The Victoria Pub.

In March 1920 an objection was put before the justices against the renewal of the licence of the Victoria Beerhouse in Rosegarth Street. The objection was that there were twenty five lodgers living in only six rooms. The statement evidently "staggered" the Mayor who, when he pointed out that there were only six bedrooms, the landlord replied that there were three beds in each room. Six times three equals eighteen the Mayor said and the landlord complacently remarked that they were double beds!

The area of Boston now occupied by the Police Station, old Quik-Save supermaket, Jobcentre etc. By the time this picture was taken most of Rosegarth Street had been demolished.

 

The Chief Constable stated that the licence was unnecessary and the renewal was not desirable. He said that in Lincoln Lane and Courts leading out of the lane, from the corner of Stanbow Lane to the Mission Schoolroom, a distance of 186 yards, there were 68 inhabited houses, three of which were licenced - The Blue Lion, The Victoria and The Duke of York. In Rosegarth Street there were three licenced houses, The Victoria, The Stag and Pheasant and The Hop Pole.
Inspector Swain said that he had known The Victoria for over 30 years and during the last twelve years had frequently visited the house. The class of trade he said was very rough and men and women from various parts of the town went there. On more than one occasion he had spoken to the landlord (George Henry Brady) about the conduct of the house. Brady, the Inspector added, had been too lenient with his customers, and they had got the upper hand of him. J. Broughton of 29 Lincoln Lane, a second hand furniture dealer, said he had been a regular customer for 43 years and that half the customers were local residents, and the volume of trade spoke to the necessity of the house. Evidence was also given by James Wm. Bull of Rosegarth Street, and Walter Vergin, boot repairer, Rosegarth Street. Fortunately for the customers the licence was renewed but the Mayor said they might give a warning as to that particular house, for further guidance.

Lincoln Lane Area

During the 1960’s the Lincoln Lane area (almost opposite the Stump on the other side of the river) was demolished in preparation for redevelopment.

The Blue Lion on the corner bottom left, and the Victoria Inn on the far right corner.

The area included Irby Row, St. George’s Lane, Lawrence Lane, Leicester Square, Pinfold Lane, Stanbow Lane, Rosegarth Street and Lincoln Lane itself. Earlier demolition and the passage of time had already brought Lincoln Lane to its knees and from 1932 to 1961 between 75 and 100 properties had been pulled down by the Corporation or by their owners.

Many of the buildings and homes were up to 200 years old and four of the Stanbow Lane cottages were once used as a hospital.

The cottages that were used as a  hospital in Stanbow Lane.

When it was built the area was a prosperous place, boasting among other homes, two or three large merchant’s houses and gardens. It was mainly residential but later a few pubs (the Stag and Pheasant, the Hop Pole, the Victoria, the Blue Lion etc.) appeared as well, and then, as slum clearance produced waste land, shops were built and industry edged a foot in the doorway, including the shoe lace factory of Arthur Whittle and Co. Ltd., a slaughterhouse, George White’s saleroom and even the Fire Station had its home there but by 1961 there were fewer than fifty houses occupied.

Part of Lincoln Lane.

But what of the residents in 1961 that were told they would have to leave? At the Victoria Inn, Mrs. Agnes Berry, wife of the landlord said, “I’m not really bothered, but I know most of my customers are” she also looked back at some of the characters of the area she knew, there was Topper, (a chimney sweep who sported a top hat) Shetty, Weary butterfly, Sooty Sue, Old Pol Simpson, Old Nel Drury……….
At 13, Rosegarth Street, lived Tom and William Cushley, brothers (at 66 and 70 respectively) and both retired Corporation dustmen. Tom had won the Military Medal in the First World War and it was his fourth home in the area. He said, “We’ve both had 35 years on the ash carts. We live here happily together. It suits us and we’re never badly*. Course we don’t want to move!” “I spent four years out in France without a scratch. Now, after five years here they want me out, and it’ll be the fourth time.”
At 16, Rosegarth Street, Mr. and Mrs. W. Hough, with a growing family, took a different view. Said Mrs. Hough: “We’ve always lived in old houses and it will be a pleasure to get away from this and into a decent one. We’ve no bath and no electricity, and the place is damp.”

Rosegarth Street.

At her grocers shop in Lincoln Lane, Mrs. May Peacock, was worried. “I’ve been in this shop for 24 years, the ground opposite has been waste all that time and we want to know definitely what’s going to happen, and when. This shop is my living.”

The corner of Stanbow Lane and Pinfold Lane.

So, back to today, it was all eventually “rejuvenated” and on the characterless, red-bricked site now (2011) among other things are the Police Station, the Department of Employment, an empty Kwik-Save supermarket and the Bus Station.
*In Boston “never badly” means you’re never ill.

Description of The Peacock and the Red Lion (1904)

A description of the Peacock and Royal and the Red Lion in 1904 by an American visitor Josephine Tozier.

The Peacock and Royal.

The front is decorated by bright flowers and long trailing vines growing from the window-boxes on the balconies, and above all is a most gorgeous sign of the most gorgeous of birds, from which it takes its name. We ate our comfortable little dinner in the coffee-room……it was nine o'clock before we left the table. We were too tired to explore Boston's winding ways, and, as it was too early for bed, I had this time secured a large front room looking over the market-place, and my sleepy friends soon found entertainment there.

The sound of a twanging banjo, which came from beneath our window, gathered the few stragglers in the market-place into a circle around the door of the Peacock. We could not see the musician from our window, but he broke forth as soon as the audience had gathered into the usual sentimental ballad dear to English ears. Some boys, with dogs at their heels, formed the outside of the meagre crowd, and then from a side street came belated mothers, pushing their babies home in perambulators. Polly says that at no hour in the twenty-four are English streets entirely free from perambulators, and, late as it was, three of these useful carriages joined the circle, the mothers, in true Boston fashion, being unable to resist music. The audience grew larger and the circle wider; the songs were succeeded by dialogues, and coppers rained plentifully into the collector's hand, until a baby set up an opposition concert, and an enterprising dog was encouraged by the noise to fight his four-legged neighbour. During the rumpus which succeeded, the musicians vanished. The dog riot was finally quelled, the babies trundled home, and the market-place in a few minutes was absolutely deserted for the night.

The Red Lion.

The Red Lion Inn, which faces the Narrow Bargate, has a more venerable exterior than the Peacock, but a decidedly decayed interior. It owns to the age of four hundred years, so no wonder that it is neither very clean nor very modern at the present time. It was formerly the property of one of the Boston guilds, and in the inn yard strolling players were wont to perform for the delight of all Boston.
There is still a very stern, solemn, Puritanical look about the dull little Holland-like city, in spite of the numerous houses of entertainment. Some of these rejoice in extraordinary names. There is "The Axe and Cleaver," "The Loggerhead," "The Indian Queen," "The Ram," "The Whale," "The Unicorn," "The Red Cow," "The Blue Lion," and "The Black Bull." They all furnish abundant liquid refreshment, with our favourite "The Rum Puncheon," and the picturesque "Angel." Even the streets have delicious names: "Paradise Lane," and "Pinfold Alley," "Liquor Pond Street" and "Silver Street," "The Worm Gate," "The Bar Gate," Wide, and Narrow, and "Robin Hood's Walk." There is "Pump Square," there is "Fish Toft Road," and in quaint "Spain Lane," in a house since demolished, until she was fourteen years old, lived Jean Ingelow, the writer. Boston is proud of its literary celebrities, and has erected a statue to Herbert Ingram, the founder of the London Illustrated News.