This page lists pubs/beerhouses which either brewed on the premises, or where it looks like they did so. Further research is required. Can you help?
TRADEMANS ARMS, 100-101 East Street
The 1853 and 1855 directories list John Chitty as a beer retailer at 21 Middle East Street, and by 1857 as a brewer and beer retailer at the same address. He is a brewer again in 1859, but by 1861 is only a beer retailer.
Newspapers of June 1852 carry a report of a lad in the employ of Messrs. Forbes and Marshall, booksellers, being charged with being in the beer- shop of Mr. Chitty, in East Street, with intent to rob the till. Mr. Chitty was in a back-room, and heard some money rattle. He went into the shop when the boy ran out, but he ran after and caught him. The lad being respectably connected, Mr. Chitty declined to proceed with the case, and the lad was discharged after a severe lecture!.
In June 1855, there was a petition for insolvency filed against John Chitty of Middle East Street “brewer and retailer of beer”, and on 1st March 1856, his notice of insolvency also describes him as a brewer and retailer of beer.
In both August 1857 and Sept 1859, he applied for a licence and it was refused. In the 1858 Licensing sessions it was said that John Chitty had occupied the house as a beer shop for 9 years and could accommodate 40 horses. In the Hampshire Independent of 1st September 1860, he applied again for a licence for the Tradesman’s Arms, saying he had lived there 12 years, and had applied five times before. He brewed his own beer and could accommodate 50 horses. (an increase of 10 in a year!). It was not for himself that he wanted the license, but for the Public. He could give them now a glass of good home brewed beer.
He was however on the move by December 1860 when his free beerhouse was for let in East Street with a brewery attached, and a dry skittle ground and good yard. Stock etc, was to be taken at a valuation. Possession could be had immediately. “Satisfactory reasons will be given for leaving.
A John Chitty, a farmer, was subject to bankruptcy in 1861 and in 1862, and his debts included £65 for hops, £35 for malt, and £18 to Scrase and Baker for beer. He blamed failure of crops and death of cattle. Since debts were for hops and malt, perhaps we can perhaps assume this is the same ‘John Chitty’.
The True Briton, 5 King Street.
The name changed to Britons in Union and in the 1880s it became known as United Britons.
All I have is an auction notice in the Hampshire Advertiser of 14th January 1854, where there was to be a sale at the True Briton Inn of a small brewery plant including a fifty-gallon copper, mash tub, coolers, four 100-gallon store casks, barrels, liquor pump, a 6 pull beer engine, counter, signboard, etc. May be viewed the morning of Sale.
The Unicorn See Oddfellows Arms
THE VICTORY, 1 Godfrey Street.
Information is sparse, and limited to a sale notice in the Hampshire Independent of 11th May 1839. The auction sale was to be in 2 lots, at the instruction of the Mortgagee. Lot 2 was described as a freehold compact brewery in full trade. with a shop and outbuildings called The Victory Brewery in Godfrey Street, Saint Mary's in the occupation of Mr George (with two dwellings and tenements adjoining) with Yard. This Lot yielded a rental of £63 12s. per annum.
There seems to have been no sale as the advert is repeated on 31st August 1839.
In the Hampshire Advertiser of 23rd November 1839 there is another auction notice “Bankrupt’s effects without reserve”. This was for a large Copper, with discharging tap, fixings etc and 300 casks of various sizes, the property of B George and Co, bankrupts. The auction was to be held on the premises, the Victory beerhouse near the gas works.
On 21st December 1839 there is an auction notice for the sale of 80 lots of household furniture on the premises at the Victory beer house.
Who was Mr B George? In October 1935, B George purchased the brewery of Messrs Whitchurch & Co Salisbury, and would continue under the name of George, Rolfe and Elliott. It would appear they were also coal dealers. In December 1836, this partnership was dissolved and all debts were to be settled by B George at the Accounting House, Brewery, Milford Street Salisbury, with the business continuing under the name of B George & Co. In a notice dated 23rd September 1839, it was announced that the Whitchurch Brewery and Coal trade had been assigned by the estate of B George to Giddings & Company. They would continue from premises in Milford Street.
Perhaps the Whitchurch Brewery took a lease of the Victory, brewed beer in Southampton but ceased in late 1839. A rare early example perhaps of a brewery outside of the town moving in.
According to Tony Gallagher the name of this beerhouse changed to the Godfrey Inn the 1890s. It closed in the early 20th Century.
West Quay Tavern, West Quay.
There is a connection with the Queen Charlotte in Simnel Street, and the Wonder Inn. I can find no direct evidence of brewing here, but I will keep investigating!
The landlord for a time here was William Batchelor, and the 1861 Census shows him at Castle Lane, brewer West Quay Tavern. His father was Maurice Batchelor of the Queen Charlotte in Simnel Street from around 1836 to 1845. (see the Queen Charlotte brewery page).
In November 1862, William John Batchelor was summoned for keeping the West Quay Tavern after 11pm on a Sunday night, but the case was dismissed.
In 1848 and 1854 the house was owned by G Hunt, who was no doubt of the Hunt and Co brewery, so it is unlikely to have been brewing at those times.
William continued to run the West Quay Tavern until his death on the 9th of September 1875, and the licence was transferred to Maria Jane Batchelor.
WHITE HART INN (later Hotel), 49 Shirley High Street Shirley
I start with a notice in the Hampshire Independent of 3rd July 1852, when C Beavis, builder etc ‘begs to return his sincere thanks to his numerous friends, and the gentry and inhabitants of Shirley,' for the very liberal support which he had received whilst carrying on the business of brewer and publican at the White Hart Inn, Shirley, and to inform them that he had disposed of the business to Mr. F Collins, whom he recommended as his successor. Beavis had given up the business to devote his attention to his own business, as a builder at No. 1, Church Street Shirley which he had run for the past 14 years. The same newspaper runs an announcement that he (Collins) had taken over the White Hart Inn which was “a free house and the ales are home brewed and of the purest quality”.
Directories do not help, listing Beavis as a builder, sometimes at the White Hart Shirley. It would appear from what I have seen that he was a well known local builder of repute.
In June 1852 the license of the White Hart Inn had been transferred from Cornelius Beavis to Francis Collins. Beavis owned the freehold of the inn and granted a lease to Collins. In the Hampshire Advertiser of 12th May 1855, there appears an auction sale notice for the sale of the freehold of the White Hart Inn, a free house, by order of the mortgagee under a power of sale on the premises on 25th May. It was described as an “excellent house together with yard stabling and 2 quarter brewery, (a brew of about 288 gallons a time) in the occupation of Mr Collins by lease at £60pa”. There was also a smoking room, bar, tap room,kitchen, scullery and a brewhouse, malt store, cellar, double coach house, a 5 stall stable loft, piggery, coal house and large yard. The 1857 directory shows Francis Collins was still here.
In April 1860 there was another sale of dwellings and the freehold beerhouse and brew house, by the executors of George Dorrell. Lot 2 was the freehold pub the White Hart Inn occupied by Mr Collins comprising a bar, parlour, smoking room, kitchen club room and six bedrooms. There was also a compact brewery, large yard, good stabling, a coach house etc. The sale was by a mortgagee under power of sale.
It seems likely that George Dorrell bought the freehold in 1852, and there was then another sale after his death, subject to the lease to Collins. However, six years later on 29th September 1866 an auction was advertised for the 2 quarter brewery plant, mash tun, copper, 2 malt crushers, coolers, backs, sieves, vats, casks, stands, stillions, piping, buckets etc, a six, and a three pull beer engine, a brewer’s dray, trucks, 2 light spring carts, 2 sets of harnesses and household furniture. This was clearly a sale of the equipment only and we can conclude brewing ceased around this time. Newspapers repot the death of Cornelius Beavis in September 1879.