Stories & Memories

Although cavalry horses get the glory, the war could not have been won without the working horses and mules that were essential to bringing supplies to the front and to enable large-scale troop movements. The huge numbers of horses deployed by the British army (one estimate puts it at one million) required large numbers of men to handle them.

One such man was Thomas Piggin. He was an experienced horse-handler and quartermaster for the Derbyshire Yeomanry. He came from a large farming family, starting his working life on the family’s farm on Sinfin Moor before managing the Derby Racecourse. Although he was over 40 at the start of the War, and running the Alexandra Hotel, he volunteered to use his experience to benefit the war effort.

[Read more…] about DWWIPP-12: THE ALEXANDRA HOTEL

The Exeter Arms is one of Derby’s oldest pubs with a long history of brewing lasting until 1970. It illustrates how small pubs were at the time of WWI. Even in the 1960s it was tiny, just the bar area without the openings either side of the fireplace that were made when it was extended into the cottage next door sometime later. (The extension into the third cottage is even more recent.)

[Read more…] about DWWIPP-11: THE EXETER ARMS

Some wounded soldiers were sent back to Britain for hospital treatment or convalescence. Mobile patients were allowed to go into the town but were forbidden to drink or enter public houses. Unfortunately for them, they could be easily identified by their grey uniforms.

There were suspicions around the town that convalescents were obtaining alcohol and the New Flower Pot (as it was then) became the centre of a surveillance operation. And so it was that a police sergeant observed three wounded soldiers enter 21 Chapel Street, just around the corner. Shortly afterwards Mrs Hynes, the occupant, left the house with “something bulky under her apron” and went into the Flowerpot. A little later Hynes returned home “still carrying some bulky object”.

The sergeant attempted to follow but found the door locked. On gaining entry he discovered an empty three-pint jug, glasses of beer and three soldiers in hospital uniform.

[Read more…] about DWWIPP-9: THE (NEW) FLOWERPOT

Mr Grundy’s Tavern is housed in part of 36 Ashbourne Rd, a fine Georgian property, now The Georgian House Hotel. It has the distinction of being the only pub in Derby named in honour of a WWI veteran. The on-site microbrewery is also named after him and the names of its beers have a WWI theme, such as ‘1914’, and ‘Bullet’ and ‘Sniper’.

[Read more…] about DWWIPP-6: MR GRUNDY’S TAVERN

At the beginning of the war many Derby pubs were brewing their own beer. They too were subject to the wartime restrictions on alcohol production and consumption imposed under DORA (see DWWIPP-2). As the licensee, Edward Morley, discovered, flouting the regulations, in this case the restrictions on how much could be brewed, could be costly, in his case £50. This is about £5750 in today’s terms.

Morley, a borough councillor, was caught when an excise officer, visiting one Sunday morning in March 1918 “for special reasons” (presumably a tip-off), discovered 200 gallons (900 litres) of undeclared wort (beer before fermentation) hidden behind crates of soft drinks in the cellar.

Councillor Morley eventually admitted responsibility but claimed that his brewer, Joe Cooper who also ran the Golden Eagle for Morley, had misunderstood his instructions as he was “sometimes very deaf”. The brew was to supply all three of Morley’s pubs, the Gallant Hussar being the third. It was intended to protect his employees who often suffered abuse from potential customers when beer supplies ran out.

[Read more…] about DWWIPP-5: WAGON AND HORSES