Ye Olde Fighting Cocks pub - did it survive?

Pubs were once the social centre of many British (and Australian) communities. When spouse and I lived in Britain, we were paid so poorly by the National Health that we could not afford to go to restaurants or on cruises. The local pub became the meeting place of all our colleagues, for a drink or two after work to be sure, but mainly for socialising, being entertained and keeping warm.

All that has changed. In 2014 The Guardian wrote that the rate at which British pubs are closing down has accelerated to 31 a week. Closures are being blamed on factors such as high taxes on beer, competition from supermarkets selling cheap alcohol and changing demographics in cities where some migrant communities won’t tolerate alcohol in their midst. And there is something else. According to most 20-Somethings, the pub has not kept pace with social change! Once the heart of the local community, young people would rather be working their technological devices at home, drinking beer in front of the tv or computer.

And sometimes there was a very local economic catastrophe. Twenty-five years ago, the Marston's pub chain operated twelve pubs in Kidderminster, the home of the carpet trade. After the carpet trade disappeared, there were only three pubs left standing.

Pubs have been built and demolished in the past, of course. There were 99,000 pubs in 1905 but just 77,500 by 1935, as a result of a series of government policies including deliberate suppression, restrictive opening hours, stringent regulations and higher taxes. The industry saw a temporary recovery after the Second World War. By 1969, there were 75,000 pubs in the UK, a number that fell gradually to 69,000 by 1980, then rather tragically slipping to 60,000 in 2002 and 48,000 in 2013.

In the past breweries used to own most pubs and used them to sell their own products. Today’s PubCos are a significant reason for the demise of the industry. The 1989 Monopolies and Mergers Commission ruling, that the old, vertically-integrated system was anti-competitive turned out to be a great mistake. Now campaigners are calling for an urgent change in the law to make it harder for pubs to be demolished or converted to ugly modern convenience shops.

I have looked at British pubs in this blog before, including the Red Lion Hotel on the River Thames; three Dickens-related pubs in Broadstairs; and The Falcon, Clapham Junction and Turk's Head, Middlesex. But now I want to focus on a special pub. When spouse and I lived in St Albans in Herts, we loved Ye Olde Fighting Cocks. This pub originally sat on land that had been the site of an early Saxon royal palace and monastery, founded in 793 AD. St Albans Cathedral and grounds were close by and there were tunnels stretching from the beer cellar beneath the pub to the Cathedral, apparently frequented by monks. Could that have been correct - boozed up clerics?

Front entrance

One of the timbered rooms

Part of the beer garden

The main structure we see today is free-standing and has an octagonal appearance. It has been added to over the years but the original timber-framed structure is clearly visible. The pub was moved to its present site after the dissolution of the Abbey in 1539. The location is perfect - at the end of Abbey Mill Lane beside the River Ver, just outside Verulamium Park.

If the octagonal half-timbered structure appears to be strangely shaped, it was because the building was once a medieval dovecote. What is the evidence? Pleadings in a legal case filed in 1622 state that Thomas Preston “…bought an old pigeon house and pulled the same down and erected it...and afterwards put up a chimney and made thereof a tenement which is now called the Round House.” However, the precise date when the building was re-erected is not certain, a safer conclusion being that it was sometime between 1600 and 1622.

It is reputed that Oliver Cromwell slept at the inn at some stage during the Civil War of 1642-1651. Needless to say this was before he became Lord Protector. Perhaps its 17th century references account for the half timber exterior, while the inter­ior displays low ceilings, atmospheric lighting, fireplaces & dark timber panelling

Cock fighting was a national sport in Hertfordshire (and elsewhere) for 600 years from the reign of Henry II to the reigns of all the Georgian kings. So it is believed that the pub’s small Cock Pit was brought from the Abbey and then the original name was changed to Ye Olde Fighting Cocks. When cock fighting as a sport was banned in 1849, the pub name was changed to something more respectable and the cock-reference was only reinstated later (in 1872). If the stories are true, cock fighting took place right IN the main bar in the late Victorian and Edwardian eras.

The pub still has a beer garden which in summer, I can assure you, is lovely. Apparently Chief Inspector Morse thought so too when he and Detective Sergeant Lewis discussed a case over a drink at the Ye Olde Fighting Cocks pub in 1990. Having been back in Australia for a long time by then, I was very excited to see "our local pub" on television so unexpectedly. 

The Talbot in Knightwick

The UK's best sporting pub has just been voted for and The Talbot in Knightwick Worc won. The Talbot Arms was a traditional coaching inn that started in c1450 on the banks of a river. Old fashioned and unspoilt, it is famous for its own pigs, a kitchen garden, game freshly served, a monthly farmer's market, a beer festival and hunters' breakfasts. I don't like shooting, but I do understand when the locals say they could absolutely not survive without their pub.