Chapter3

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IT IS NOW time to revert to the business itself - to the industry which the successive generations of

Courages developed on the banks of the Thames at Horselydown. Structurally that undertaking may

be observed today as an imposing mass of buildings covering some 4 acres contiguous to the Surrey

end of the Tower Bridge. They are grouped about a small and most curiously named thoroughfare -

Shad Thames. Antiquarians have not settled whether this name arose out of the fact that the fish

called shad were at one time prolific in the water near this spot, the most likely explanation, or whether

“Shad Thames” is a corruption or abbreviation of St. John at Thames, as the street runs through the

ancient Liberty of St. John. In any case this is the little riverside highway which is now flanked by the

brewery, offices, stabling, cellars, cooperage stores, etc., which make up the Anchor Brewery,

Horselydown The present buildings are not old, for a fire on May 5th 1891, started by a spark in the

malt mills, and causing an explosion and conflagration of the flammable malt dust, destroyed the

brewhouse, after raging for several days, notwithstanding the efforts of the famous Captain Shaw and

his London Fire Brigade and its engines, aided by tugs and floats on the river. This prevented

brewing for some three or four weeks, and Messrs. Barclay, Perkins & Co. supplied the Company with

all London Beers to the extent of about £40,000 - the Pale Ale trade not being affected, The fire

necessitated the rebuilding of the brewhouse. At other times other alterations and extensions have

been made for the equipment of one of London’s most modern and well appointed breweries. It is

interesting to note that on the day the fire broke, out the beer in process of being brewed was Mild

Ale XX, of a gravity of 22 lbs., or 1060°, sold to the houses at 33/- per barrel (less 5%) and retailed to

the public at 2d. a pint - 4d. a quart; hence its name Fourpenny. The duty on this beer was about 7/-

per Barrel, as it was over standard gravity. The duty on the same beer today (1932) would be about

£6.

Another result of the fire was the re-arrangement of the various lease-hold properties held from the

Abdy family, by the surrender and regrant for 99 years of an inclusive lease at a ground rent of

£1,900. The re-building of the waterside premises with deep concrete foundations, sunk well below

the bed of the river, was carried out according to plans of Messrs. Inskip and Mackenzie, by Mr. W.

Watson, the builder, at a cost of £15,524. It included a new malt tower and chimney shaft, bearing the

date 1895; and in this reconstructed brewery were installed duplicate coppers, hop-backs and new

mash-tuns, making up a 250-quarter plant, at a cost of £27,000, less £15,000 received from

Insurance.

This opportunity was taken to install a steam cooperage for making and cleansing the firm’s casks,

which was erected by Messrs. Ransome, of Chelsea.

As has been shewn in the previous chapter, the business began on a much smaller scale. The output

of John and Hagger Ellis from their eighteenth century premises in the converted mill house of the

Knights Hospitallers must have been a very “small industry,” if the first brew of their successor, John

Courage, consisted of but 50 barrels. The premises upon which this output was made comprised for

some years only this small brewhouse and its foreshore, which are all that is contained in the original

lease from the Abdy family. But under the enterprise of the first two Courages, the business soon

began to grow; Liddards and Hartley’s Wharves, on the west of the Brewhouse, Burgess’ Wharf on

the east, were absorbed into the Brewery. Then Keen’s Wharf, and further, outside the Abdy

property, two large plots of freehold land were acquired. The one printed yellow, on the

accompanying map was the firm’s freehold and was sold, before the Company was formed, to the

Corporatio

n of London under the Tower Bridge

Act 1885. Thus the whole of the southern approach of

that great edifice was acquired from the Courages.

                                              Map of Anchor Brewery site dated 1872

Those early times were the days of waterborne traffic. At Courage’s

wharves were discharged malt

and coal and forage for the horses, and from

them Courages’ Ales were shipped in barges, for

loading on ships for

Lowestoft, Dundee, Leith, etc. These were acquiring a more than local

reputation, the shipments including large consignments of stout to Hamburg and other Continental

ports. So important was this department of the

Brewery’s transport that the firm had its own

lightermen, as well as barges

and a skiff - ” The Brothers “ - in which the partners and others

journeyed

across the river to and from the north side. Clerks and excise officers used

the same mode

of transport for their visits to the Brewery, for London

Bridge was some distance away, and the Tower

Bridge, which was to add to

the Brewery’s convenience of access, as well as to its site value, was still

the future.

It is not surprising that the fame of Courage’s beers spread. Southwark

had long been noted for the

purity of the Borough’s waters, and it only

needed enterprise to turn that fame into an effective

demand. It was

probably the keen business sense of the first John Courage which prompted

him to

exploit the celebrity of the water by purchasing the Knight’s house

brewery, just as it was the

enterprise of the second John Courage which led

him to make the most of the neighbourhood’s

natural advantages.

The

well in the brewhouse was sunk to a depth of 450 feet, and yielded 200

barrels an hour of water

of such quality and coldness that neighbours

besieged it in the summer months, and the brewers

produced with it beers

which could hold their own with any.

These beers however were limited in range. The quality of the water

was admirable for the specifically

London beers, such as mild ale and stout,

but it lacked the mineral ingredients needed for good pale

ale. Hence, in

order to supply the large demand for bitter beers, the Courages contracted

in 1872

with Messrs. Flower and Son, of Stratford-on-Avon, brewers of

a fine bitter beer, to supply them with

pale ale for distribution among their

customers. This arrangement continued until 1886. Then it

occurred

to Robert Michell Courage, the youngest partner, while he calculated the

economic waste in

heavy railway freights from Stratford, and the double cartage of the beer across London, from the

railway to the brewery and out

again, that a better arrangement might be made. The contract was

trans

ferred to Messrs. Fremlins Bros. of Maidstone, for Maidstone is on the

Medway, and the Medway

flows into the Thames, and Fremlins could ship

the beer from their brewery in barges for conveyance

direct to Courage’s

wharf at Shad Thames. Thus the lower reaches of the Thames gained an

added picturesqueness as tall-masted brown-sailed barges sailed with their

precious freight—some

32,000 barrels of it a year—from the Medway to

the Pool of London.

Later, economic considerations prompted yet another method of hand

ling the pale ale question.

Fremlin’s ale was of excellent quality; but

why should not Courages acquire a Brewery of their own, to

brew their

own bitter beers in some place where the water was adapted to the brewing

of such ale?

The directors after much search and enquiry eventually

bought Messrs. G. & E. Hall’s brewery at

Alton, in Hampshire in 1903.

These ales were already well known in London; and there, 42 miles from

London, are brewed today

Courage’s Alton Pale Ales. The adoption of this

course was similar in policy to the possession by

other London brewers of

breweries at Burton, which is further from London than Alton. Hall’s

was an

old established concern, having been bought by Mr. Henry Hall

from Mr. John Hawkins in 1841. An

item of some historical interest in

connection with it is that Mr. Hawkins’ manager, James Newman

Frost,

was a relative of Cardinal Newman, and the Cardinal often resided in what

is now the Brewers’

house.

The Alton brewery was of respectable size when Courages acquired it;

it had 64 freehold and 13

leasehold public houses, and its local trade reached

20,000 barrels a year. The premises were rebuilt

according to Messrs.

James Bradford and Son’s plans, and now challenge acceptance as a model

brewery. It is certainly a valuable asset to the Company.

When the acquisition was made Major M. R. F. Courage went to Alton

as local director, taking the late

Mr. B. W. Peile from London as manager,

Mr. H. Cooper remaining as brewer; his retention was

justified in the

increased production, which under the new management soon reached an

output of

50,000 barrels a year. The present headbrewer is Mr. Cooper’s

son, Mr. W. M. Cooper.

G. & E. Hall’s brewery at Alton, in Hampshire, acquired in 1903.

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CHAPTER 3

THE GROWTH OF THE BUSINESS

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