The Blue Lion

At 11 p.m. one night at the end of June 1964 in Stanbow Lane, Boston, a beat group shattered the cool night air with a twanging version of "Knees-up Mother Brown" and with this soundtrack one of Boston's good old fashioned pubs curled up and died. All the regulars were there, and in the yard, lit by a string of naked light bulbs, some of them did get their knees up as they danced around on the hardened earth that was once a lawn.

The Blue Lion, bottom left,

"I shall enjoy this, it will be the last", said regular Jack Fletcher as he drank his pint of Mild, and he could have been speaking for everyone present as they ordered their last drinks because for after more than 180 years progress had caught up with the pub and it was to be demolished as part of the Lincoln Lane re-development scheme.

Before the footbridge was built over the river, the Blue Lion can just be seen on the left, opposite the Stump.

"It used to be one of the best pubs in the town", said Mr. Owen Hill, a regular for nine years. "I've been in the bar when you couldn't move". You could move on the closing night though, the bar was only half filled and a handful of regulars stood out in the yard listening to the beat group "Jerry and the Kodas".

"A lot of the old ones aren't here". explained Mrs. J. Holland, another regular. "When their houses were pulled down and they moved onto the Council estates it was too far for them to come".

At last the final pint was pulled and farewells were exchanged as the regulars went off on their different ways and later in the week when the landlord and landlady, Mr. and Mrs. Bob Mawer moved out the shell of the Blue Lion looked out over the river with sightless eyes, as though it could already see the demolition men coming.

Mill Hill

There used to be a cluster of buildings down Wide Bargate known as Mill Hill.

They were situated roughly opposite the Red Cow on what is now a Car Park.

Above : "Robin" informs me that the white curved part of the building was up to 1908 a Pub known as the North Pole.

Mill Hill in Bargate, and the waste land beyond it, are mentioned in Corporation records in 1676.

I am told by Mr. John Clayton that the building on the right above, with the name sign over the window was a fish and chip shop.

The map below shows the site of Mill Hill. The Red Cow is on the left and the old Three Crowns is next to the present day Holland House Dentists.

Below : The site as it is today, the New England Hotel is far right of the picture.

Lord Nelson figurines

These two figures were removed from the facade of the Lord Nelson Public house in High Street, Boston, in the 1960‘s.

They were auctioned at Summers Place Auctions in Billingshurst, West Sussex in October 2009 and fetched £12,000. The figurines can be seen on the original building below each side of the second upstairs window to the left of the picture. It wasn't unusual for Boston to have two pubs side by side, the Rumpuncheon and the Angel in the Market Place were also neighbours.