distribution facility until 1984 and demolished 1987); Gripper Brothers Bell Brewery, Tottenham (founded 1760, bought and closed 1896, continued as a depot until mid-1985); Matthews and Canning Anchor Brewery, Chelsea (founded 1829, bought 1899, closed 1907); Jones & Co (Bromley Steam Brewery), Bromley Common (founded c1840, bought and closed 1901); Notting Hill Brewery (founded c1855, closed 1920 and later demolished with pub estate bought by Whitbread); and Forest Hill Brewery Co (founded by 1867, bought and closed 1923, converted to a dairy and later demolished).
Another significant pre-war purchase was Mackeson & Co in Hythe, Kent, founded in 1669 and noted for a pioneering sweet stout with added lactose, launched in 1909. This was initially sold to Simonds of Reading (later bought and closed by Courage) in 1920, and sold on to Jude Hanbury & Co of Canterbury in 1929, which in turn was bought by Whitbread the same year. The Mackeson brewery remained in production until 1968 when its flagship brand was switched to the former Tennant Brothers site in Sheffield, of which more below.
In the 1950s the brewery launched the so-called ‘Whitbread Umbrella’ in response to the wave of mergers then sweeping the industy, buying shares in smaller regional breweries and obtaining favourable trading agreements on the promise of protecting them from hostile takover. The umbrella might have shielded them from other brewers but not from Whitbread itself, as by the early 1970s most had been absorbed.
Whitbread bought and either immediately or eventually closed over 30 other breweries between 1946 and 1989, including major regional names like keg ale pioneer Flowers (Luton and Stratford-upon-Avon, 1961), Nimmo (Castle Eden, 1963), Lacon (Great Yarmouth, 1965), Rhymney (1966), Fremlins (Maidstone, 1967), Strong (Romsey, 1969), Brickwoods (Portsmouth, 1971) and Boddingtons (Manchester, 1989). From Tennant Brothers of Sheffield, bought in 1961 and closed in 1993, it inherited another nationally recognised bottled brand, Gold Label Barley Wine. At its peak in the 1980s it owned almost 8,000 pubs and brewing and distribution facilities in Belgium as well as the UK.
After closing Flowers in Luton in 1969, Whitbread replaced it the same year with a massive new brewery at Leagrave nearby, claimed to be the first major new-build brewery in the UK for over 30 years and the largest fully automated brewery in Europe. It produced only keg, bottled and canned beer, not only Whitbread beers but mainland European lager brands brewed under license like Heineken and Stella Artois. Two other large new plants focused primarily on lager production followed, at Samlesbury, Lancashire, in 1972 and Magor, South Wales, in 1979. The Luton plant was decommissioned in 1984 after only 15 years in production.
In the 1970s, Whitbread’s London facilities brewed a version of cask Trophy Bitter (3.6%), which was also brewed, sometimes to different recipes, at most of the group’s other sites, as well as cask Best Mild (2.8%). Alongside these were flagship keg bitter Tankard (3.9%), and bottled Light Ale (around 3%), Forest Brown Ale (around 3.2%, though some of this had been contracted to Truman), Pale Ale (around 3.5%), Brewmaster Export Pale Ale (4.8%) and, possibly, Gold Label barley wine (11.3%). Pale Ale was the last beer brewed at Chiswell Street in 1976, before the brewery closed for good.
Where are they now?
Following the closures, some of the brewery buildings continued in use as the corporate headquarters until 2005. But by then Whitbread was no longer a brewer. Having diversified into broader hotel and catering interests, it found this side of its business more profitable. It had a longstanding trading relationship with Stella brewer Interbrew of Leuven, Belgium, created in 1987 through the merger of two major Belgian brewing group, Artois and Piedbœuf. So in 2000, Whitbread sold its brewing interests, including its breweries and brands, to Interbrew, which also acquired Bass the same year (see Charrington).
Interbrew merged in 2004 with Brazilian brewing giant AmBev to create InBev, the biggest brewing company in the world. In 2008, InBev bought major US brewer Anheuser-Busch of St Louis, Missouri, to become Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev). Anheuser-Busch was already active in London, having leased the Stag brewery in Mortlake from Courage to produce a regional version of its flagship Budweiser brand. This was later fully acquired by AB InBev and closed in 2015. AB InBev continues to operate the Salmesbury and Magor sites.
Whitbread continues as a hospitality company today, owning the Premier Inn hotel and Beefeater restaurant chains among others. It owned Costa Coffee between 1995 and 2019, when it was sold to Coca-Cola.
The Whitbread brands have largely disappeared, though Pale Ale has remained intermittently available in Belgium, likely brewed by AB InBev at Leuven or Jupille. In 2016, a company called Pioneer Brewing licensed the brand and worked with Windsor & Eton Brewery to relaunch the beer as a 4% cask or 4.6% bottled ale, but it’s since been withdrawn again.
AB InBev revived Flowers IPA (3.4%) and Best Bitter (4.5%) in keg and occasionally cask in the 2000s, contracting them to the Badger brewery in Blandford St Mary, Dorset. Mackeson Stout (2.8%) is still available in cans, possibly produced at Hydes in Salford. Canned Gold Label, now only 7.5%, remains available too, produced by AB InBev in Salmesbury, along with Boddingtons Bitter, now in canned and nitrokeg form only.
Things to see
Though part of the site was demolished, several historic brewery buildings still stand in Chiswell Street, in what’s now the Brewery Conservation Area, largely dating from various rebuilds in the second half of the 19th century. Most are at least Grade II-listed.
The group on the south (City) side, on the original site, are still owned by Whitbread and mainly used for hospitality. Most obvious is the Entrance Wing (52 Chiswell Street EC1Y 4SA) with its carriage arch through to the brewery yard: the arch and the bay above date from around 1890-91, while the bays to each side are earlier, around 1867. The buildings, which also have some notable interiors, were used as offices from the 1890s onwards, and have since been converted to the luxury Montcalm hotel.
A terrace of late 18th century brown brick houses stretches to the left along Chiswell Street (nos 53-55), terminating in a pub building of the same period at no 56 on the corner with Milton Street, though the frontage of this was substantially altered perhaps in the 1870s. It was once known as the St Pauls Tavern but was closed in 2008 and reopened in 2011 as an upmarket restaurant, the Chiswell Street Dining Rooms, by the ETM Group who also own the Long Arm brewpub not far away. A range of yellow brick brewery buildings perhaps from the 1870s continues round the corner along Milton Street, with tall entrance arches at each end.
To the right of the Entrance Wing, fronted by railings, is the Partners’ House (47 Chiswell Street EC1Y 4SB). The only Grade II*-listed building in the group, it’s a grand four storey early 18th century red brick house which predates the brewery but was later used as a residence for the owners and is now offices. Immediately right of this (no 49), on the corner of Silk Street, is the Kings Head, now known as the Jugged Hare. This was the site of the original brewery, though the current building is late 19th century, with 20th century additions. It closed in 2008 but was reopened by ETM under its current name in 2012. A later brewery building in red brick and granite, from 1904, is round the corner in Silk Street, next door to the pub.
It’s usually possible to walk through the main entrance arch, with its war memorial plaque on the right, into the yard behind, where many of the buildings now form part of the Brewery events and conference centre. Straight ahead is a clock in a block dated 1912. Immediately right, an enclosed iron footbridge built in 1892 connects both sides of the yard at first floor level. The octagonal building to the left is the entrance to the Porter Tun Room, which is now used for events and isn’t usually open to the public except occasionally on Doors Open Days. Beyond it, now fronted by a conservatory, is the former sugar room.
The brewery’s ‘North Side’ once stretched as far as Errol Street, covering around 1.2 ha, and is still linked to the South Side by an underground passage, now closed off. Much of it was demolished and redeveloped in the 1980s, but the front yard remains, surrounded by brewery buildings from 1870 behind a gated entrance almost opposite the South Side arch. The gates were originally wood but were replaced by the current iron ones in 1986. Immediately left of these and forming part of the same range of buildings is the Brewer’s House (no 41), with a double front door under a broad arch.
The yard is now known as Sundial Court (38 Chiswell Street EC1Y 4SB) after the 1774 sundial visible at the far end, not in its original position but moved here during the 1870s rebuild. An arch below this, blocked off in 1986, once gave access to an inner yard. The buildings to the left of the Brewer’s House are older: no 42, next door, is early 19th century, while the ‘Georgian Terrace’, nos 43-46, dates from 1774. All were once used as accommodation for brewery staff. The site is now offices, flats and student accommodation.
Some other remnants of Whitbread’s brewing days are still visible in London. The distinctive southern gatehouse of the former Bell Brewery, surmounted by a Whitbread clock and with the outline of the brewery yard obvious behind it, is also now Grade II-listed (667 High Road N17 0AE). The entrance arch of Matthews and Canning, topped by an anchor, stands next door to the former brewery tap, the Builders Arms (13 Britten Street SW3 3TY).
The Forest Hill Brewery has completely vanished, though a beautiful 1920s painted tile advertisement for its beers is visible on a wall at 2 Tintern Street SW4 7PZ: likely the building once housed an off-license. The only legacy of the Bromley Steam Brewery is the street name, Brewery Road (BR2 8BF).
Pre-1972 Tolly Cobbold label listing its location as “Ipswich and London”.
Closed brewery Essex Brewery, St James Street E17 7FE (Waltham Forest) First sold beer: 1859 Ceased brewing: 1971
Founded as a steam-powered brewery by William Hawes, this operation was first known simply as the Walthamstow Brewery, and located on the north side of St James Street (then known as Marsh Street) immediately west of its junction with South Grove and Markhouse Road. It drew water from two artesian wells on the site, which it also supplied to locals as washing water.
It was renamed the Essex Brewery when it was bought by the Collier brothers in 1871, at a time this area still formed part of Essex. An advertisement from 1890 shows it made an extensive range of beers typical of the day, all in cask, including four milds of varying strengths, a bitter, an amber ale, two IPAs and three porters and stouts. By 1900 the business employed over 100 staff.
The brewery and its five pubs were sold on again in 1920 to the Tollemache Brewery of Ipswich, which had been founded in 1856 as Charles Cullingham & Co, but had been in the hands of the Tollemache family since 1888. The family had ambitions to build a significant regional if not a national brewery, and the Walthamstow plant was put to use brewing Tolly brands for the lucrative London and southwest Essex markets, including a growing tied estate, a function it continued to fulfill when its owner merged with Ipswich neighbours the Cobbold Cliff Brewery (a concern that dated back to Harwich in 1723) in 1957 to form Tolly Cobbold.
Essex Brewery 1890 price list. Image: British Library.
Where are they now?
Tolly ceased brewing in Walthamstow over the Christmas period of 1971-72, by which time the Essex Brewery was likely producing a limited range of cask mild and bitter and bottled pale ale and stout. The site continued in use for bottling beer sent in tankers from Ipswich until 1974.
The parent company’s subsequent history was chequered. In 1977, as non-brewing groups began to enter the industry through developments like Imperial Tobacco’s purchase of Courage and Grand Metropolitan’s of Watney and Truman, Tolly Cobbold was sold to shipping company Ellerman Lines. But the buyer’s expectations weren’t met and the company continued to struggle with a declining reputation. In 1983 it was sold on to business tycoons the Barclay twins, later owners of the Daily Telegraph, the Spectator and the Channel Island of Brecqhou, then to the Brent Walker property and leisure group in 1989.
Brent Walker closed the brewery later that year, but it was reopened the next year following a management buyout. In 2003, it was bought and closed by family brewer Ridley, of Hartford End near Chelmsford, which was in turn bought and closed by emerging new national brewer Greene King of Bury St Edmunds in 2006. Greene King still occasionally brews Tolly brands as specials.
Tolly Cobbold’s London pubs were eventually sold to other breweries and pub groups but a couple are still known locally as ‘Tolly’s’.
Things to see
The former Essex Brewery was demolished and the site redeveloped, with a new estate of flats built in the 2010s, although street and building name such as Hops House, Malt House and Old Brewery Way recall its former use.
The brewery tap was originally on the northwest corner of St James Street and Markhouse Road, adjacent to the brewery itself, but this proved inadequate and was replaced in 1906 with a new Essex Brewery Tap on the opposite, southwest corner. It was sold to Charrington when the brewery closed in the early 1970s, and was renamed several times: it was known as the Fallen Angel before it closed around 2006. The building still stands as the only visible remnant of the brewery: the ground floor is now a fitness centre with flats upstairs (2 Markhouse Road E17 8FF).
Mann’s beermat with the sort of slogan no longer permitted today.
Closed brewery Albion Brewery, Whitechapel Road E1 1BU (Tower Hamlets) First sold beer: by 1673, perhaps earlier Ceased brewing: 1979
An inn stood on the northwest corner of the junction of Whitechapel Road and Cambridge Heath Road since before 1654, with an attached brewhouse since at least 1673. It was known as the Blind Beggar after a legendary figure who supposedly begged on the site, featured in the popular ballad ‘The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green’, known since the early 17th century. In the ballad, the beggar turns out secretly to be very rich, and in some versions is identified with Henry de Montfort, a young nobleman who was killed in 1265 during the Second Barons’ War. In these versions, Henry survived but was blinded and became a beggar.
This was long a busy and important junction on the old Roman road from London to Colchester, which becomes known as Mile End Road east of here, as the crossing was a mile (1.6 km) from Aldgate where the road left the City of London. During the 18th century the road was ‘turnpiked’ (improved by a trust which recouped its investment by imposing tolls on road users) and a toll gate installed at the junction.
In 1807, the Blind Beggar’s owner Richard Ivory enlarged and improved the brewhouse with the intention of leasing it to a third party, and in 1809 John Hoffman is listed as brewing at what was now known as the Albion Brewery. Hoffman got into financial difficulties and in 1819 the business was sold to Philip Blake and his junior partner James Mann.
Blake and Mann already owned a brewery, the Strand Bridge Brewery in College Street, Lambeth, on the riverside by Kings Arms Stairs, in what’s now Jubilee Gardens just north of the London Eye (SE1 7PB). This had been established around 1783 as a porter brewery by the Martineau family, and the firm was known as Martineau & Bland when it merged with Whitbread in 1812. Brewing ceased at the Lambeth site, but was revived when Blake and Mann bought it in 1816. Following their acquisition of the Albion, the partners concentrated their activities there, and closed the Lambeth site in 1821.
Mann’s Albion Brewery gates in the late 19th century.
Blake retired in 1826 and Mann ran the Albion on his own for 20 years. In 1846 he financed expansion by going into partnership with Robert Crossman and Thomas Paulin, both of whom had previously worked at what became the Stag brewery in Mortlake. The business was known as Mann Crossman & Paulin from 1847.
By 1850, the Albion was producing almost 100,000 hl a year, supplying 500 pubs, mainly with a porter known as Entire. The brewery was rebuilt in 1863 and expanded onto adjacent sites, including former almshouses and a workhouse, becoming the most advanced brewery of that time, with a capacity of 410,000 hl a year. Stables on the east side of Cambridge Heath Road included an automatic facility for filling 150 nosebags at a time with metal tubes from a store above.
Manns became one of the London breweries to add capacity in Burton upon Trent, opening a second Albion Brewery on the outskirts of the town at Shobnall in 1875. In 1898, by which time the firm was producing over 800,000 hl a year, the Burton site was sold to a local brewer, Marston’s, founded at the Horninglow Brewery in the town centre in 1834.
By the end of the 19th century, Manns was noted for its investment in bottled beer. Having outgrown the original bottling store on the former workhouse site, the brewery added a much larger bottling plant surmounted by a water tower a short distance away on the south side of Whitechapel Road, off Sidney Street. In 1892, it became one of the first brewers to capture carbon dioxide during fermentation, using it to carbonate bottled beers and selling it to other brewers for the same purpose.
In 1899, or possibly 1902, head brewer Thomas Wells Thorpe created a new style of bottled brown ale which was relatively low in alcohol (around 3.5%) and described at the time as ‘the sweetest beer in London’. In subsequent decades Manns Brown became the brewery’s best-known brand. Other noted bottled brands included Cream Label Stout and Rustic Ale, a pale ale.
In January 1911, the bottling plant played a role in the notorious Sidney Street Siege, an attempt by police to arrest two Latvian immigrants, assumed to be anarchists and alleged to have taken part in an attempted robbery at a Houndsditch jewellers the previous month in which three policemen had been shot dead. The two men were traced to a terraced house at 100 Sidney Street and a firefight ensued. An injured policeman was first taken to the Manns plant before going to the Royal London Hospital.
The army were called, and Winston Churchill, then responsible for the Metropolitan Police in his role of home secretary, attended. Army snipers took positions on the bottling plant’s water tower. For reasons never explained, a fire broke out inside the house but the police and Churchill stopped the fire brigade from attempting to extinguish it, and both suspects and a fireman died. The siege was sensationally reported in the media in terms of the supposed menace of foreign and likely Jewish anarchists and revolutionaries in the East End.
The company absorbed a number of other breweries in the 1920s and 1930s, including four in Greater London: Michell Goodman Young & Co of the Stamford Hill Brewery, Stoke Newington (founded by 1775, bought and closed 1919); Brandon’s Brewery, Putney (founded c1800, bought 1920, ceased brewing 1949 though continued in use for bottling for some time); Best’s Brewery, Clapham (founded by 1831, bought and closed 1924); and the Hornchurch Brewery Co (founded 1789, bought 1925, brewing ceased 1929).
Manns merged with Watney in 1958 to form Watney Mann, and was bought in turn by the Grand Metropolitan group in 1974, becoming Watney Mann Truman later that year. The Albion was closed in 1979, by which time it was making only bottled and keg beer, principally bottled Manns Brown.
Where are they now?
Watney transferred production of Manns Brown to its Stag brewery when it closed the Whitechapel site. When its parent Grand Metropolitan withdrew from brewing in 1991, the brand was sold to Refresh UK, a company set up by Watney managers who continued to brew it at another former subsidiary, Ushers of Trowbridge. This closed in 2000 and Refresh UK eventually became part of Marston’s, with Manns transferred to another of its brewing sites, Banks’s in Wolverhampton, where it remains in production today at 2.8% ABV, now part of the Carlsberg portfolio.
Brewing briefly returned to the vicinity in 2013 when a small kit was installed in the cellar of the White Hart pub, opposite the Blind Beggar on the northeast corner of the junction. It traded as One Mile End after its address. The brewery relocated to a larger site in Tottenham in 2016 and subsequently closed.
Things to see
The main gates and frontage, now Grade II-listed, still stand on Whitechapel Road, just short of the junction (333 Whitechapel Road E1 1BU), looking much as they did when the brewery was in operation. The decorative iron arch over the main gate still bears the name Mann, Crossman & Paulin, and the imposing yellow brick building behind is surmounted by a decorated pediment with a clock and flagpole. It was subsequently used as offices, though converted to flats around 1995.
The main brewery site behind this has been demolished, with much of it now occupied by a supermarket. Some of it was excavated and redeveloped again in the late 2010s and early 2020s during the construction of the Elizabeth Line through Whitechapel station, unexpectedly uncovering the brewery’s artesian well.
The Blind Beggar was rebuilt in 1894 and became notorious as the place where gangster Ronnie Kray murdered George Cornell in 1966. The building, still bearing its 1980s Watney branding, remains in use as a pub, though has a modern interior and is of no great beer interest.
Another attractive heritage building that once formed part of the site is the Brewery Engineer’s House, a little further east on the other side of the junction (27a Mile End Road E1 4TP). This is a flamboyant Edwardian neo-Baroque house built in 1905 and now Grade II-listed, though its unusual mansard and gable were added in the 1980s. The Grade I-listed 17th century Trinity Almshouses next door are unconnected to the brewery but nonetheless contribute to the interesting streetscape.
The famous stables were behind the Engineer’s House, accessed from around the corner in Cambridge Heath Road: the driveway is still there but the stables were badly bombed in the 1940s and demolished soon afterwards.
The bottling plant has also been demolished: the Silk District, an early 2020s mixed use development, now stands on the site. The besieged terrace in Sidney Street was replaced by social housing in the 1960s.
Marston’s still operates the Albion brewery in Burton, now as part of Carlsberg, and has been known to offer brewery tours (Shobnall Road, Burton upon Trent DE14 2BD). For many years the building housed the only remaining working traditional Burton Union fermentation sets in the UK. These were decommissioned early in 2024 though at least one of them is being moved to Thornbridge in Bakewell, Derbyshire.
Closed brewery Star Brewery, 19 High Street, Romford RM1 1JU (Havering) First sold beer: 1708 Ceased brewing: 1993
Closed brewery Barley Mow Brewery, Newell Street E14 8HZ (Tower Hamlets) First sold beer: c1735 Ceased brewing: 1960
Romford was a rural Essex market town in 1708 when George Cardon started brewing at the Star Inn. In 1799 the business was bought by Edward Ind in partnership with John Grosvenor, who later sold his share to John Smith.
It was Smith’s son Henry who, along with his brother-in-law, head brewer John Turner, quit the firm in 1845 to become a partner at the Griffin brewery in Chiswick, creating Fuller Smith & Turner. C E Coope joined the firm in 1856, when it became Ind Coope, the name under which it was registered as a limited company in 1886.
By 1889, the town centre site had expanded to 16 ha, with 400 staff and an annual output of almost 330,000 hl, sourcing water from eight wells and delivered by 62 horses and 40 drays and carts as well as trains using over 3 km of private railway sidings.
Like several other London breweries in the mid-19th century, Ind Coope built a satellite brewery in Burton upon Trent to take advantage of the local water, which was more suitable for brewing pale ale than London water. The substantial site on Station Street opened in 1856.
In 1934, Ind Coope took over its Burton neighbour Allsopp & Sons to become Ind Coope & Allsopp, a substantial concern with an estate of around 1,800 pubs. Founded in the 1740s, Allsopp was a venerable Burton name widely credited with first introducing pale ale brewing to the town, but had found itself faced with financial and management difficulties, described by two influential brewing historians as ‘the most recklessly run brewery in England’. Ind Coope inherited what became its signature red hand logo from Allsopp.
Part of the Ind Coope Romford brewery, now Havering Museum.
In 1959 the company, now once again known simply as Ind Coope, took over Taylor Walker in Limehouse E14 (see below), closing it the next year. A year later it became the heart of one of the Big Seven breweries by merging with Tetley Walker in Leeds and Ansells in Birmingham to create Ind Coope Tetley Ansell. Renamed Allied Breweries in 1963, it was the largest drinks company in Europe and the second biggest beer producer in UK, owning 11% of the nation’s pubs.
In 1978, the parent group merged with catering and baking company J Lyons & Co, renaming itself Allied Lyons in 1981. A restructure in 1980 saw the Star assigned to a new subsidiary, the Romford Brewing Company. By now the site had been reduced to just over 10 ha, with 870 staff producing 800,000 hl a year. Allied continued to develop the brewery throughout the decade, and by 1987 it had an annual capacity of 1.6 million hl. But even so Romford remained a junior partner to Burton.
In the early 1970s, the Romford brewery produced cask mild (~3.1%) and bitter (~3.8%) for outlets in southern England, sometimes branded Superdraught. From 1979, it also produced cask bitters under the names of breweries Ind Coope had closed down, in line with Allied’s policy of reapplying these names to some of its pubs in the hope of making them appear more ‘local’.
These beers, all around 3.5%, were branded Benskins (Watford, founded 1722, bought 1957, closed 1972), Friary Meux (Guildford, founded 1865, bought 1964, closed 1969) and Taylor Walker (see below), although it’s possible that Benskins and Friary Meux, at least, were the same beer under different badges. In 1986, all Ind Coope cask production was centralised in Burton, with Romford shifting its focus to lager-ale hybrid Long Life (4.5%) in keg and can, originally developed here in 1956.
Ind Coope’s two best known brands were of Burton origin and were always brewed there. Double Diamond originated as a primarily bottled premium pale ale at Allsopp in 1876, and was one of Britain’s best-selling bottled beers by the late 1950s, when it was brewed at around 4.5%. Ind Coope subsequently marketed it as their main keg bitter, its strength reduced to around 3.6%. The much-admired Draught Burton Ale (4.8%) was launched in 1976 in response to renewed consumer interest in cask beer. Despite its name, it wasn’t a historic ‘Burton ale’, which was a darker style dating back to the Baltic trade of the late 18th century, but a cask version of a pale ale based on a 1950s Double Diamond recipe.
In 1993, Allied began preparing for a further merger with international drinks company Domecq, originally a Spanish-based sherry firm, to create Allied Domecq, and sold 50% of its brewing interest to Carlsberg. The Star was deemed surplus to requirements and promptly closed. Carlsberg bought the rest of the shares in 1997 and sold the pubs to Punch in 1999, by which time the ‘local’ cask brands had been discontinued.
The managed pubs passed to the Spirit group in 2011 and were later sold to Greene King. The Burton brewery was sold to Bass in 1998 and is still in operation as part of Molson Coors. Most of the brands remain with Carlsberg. Long Life, despite its name, was retired in the 1990s as a regular brand, though occasionally emerged in the 2000s from Carlsberg’s lager plant in Northampton. Double Diamond remains available as a 2.8% keg beer aimed at clubs, perhaps brewed at Banks’s in Wolverhampton.
Following the sale of the Burton plant, Draught Burton Ale was contract brewed, most recent at J W Lees in Manchester, but was discontinued in 2015. There are a few reconstructed versions around, most notably Burton Bridge DBA (4.8%), introduced in 2015 at a brewery founded by ex-Bass employees who were involved with developing the original.
Curiously, well-known Scottish multinational craft brewery BrewDog bought the Allsopp trademark, including the red hand, from Carlsberg in 2017 but did little with it. In 2021, it was sold on to Jamie Allsopp, a descendant of the original brewery’s founders. He relaunched the brand in 2022, initially through cuckoo brewing.
Things to see
By the time it closed, most of the Star brewery’s buildings were recent, though several historic buildings fronting onto the High Street survived, including the main entrance, a brick arch once leading to the brewery yard, and a boiler house with chimney. These buildings now house the Havering Museum (19 High Street RM1 1JU), which includes numerous brewery-related items among its collection. The rest of the site was demolished, replaced with the Brewery shopping centre and car park.
Taylor Walker
Several sources claim that Taylor Walker originated as the Stepney Brewery, owned in 1730 by James Salmon and Richard Hare, and was later relocated to the site in Limehouse where it continued to brew until 1960. But Martyn Cornell says there’s no evidence for this, suggesting that the brewery was likely always on the Limehouse site and confusion has arisen over place names. Limehouse was part of Stepney parish until 1709 and the names continued to be used imprecisely: for example today’s Limehouse rail and DLR station was opened as Stepney and only received its current name in 1987.
Salmon and Hare were likely brewing on the Limehouse site, then known as the Ship or Ship House Brewery, by 1735 and certainly by 1740. The brewery, which initially specialised in porter, appears on a map drawn around 1745, between Narrow Street, then Fore Street, and Ropemakers Field, a street that has since partly disappeared. The brewery tap was at 78 Fore Street, later renamed and renumbered 133 Narrow Street, known since at least 1805 as the Barley Mow.
Richard Hare’s son Robert emigrated to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1773 and started a porter brewery there, sometimes claimed to be the first such brewery in the Americas.
John Vickris Taylor became a partner in 1792, and in 1816 his future son-in-law Isaac Walker joined him. By the 1880s the firm was known as Taylor Walker, and in 1889 added a substantial additional brewhouse, named the Barley Mow after the pub, north of Ropemakers Field, with the main entrance to the site eventually located on Newell Street (previously known as Church Row) by the junction of today’s Oak Lane. The business was registered as a joint stock company in 1907, becoming a public limited company in 1927. It ceased brewing porter in the 1930s.
The brewery grew through acquisition in the 20th century. Its purchases included John Furze, Whitechapel, founded 1838, bought and closed 1901; Highbury Brewery, Holloway Road, founded 1740, bought and closed 1912; Smith, Garrett & Co of the Bow Brewery, successor to Hodgson’s, founded in 1752, and renowned in the mid-19th century as the leading exporter of pale ale to India, bought and closed 1927 and demolished 1933 to make way for social housing; Glenny’s, Barking, founded 1864, bought and closed 1930; Cannon, St John Street, Clerkenwell, founded 1720, closed 1955; and the Westerham Black Eagle Brewery (Bushell, Watkins & Smith) in Kent, founded c1840, bought 1948 and remaining operational until after Taylor Walker’s own acquisition.
When it was taken over by Ind Coope in 1959, Taylor Walker had 1,360 pubs and off-licenses, including 650 in London, and was particulary noted for its bottled beer, including Cannon Stout (3.6%), inherited from the Clerkenwell brewery, and a pale ale exported to Belgium (5%). Its cask mainstay was Mainline Mild (3.5%). Brewing ceased in 1960 and the site was sold in 1961. Production continued at Westerham until 1965.
As mentioned above, the name made an unexpected reappearance in 1978 when Allied tried to improve the ‘local’ image of its pubs in southern England by rebranding them with names of breweries it had closed. Hundreds of London pubs were rebadged Taylor Walker, including some that had never belonged to the brewery, using the cannon logo inherited from the Cannon brewery in Clerkenwell. By 1980, these pubs were being supplied with a newly formulated Taylor Walker Bitter (3.5%) brewed in Romford, with production shifted to Burton by 1986. The practice ceased in 1999 when Allied sold its pub estate to Punch, but a few pubs still bear the legacy of this period.
Punch revived the name yet again in 2010 as a sub-brand for a selection of upmarket managed pubs, but it was dropped in 2015 when these pubs became part of the Greene King estate. Greene King has occasionally brewed a cask bitter branded Taylor Walker 1730 (4%) as a special.
The brewery was entirely demolished in the mid-1960s, including the Barley Mow pub, and the site is now flats and green space, with the Limehouse Link road tunnel running beneath. Only street and building names recall its past: Barleycorn Way, the Barley Mow Veterans Club, Brewster House and Malting House. In 1989, when a Grade II-listed former customs house a short distance west along Narrow Street, beside the Thames at the entrance to Limehouse Basin, was converted to a pub, it initially revived the name Barley Mow. It’s since become a restaurant, Gordon Ramsay’s Bread Street Kitchen (44 Narrow Street E14 8DP).
Some remnants of Taylor Walker’s acquisitions are still visible. Part of the Cannon brewery can be seen at 156 St John Street EC1V 4LE, the arch in its attractive facade still giving access to the brewery yard with its clock; it continued in use as offices both for Taylor Walker and Allied though is now used as flats. Some of the Furze brewery buildings still stand at 33 Commercial Road E1 1LD, subsequently a warehouse for Johnnie Walker whisky but now converted to flats, student halls, retail and offices.
Though the Highbury brewery was demolished, its tap remains: it operated as brewpub the Flounder and Firkin between 1985 and 1999 and is now known as the Lamb (54 Holloway Road N7 8JL). Only the brewer’s house remains of the Westerham brewery, on the east corner of Black Eagle Close and the High Street (TN16 1RG), though a new Westerham Brewery was founded in 2004, using the old Black Eagle yeast strain.
Courage Brewery Closed brewery Anchor Brewhouse, Horseleydown SE1 2LY (Southwark) First sold beer: 16th century (under an unknown name) Brewing ceased: 1981
Barclay Perkins & Co Closed brewery Anchor Brewery, Park Street SE1 9EQ (Southwark) First sold beer: 1616 (as Monger’s Brewery) Brewing ceased: by 1963
The Anchor Brewhouse stood on the south bank of the Thames at Horseleydown, immediately to the east of the present Tower Bridge, at least from the 16th century. It was one of many small brewhouses that once flourished beside or close to the Pool of London, the stretch of river that formed London’s original port. In 1571 it appears to have been owned by a Flemish expatriate, Wessell Webling. This was a time when most beer drunk in England was still unhopped ‘ale’, and hopped ‘beer’ was a continental novelty introduced by immigrants from the Low Countries.
In 1787, then-owners the Ellis Family sold the brewery to a consortium led by John Courage (1761-97), an ambitious shipping agent born in Aberdeen of French Huguenot descent. By now, adding hops had become the norm in English brewing, and the term ‘ale’ had changed its meaning, among other uses applied to modestly hopped ‘running’ or ‘mild’ ales intended to be drunk fresh, as opposed to long-matured beers like the porter for which London was now famous. Courage bucked the porter trend by focusing on ale brewing.
From 1797 the firm was known as Courage & Donaldson but by the time it was registered in 1888 it was simply Courage. The site had by then expanded significantly and was rebuilt in 1894-95.
The former Courage Anchor Brewhouse at Horseleydown, seen from St Katherine’s across the Thames.
Courage continued to expand in the 20th century, taking over other brewers in London and elsewhere and eventually becoming one of Britain’s ‘big seven’ brewing groups, starting with the Alton Brewery in Hampshire in 1903. In 1955 it merged with nearby Barclay Perkins (see below) to become Courage & Barclay, and five years later merged again with Simonds of Reading to create Courage, Barclay & Simonds. In 1961, it acquired the Bristol Brewery (George’s) along with its near-1,500 pubs. Another big takeover was John Smith’s in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, in 1970, a substantial regional with around 1,800 pubs.
Among its other London acquisitions were the Camden Brewery (opened 1859, bought 1923, closed 1925), Hodgson’s in Kingston upon Thames (opened c1610, bought 1943, brewing ceased 1949), Reffell’s in Bexley (opened 1874, bought and closed 1956), Harman’s Uxbridge Brewery (opened c1730, bought by Mann’s 1925, sold to Courage 1962, closed 1964) and Charles Beasley in Plumstead (opened 1845, bought 1963, closed 1965).
By the 1970s, Courage was particularly noted for three beers: cask Best Bitter (~4%), which was likely made to a slightly different recipe at the various breweries to suit local tastes; cask Directors Bitter (~4.8%), which originated at the Alton Brewery in the late 19th century as a brew reserved for the directors and their guests but was subsequently commercialised; and Imperial Russian Stout (~10.5%), a bottle-conditioned beer inherited from Barclay Perkins (see below). All of these were produced in London, though not necessarily exclusively.
According to the 1977 Good Beer Guide, Horseleydown also brewed a cask dark mild (~3.2%). Among the other Courage brands were Tavern keg bitter (~3.9%) and various bright bottled beers like Light Ale (~3.4%, brewed in Plumstead between 1963-65), Brown Ale, Velvet Stout, John Courage strong pale ale (by now likely no stronger than 5%) and Barley Wine, though some of these may well have been produced at other sites.
Where are they now?
In 1972, the group, now known simply as Courage, was itself taken over by the Imperial Tobacco Group. Like many other large London-based brewing groups, the company began reconsidering its future in the capital, and finally closed its historic Horseleydown site in 1981, transferring production to other sites like Bristol (closed 1999 and since redeveloped) and a new brewery at Worton Grange in Reading which had replaced Simond’s in 1980 (itself closed in 2010).
By then, many of the once-busy surrounding wharves and warehouses, like the rest of London’s historic docks and port areas, had fallen into disuse and dereliction, incapable of accommodating ever-larger container vessels. Following the creation of the London Docklands Development Corporation (LDDC) in 1981, Horseleydown became one of the earliest former port areas to be regenerated. The Courage site was redeveloped between 1985-89, converted to upmarket flats, offices and shops.
When Imperial changed hands in 1986, the new owners sold Courage to Australian national brewer Elders IXL, later renamed Fosters Group after its best-known brand. Following the 1990 Beer Orders, a set of government regulations aimed at restricting the tied house system which had far-reaching consequences for the structure of the brewing industry, Fosters’ Courage subsidiary took over the brewing side of Grand Metropolitan (Watney) in 1991 while both breweries’ pubs were spun off into an arm’s-length, jointly-owned company, Inntrepreneur. This pub estate has long since passed into other hands, primarily Stonegate.
Another former Big Seven brewing group, Scottish & Newcastle, bought Courage from Fosters in 1995 to create Scottish Courage, which also had extensive brewing interests outside the UK. This in turn fell to a hostile joint takeover bid by two multinationals, Carlsberg of København and Heineken of Amsterdam, in 2008, with Heineken taking control of the UK brewing side.
The Courage beer brands were sold to Wells & Young’s of Bedford (see Young’s) in 2007, passing to Charles Wells in 2011 when Young’s withdrew from the consortium; to Marston’s when it bought the Wells Eagle Brewery in 2017; and to Carlsberg when it acquired majority control of Marston’s brewing interests in 2020. Following the sale of the Eagle to Damm of Barcelona in 2022, Courage beers are now brewed at Marston’s in Burton upon Trent. The only beers still in regular production are cask Bitter (4%) and Directors (now subtitled ‘Superior Ale’, 4.8%) and bottled Light Ale (3.3%), though Imperial Russian Stout (10%), which was last brewed in London in 1981 and last brewed by Courage at Tadcaster in 1993, was sporadically revived at Wells in the early 2010s.
Things to see
The 1895 brewhouse, boiler house and malt mill with its distinctive cupola and chimney, still stands immediately downstream of Tower Bridge. There’s a good overview from the east side of the bridge, and the landward side, still with its Courage nameplate and various plaques, can be admired from Shad Thames (44 Shad Thames SE1 2LY). An alleyway on the left side of the building leads to Horseley Down Old Stairs dating from at least the early 18th century, giving access to the foreshore where you can enjoy a closeup view of the brewhouse, including mooring rings for boats making deliveries and collections.
The Anchor Tap, 20A Horseleydown Lane SE1 2LN, was built as the brewery tap likely in the first half of the 19th century. It’s now Grade II-listed and operated by Samuel Smith. It has a one-star heritage interior in recognition of its original bar counter, panelling and fireplaces. Another historic brewery building adjoins it to the southwest, and the brewery site extended into what’s now Brewery Square behind.
The Jacob the Dray Horse statue is a short walk away at the Circle, Queen Elizabeth Street, SE1 2JE. This powerful sculpture by Shirley Pace, installed in 1987 as the centrepiece of a luxury housing development, marks the former site of the brewery stables.
Barclay Perkins
Barclay Perkins in its pomp in the late 19th century: an aerial view looking west from above Borough Market, with Park Street running left to right at the bottom of the image and the river Thames visible top left. Blackfriars Bridge is in the distance: Southwark Bridge hadn’t yet been built. The head brewer’s house on the corner bottom left still stands today.
Just upriver on Park Street, Bankside, was another celebrated London brewery, confusingly known as the Anchor Brewery rather than Brewhouse. It was built by former clothworker James Monger (d 1657) in 1616 adjacent to the site of William Shakespeare’s original Globe theatre, which had burned down three years previously (the current Globe, overlooking the river 230 m to the north, is a 1997 replica). It later passed through the hands of the Child and Halsey families and was likely already a relatively important brewery by 1693, when one of the partners, James Child, was appointed Master of the Brewers’ Company.
Ralph Thrale (1698-1758), nephew of another partner, Edmund Halsey, bought the brewery in 1731 and he and his son Henry (1724?-81) developed it into a substantial porter brewery, the seventh-largest in London by 1760 when it was producing over 50,000 hl a year. It was particulary technologically advanced for its day: it was likely the first brewery to adopt regular use of the saccharometer for precisely monitoring the progress of fermentation in 1770, and one of the first to commission a steam engine from James Watt in 1789.
Henry Thrale was born in a pub on nearby Harrow Corner, now the stretch of Park Street that bends towards Stoney Street and Borough Market, so possibly on the site of what’s now the Market Porter (see Old London Bridge Brewery). In 1763, he married Hester Salusbury (1741?-1821), a diarist, writer, arts patron and proto-feminist. Profits from the brewery were substantial enough for the couple to enjoy something of a bohemian lifestyle at Streatham Park, a country mansion originally built for Ralph in Tooting, where their circle of ‘Streatham Worthies’ included writers Edmund Burke and Oliver Goldsmith, actor David Garrick and painter Joshua Reynolds. They became particularly close friends with writer, lexicographer and coiner of bons motsSamuel Johnson (1709-84), who occupied apartments at Streatham Park and sometimes stayed at the brewery. Indeed it seems Hester and Samuel’s relationship went beyond ordinary friendship.
Henry, who lacked technical expertise in brewing, largely left management in the hands of chief clerk John Perkins. Hester, meanwhile, took an active interest in the business but wasn’t particularly fond of Perkins. When Henry died in 1781, she decided to sell, and enlisted Johnson, one of the executors to assist her. They entered successful negotiations with Robert Barclay and his nephew David Barclay, of the well-known Quaker banking family. When the bankers questioned the brewery’s value on the day of the sale, Johnson riposted: ‘We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich beyond the dreams of avarice”, which gives some indication of the wealth London breweries were generating at the time. Perkins was cut into the deal as a partner and the brewery renamed Barclay Perkins & Co.
The brewery prospered under new management, becoming what’s widely thought to be the biggest in the world by 1815, when it was producing just under 500,000 hl a year. It expanded further following a fire in 1832, and with its impressive halls of tall porter tuns and cutting edge technology it became a VIP attraction. Among its visitors were German statesman Otto von Bismarck, French politician Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (later Napoléon III), Egyptian general Ibrahim Pasha and Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Garibaldi. An 1850 visit by Austrian general Julius Jacob von Haynau, notorious for his bloody and ruthless suppression of the revolutions in Austria-Hungary in 1848, resulted in an international incident when he was attacked and badly beaten by draymen and other brewery workers chanting ‘Down with the Austrian butcher!’
Barclay Perkins label. Pic: Ron Pattinson, barclayperkins.blogspot.co.uk.
Like other porter breweries, Barclay Perkins brewed porter at several different strengths and by the end of the 18th century, the strongest porters (likely 10%+) were particularly known for their popularity in the Baltic trade, with a claim in 1796 that Barclay’s version was ‘specially brewed for the Empress of Russia’, Catherine II (‘the Great’, Екатери́на Вели́кая, reigned 1762-96). Though this trade had dwindled by the end of the 19th century thanks to various political and taxation barriers, the brewery continued to market strong bottled porter domestically, branding it Barclay’s Imperial Russian Stout.
By this stage, with an annual output now exceeding 800,000 hl, the brewery was no longer exclusively a porter brewery, having added facilities to make fresher, lighter ‘running’ ales in 1885. In 1922, following five years of experiments and the installation of chilled tanks, it widened its repertoire still further by launching a pale London Lager (5.4%), as well as a dark version (5.1%). British-brewed lager was then a rarity, but Barclay’s was so successful that it installed an additional German-style brewhouse in 1930.
By the 1950s the lager was Barclay’s biggest seller, accounting for 20% of sales, which was what attracted the attention of ambitious near neighbour Courage, leading to the merger that created Courage Barclay in 1955. Courage soon wound down brewing activity at Park Street, converting much of the site to a bottling plant in 1958, though lager brewing continued until 1962, by which time a large purpose-built brewery had been commissioned at Courage’s Alton site for Harp lager (closed 2015), produced in partnership with Guinness, Mitchells & Butlers (later Bass Charrington) and Scottish & Newcastle.
The site continued as a bottling plant and depot for a few years, but was disused by the mid-1970s then almost entirely demolished in 1981, replaced by a housing estate and hotel. Had it clung on a few more years, most likely at least some of the historic buildings would have been saved and redeveloped.
Things to see (Barclay Perkins)
The Anchor pub at 34 Park Street SE1 9EF (Bank End) is the former brewery tap. It occupies a Grade II-listed mid-18th century building incorporating some elements from earlier in the century, including a staircase and fireplace, with a later panelled room preserved as the Shakespeare Room on the first floor. It’s now operated by Greene King and a popular tourist spot thanks to its location on the Thames Path.
Various commemorative plaques were installed around the site as part of the 1980s redevelopment. A list of owners can be seen on the western reach of Park Street, behind the hotel (SE1 9EQ). Further along, a depiction of Samuel Johnson is at the corner of Porter Street (SE1 9EA), with the street name also recalling the brewery. Halfway along Park Street towards Maiden Lane (SE1 9EA) is a commemoration of the Haynau incident. Other related street names are Perkins Square and Thrale Street.
At 21-23 Park Street SE1 9EQ is a pair of imposing Grade II-listed yellow brick houses from around 1820, likely built for the Head Brewer and Chief Clerk. The gable end with its 1960s ‘Take Courage’ branding is a familiar landmark to commuters using the railway lines between London Bridge and Charing Cross or Cannon Street.
Up on Southwark Bridge Road along the western perimeter is Anchor Terrace (1-15 Southwark Bridge Road SE1 9HQ), a smart parade of eight houses built for senior brewery employees in 1834 and later used as brewery offices. These were restored in 1958 to match the original design and converted to luxury flats in the 1990s. The original Globe Theatre stood at the northern end of the terrace.
A classic Charrington Toby jug, originally used as a logo by the even more historic Red Lion brewery.
Closed brewery 129 Mile End Road E1 4BG (Tower Hamlets) First sold beer: Prior to 1757 Brewing ceased: 1975
Robert Westfield entered the brewing industry as an employee in 1738, and by 1757 had set up his own brewery at Bethnal Green in partnership with Joseph Moss. In 1770 the partners built the Anchor Brewery (or Blue Anchor) on a larger site on the Mile End Road near Stepney Green. John Charrington joined the partnership in 1766 and he and his brother Henry were in full control by 1783. Their descendants continued to manage the brewery into the 19th century, and a limited company was registered in 1897.
Among other acquisitions, Charrington took over and closed the historic Red Lion brewery at St Katherine’s Docks in 1934, inheriting the well-known Toby jug logo of previous owners Hoare & Co. The Red Lion was then said to be the oldest brewery in Britain and one of the oldest continuous businesses in London. It likely originated as the brewhouse of the Hospital of St Katherine’s by the Tower, founded in 1147, with the earliest record of commercial brewing from 1492. It subsequently played a major role in the perfection of porter in the 1730s when then-owner Humphrey Parsons (c1676-c1741) became likely the first brewer to mature the beer in large oak vats. By the time of the takeover, it was particularly noted for a bottled pale ale, Toby Ale (~5%), which Charrington continued to brew.
Another notable acquisition was the Abbey Brewery (Meakin & Co, London and Burton Brewery) in Burton upon Trent, giving Charrington a presence in this increasingly important brewing town. This closed in 1925 with production reassigned to London: the building was sold as a maltings before being demolished in the late 1960s.
In 1963, Charrington’s independence fell to the brewery group generally regarded as kicking off ‘merger mania’, United Breweries, established by colourful entrepreneur E P “Eddie” Taylor (1901-89), of Canadian Breweries, originally as a vehicle to market Carling lager in the UK. In 1967 Charrington United merged with Bass Mitchells & Butlers (itself the product of a 1961 merger between the historic Bass brewery in Burton-upon-Trent and large regional Birmingham brewer Mitchells & Butlers) to form Bass Charrington, then the largest brewery group in the UK.
Reminder of Charrington Brewery on Cephas Street.
In the early 1970s Charrington was still brewing some cask brands in London: dark Mild (~3.4%), Crown Bitter (~3.6%) and IPA (~3.9%). But the site was mainly functioned to distribute the group’s keg products through its pubs, including its flagship keg ale Toby Bitter (~3%).
Where are they now?
In one of the big brewers’ earliest moves to dismantle their capacity in London, brewing ceased entirely in 1975, though the brands remained available for a while with production transferred to M&B in Birmingham. Bass Charrington retained the brewery offices for some years as their London headquarters though the site was largely redeveloped as the Anchor retail park in the 1980s.
In 2000 the brewing interests of Bass Charrington were sold to Interbrew of Leuven, Belgium, which has since become AB InBev following mergers with Brazil’s AmBev and St Louis, Missouri-based giant Anheuser-Busch. Following intervention from the European Union competition regulator, the Burton brewery and some of the brands including Charrington were sold on in 2001 to Coors of Golden, Colorado, now Molson Coors.
Following the sale, Toby Bitter, in keg and occasionally even in cask, continued to appear intermittently, sometimes contract-brewed, and in the 2020s is still available as a keg product, though at an even lower strength of 2.8% ABV. Toby Ale was brewed by Molson in Québec at least into the mid-2000s (historically Molson was a rival to Canadian Breweries but had merged with its successor company Carling O’Keefe in 1989).
Charrington IPA was recreated in cask and bottle with the consent of Molson Coors in 2015 by Steve Wellington at the Heritage Brewing Co in what was then the National Brewery Centre, the former Bass Museum, in Burton upon Trent. It’s since become part of the regular range, using a vintage recipe at a respectable 4.5% ABV and the original Charrington yeast strain. Heritage subsequently revived another Charrington brand, Oatmeal Stout (4%).
The former Bass Charrington pub arm eventually renamed itself Mitchells & Butlers after the Birmingham brewery, which was closed by Coors in 2002.
Things to see
The most obvious remains of the brewery itself are the two former office buildings on the corner of Mile End Road and Cephas Avenue which remained in use by Bass for some time after the demolition of the rest of the site. 129 Mile End Road E1 4BG is an imposing mid-19th century Grade II-listed yellow brick building. The red brick building behind it, now converted to flats, was added to the office complex in 1927: a plaque laid by one of the Charrington family can be seen in an entrance way off Cephas Avenue.
The wall of the uninviting retail park car park fronting onto Mile End Road is recent but follows the line of the brewery’s main gates and at least makes an attempt at being a gateway feature. There are some genuine rear gates still standing, though, at 16 Nicholas Road E1 4AF: note the shields depicting a C for Charrington and an anchor.
A little further east along Mile End Road at no 137 is Grade II-listed Malpaquet House E1 4AR, a large four-storey house built in 1742. Henry Charrington lived here from 1794 to 1833, and it has an interesting subsequent history. To the west of the brewery site, accessed from a footpath between Cleveland Way and Coopers Close, is a secluded row of late 18th century cottages originally built for brewery workers, known as Bellevue Place (E1 4UG). Sadly, another row of brewery cottages behind Stepney Green station, built in 1842 and known as XX Place after one of the brewery’s popular mild ales, is now lost beneath the student flats of Stocks Court (E1 4AH).
The Dickens Inn at St Katherine’s Docks (Marble Quay, St Katharine’s Way E1W 1UH), a converted timber-framed warehouse dating from around 1780, may be the last surviving fragment of Hoare’s Red Lion Brewery. Predating the construction of the docks, which opened in 1828-29, it was once closer to the brewery site but was moved 70 m west in 1975 to facilitate redevelopment. It has no direct connection with Charles Dickens, though was officially opened as a pub in 1976 by his great grandson Cedric Dickens. In the mid-1980s it briefly sold beer from its own off-site brewery, across the river Thames by London Bridge station: see Tooley Street Brewery.
Also known at various times as Beach’s Ales, Bishop’s Brewery and Market Brewery (Market Porter).
Brewpub no longer brewing Market Porter, 9 Stoney Street SE1 9AA (Southwark) First sold beer: December 1981 (as Market Brewery) Brewing suspended: 1984 Brewing resumed: May 1985 Ceased brewing: 1988
Closed brewery 2 Park Street SE1 9AD (Southwark) First sold beer: November 1993 (as Bishop’s Brewery) Brewing suspended: February 1998 Brewing resumed: 2000 (as Old London Bridge Brewery) Ceased brewing: 2000
The central area of Southwark and the Borough immediately south of London Bridge boasts a tradition of beer appreciation dating from long before the development of the nearby Bermondsey Beer Mile in the 2010s. Historically, it was one of London’s main brewing centres, particularly noted for the Anchor Brewery, otherwise known as Barclay Perkins, as well as the headquarters of the capital’s hop trade. Becky’s Dive Bar, in that part of the cellars of the Hop Exchange on Southwark Street now occupied by the Sheaf, was from the late 1950s one of Britain’s (and the world’s) first ‘craft beer bars’, at its peak offering a choice of around 250 beers and with several of the founders of the modern beer consumer movement among its customers.
The Dive Bar closed for hygiene reasons in 1975, but the beer loving tradition continued in places like the Market Porter, a traditional 1890s pub on a corner site where refreshments for workers at the adjacent Borough Market had been offered since at least the 17th century. Back then, the market was still a fruit and vegetable wholesale market at its busiest early in the morning, and the pub retained (and retains) a license enabling it to open from 06.00-09.00.
In 1981, licensee John Beach decided to further the pub’s developing interest in ‘real ale’ by turning it into a brewpub, installing a small malt extract kit. It was known as the Market Brewery but also used the brand Beach’s Ales after its owner. The next year, Andy Bishop took over the brewing duties, but it apperas that despite his brewing experience at various Firkin pubs, production proved difficult to sustain on the small kit and was suspended in 1984.
Brewing activities resumed the following year with the acquisition of a better, though likely still extract-based, kit, installed in a separate unit at the rear of the premises at 1 Park Street. The pub’s drinking area has since been extended to occupy this space but it’s still readily identifiable as a separate building from the exterior. Once again the names Market Brewery and Beach’s Ales were both used.
Bishop’s Brewery, London SE1.
By 1988 the facility was producing around 12 hl of cask beer a week and supplying two other pubs: its core beers were a bitter at around 3.7% and a special at around 4.7%. Nonetheless it fell out of use later that year, though there was a failed attempt to revive it in 1989.
The kit remained in situ until 1993, when Andy Bishop bought it to set up his own Bishop’s Brewery, moving it to a unit in an old grain warehouse immediately opposite on the other corner of Park Street and Stoney Street. In Spring 1996 he upgraded to a 10 hl full mash plant, making use of the existing split-level floor to stagger the brewing vessels.
By 1997, the brewery was reaching capacity, with five or six brews a week. Like most small breweries of its day it primarily produced cask, with core beers including Cathedral Bitter (3.7%), referring to nearby Southwark Cathedral as well as Andy’s last name, and stronger pale ale Willie’s Revenge (4.7%). Despite this, production ceased at the end of 1998.
In 2000 a new owner bought the lease and equipment and briefly revived production under the name Old London Bridge Brewery but this initiative didn’t survive the year. The kit was removed shortly afterwards and renowned specialist coffee roaster Monmouth Coffee then converted the premises into a shop which still trades today. Monmouth owner Anita LeRoy recalls the market trustees still referring to the space as ‘the brewery’, and the split level layout remains visible.
There’s a pleasing circularity to the fact that Monmouth was one of a group of specialist food and drink businesses that rented arches in Bermondsey’s Druid Street nearby in the 2000s, which is how The Kernel came to be located there initially, inadvertently founding today’s Bermondsey Beer Mile.
Hollywood Bowl Finchley, Leisure Way, High Road N12 0GL (Barnet) First sold beer: 1996
Hollywood Bowl Surrey Quays, Surrey Quays Leisure Park, Surrey Quays Road SE16 7LW (Southwark) First sold beer: 1998
Both ceased brewing: 2000
Both these breweries were the result of a short-lived US-inspired experiment by then-national brewer Bass (see Charrington) to install small 8 hl breweries in its chain of Hollywood Bowl bowling alleys, beginning with its Leicester venue in 1995.
By 1998, 13 alleys were equipped with brewhouses, including the two in London shown above. All these brewhouses were decomissioned in 2000 when Bass sold off its brewing arm to InBev (now AB InBev: see Stag and Whitbread).
The chain subsequently operated as part of Mitchells & Butlers, Bass’s successor managed pub company, until 2010 when it was sold to a new owner. It was sold again in 2015, but the two London alleys remain open.
All the venues brewed keg bitters and lagers to standard recipes.
Brewery moved outside London 114 Randall Road SE11 5JR (Lambeth) hanlonsbrewery.com First sold beer: 1996 Moved outside London: 2000
John O’Hanlon, originally from Kerry, Ireland, and his wife Liz bought a small Grade II-listed ex-Whitbread pub in Clerkenwell, the Three Crowns (8 Tysoe Street EC1R 4RQ), in 1995. They renamed it O’Hanlon’s and it quickly became a popular London Irish pub.
Bored with selling so many pints of Guinness, John decided to try making his own stout, and in March 1996 began brewing in a Vauxhall railway arch on a 13 hl kit installed by Rob Jones (see Pitfield Brewery), initially primarily to supply the pub. His first beer was Port Stout, a dry stout modestly fortified with port wine, based on memories of a Dublin pub that served stout with a dose of port as a ‘corpse reviver’ for tired customers.
The beer caught drinkers’ imagination and further brands followed, with the brewery selling increasing amounts to third party stockists and adding bottled beers. The big supermarkets also began to take an interest.
Struggling with limited space, the O’Hanlons decided to relocate themselves and the brewery to a more rural setting in Devon, in 2000 completing a move to Great Barton Farm, Whimple, Exeter EX5 2NY. The pub was subsequently sold and is now known as the Old China Hand.
The relocated business received substantial investment from business mogul Gerry Robinson after featuring on Dragon’s Den-style TV series Gerry’s Big Decision in 2009. It was sold to new owners in 2014 and renamed simply to Hanlons. The same year it was relocated closer to Exeter at Half Moon Village, Newton St Cyres EX5 5AE where it remains in operation, although no longer produces Port Stout on a regular basis.
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