The sign outside gives its name and the date says 1546 - yet the pub was built in the early 1770s. It is situated in the heart of London and yet until recently the drinks licence was issued by Cambridgeshire magistrates. It is close to the jewellery centre of the capital and yet thieves in the area could not be arrested by London coppers and had the chance to escape before the police arrived from Cambridge. It is a tiny gem  of a public house with no TVs, no fruit machines, no music and it closes every weekend of the year bar one. Where is it? Ye Old Mitre Tavern off Hatton Garden.

When Richard Hall was a lad, actually until he was in his forties, the inn was part of the Palace of the Bishop of Ely in Cambridgeshire, used by its servants as a watering hole. The original inn dates from 1546.The area is close to the country’s oldest catholic church, the Chapel of St Ethelreda (otherwise known as Ely Chapel).

  St Ethelreda's Chapel  courtesy of their website at http://www.stetheldreda.com/home.html

Dating back to the year 1291 the chapel was named after a seventh century queen of East Anglia who became a nun and founded the monastery in Ely, becoming its first abbess. The later Bishops of Ely built a huge palace in London to represent their power base and to promote their influence. The gardens of the old palace stretched to 58 acres and included orchards, strawberry fields and vineyards all the way down to the River Thames.

Legends abound – that Queen Elizabeth danced around the Maypole here, and that the cherry tree still visible in the bar area was part of the actual maypole. Another puts the tree as the boundary to the estate of Elizabeth’s favourite courtier Sir Christopher Hatton, in whose favour the Queen persuaded the Bishops to donate some of their land. This was the area which became known as Hatton Garden, famous as a centre of London’s diamond trade.

 This, and  pictures 1 and 4, courtesy of the pub's website at www.yeoldemitre.co.uk

By 1772 the palace and the inn were in poor repair and both were demolished. Shortly afterwards the present pub, known as Ye Old Mitre Tavern, was re-built, using a carved stone mitre from one of the old palace gate posts as a way-mark in the alley leading to it. By some anomaly or other the premises remained under the control of Cambridge until well into the Twentieth Century – hence the oddity about the licensing rules, and the lack of jurisdiction of London’s finest.

The arched alley leading to the pub  is easy to miss – a narrow dark passageway between numbers 8 and 9 Hatton Garden, marked by an old crooked street lamp. Its position gives it a measure of privacy – an oasis of calm in a frenetic part of the City.

The pub itself is ‘small but beautifully  formed’ with two downstairs bars and a function room upstairs. All are oak-panelled and, according to the various pub guides on-line, are cosy, relaxing and with oodles of original charm.

To Richard Hall it was just one of a number of hostelries he frequented in the late 1770s - though he would have seen it as being 'new' rather than  'ye olde'. It remains as a link between the centuries, a business which has stood the test of time.

                                                 Samuel Whitbread, by Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Happy birthday Mr Whitbread, born 30 August 1720, just a few years before Richard Hall appeared on the scene. Bedfordshire born, and the seventh of eight children, he went to London at the age of 16 and was apprenticed to a brewer. At the age of 22 he founded his own brewery. In 1750 Whitbread created the first purpose-built mass-production brewery in the UK, when he moved his brewing operations to Chiswell Street in the east of London. Over the following years, Whitbread became a household name throughout the country.

The brewery premises in Chiswell Street in 1792 (courtesy of Wikipedia)

A measure of the business opportunities which opened up in the Eighteenth Century is the fact that the brewery grew into Whitbread & Co Ltd and by the time of his death in 1796 his company was the largest brewery in London, producing over 200,000 bottles of beer a year. The Gentleman’s Magazine went so far as to suggest that Whitbread died a millionaire - a fantastic amount for a self-made man. In the early years he was able to ride the wave of public support for beer as an alternative to gin - the Gin Acts discouraged gin consumption and in its place Whitbread promoted his product, particularly porter, as a healthy alternative. By 1758 his firm were producing 65,000 barrels of porter a year, but this figure was to double over the next 30 years thanks to the introduction of a Watts and Boulton steam engine to grind the malt and pump water, doing the work of an estimated 14 horses.

Official recognition of his success came on 27 May 1787 when King George III, with Queen Charlotte, three princesses and an entourage of titled guests, visited the brewery. There to greet them and to explain the intricacies of the steam engine was James Watt in person.  

Whitbread was Member of Parliament for Bedford for 22 years (and Steyning for 4). He was a keen supporter of the abolition of slavery and spoke against the trade in the Commons in 1788.

Despite that, let us raise a glass of the dark stuff to Samuel Whitbread. Many happy returns of the day, SW! 

In 1708 an Italian living in Cologne sat at his kitchen table mixing up a few drops of citrus oil – from lemons, tangerines, grapefruit and oranges. He added bergamot and a few chopped orange tree leaves, then some lavender and rosemary, added a tincture of jasmine and a dash of diluted ethanol, and hey presto, he had arrived at a miracle water! The only trouble was, he didn’t know what to do with it – take it as a medicine or splash it all over, as the saying goes. So he wrote to his brother extolling the wonders of the concoction saying : "I have found a fragrance that reminds me of an Italian spring morning, of mountain daffodils and orange blossoms after the rain". He named his fragrance Eau de Cologne, (or ‘Kolnisch Wasser’ in German) in honour of  the town where he was living.

The inventor was Giovanni Maria Farina and his product became a sensation throughout Europe and almost certainly would have been known to Richard Hall. And let’s face it, with his aversion to washing, any attempt to mask natural odours was to be encouraged!

Farina set to and sold the expensive phials of perfume from his Cologne premises. He died in 1766 and in 1806 his grand-grand-nephew Jean Marie Joseph Farina opened a perfumery business in Paris. This is now owned by Roger & Gallet and that company owns the right to call its product Eau de Cologne extra vieille.

Meanwhile there had appeared a number of imitators on the scene - perfumiers claiming that they too were selling the ‘original’ eau de Cologne. Numerous court cases followed and at least two separate products emerged – one belonging to the Parisian branch of the Farina family and the other to a Wilhelm Mülhens who claimed to have bought the name from another member of the Farina family (actually not even related, but that’s another story). He started selling eau de Cologne in 1803. Finally the courts ordered the Mülhens  family to stop passing their product off as having anything to do with the name ‘Farina’ and they therefore hit upon the idea of naming it after their original  house number – ‘4711’ (Glockengasse).

                                 The original watchglass bottle

Mülhen had claimed that the secret formula for his ‘aqua mirabilis’ had been given to him in 1792 by a mysterious Carthusan monk as a wedding present but when it was re-launched as 4711 the idea of it being used as a perfume, particularly for gentlemen, rather than as a medicine, really  took off.

The business was later acquired by the Proctor & Gamble but five years ago they sold it on, together with the original Glockengasse building, to the perfume company Mäurer & Wirtz of Aachen. They are entitled to use the description ‘original eau de Cologne’. The Glockengasse is a veritable shrine to the product with a gold fountain spurting forth the famous product in the foyer. 

For me, the distinctively coloured label is a link to a fragrant past – of great Grannies and indeed even further back to the times in which my great-great-great-great grandfather lived.

                        The 4711  building in Glockengasse

Here’s another one, with definite connections to the life and times of Richard Hall:

Gordon’s Gin

According to Wikipedia  a Scot called Alexander Gordon came down to London in 1769 and opened his distillery in Southwark – just down the road from where Richard had been brought up. Gin (production and consumption) would have been all too evident in Richard’s  formative years – when the gin craze was at its height tens of thousands of people, many of them children, died every year from the effects of gin drinking. Hogarth’s famous  picture ‘Gin Lane’ portrays the horrors – but Hogarth was simply being a lobbyist. This was a satirical piece designed to assist the landed gentry who wanted greater subsidies to grow barley to be used in brewing beer.

As a boy Richard would have encountered dozens of  traders selling gin - made in local stills – as he walked around the streets of London. By 1769 the trade had collapsed and the craze was long-gone, which makes it all the more surprising that Mr. Gordon should start his distillery then. Blind folly – flying in the face of reason? Maybe, but it worked and it has an echo in a related business venture nearly 250 years later.

This is where a blog is fun – because you can make up the rules and change them as you go. The link from Gordon’s Gin is to Sipsmith’s, which only started in 2009 and was decidedly not going strong when Richard was around. Have a look at their website at http://www.sipsmith.com/  which explains that theirs is the first distillery to open in the capital for some 189 years. The micro-distillery operates from suburban Hammersmith and uses a gorgeous copper still, shaped with a distinctive swan’s neck, called Prudence. Or better still google ‘Sipsmiths’ and read some of the enthusiastic foodies raving about the gin and the vodka produced by the company.

And why is this relevant? Not just because the company, like Gordon’s, have embarked on making gin in the capital at a time when gin consumption is dropping. But because one of the founders of the company is Fairfax Hall – a  man who has every bit as much of Richard's DNA coursing through his veins as I do.  Now I have never met my second cousin, but it seems to me to be a wonderfully crazy thing to do, and a wonderfully crazy time to do it. Would Richard have approved? Probably not – he brewed beer. And cider. And currant wine. And he bought cognac by the gallon, as well as ordering regular deliveries of a pipe of port to his home in the Cotswolds. But gin? No. There is no record that he ever touched the stuff.

So, why the plug for Sipsmiths?  Because young Master Hall had the decency to buy my book, and this is the least I can do to say ‘thank you’. And if you object to this flagrant attempt to curry favour think of this: if you buy my book and tell me about it - and your business - maybe I can work in a connection and do the same for you!

Here are a few more businesses which have survived and prospered over the past few centuries, and with which ancestor Richard Hall would have been familiar:

Lloyds Bank

The origins of Lloyds Bank stretch back to 1765, when John Taylor and Sampson Lloyd set up a private banking business in Birmingham, England. At that stage their emblem was a beehive - signifying thrift and industry - but it was later changed to the black horse when the bank took over the premises of a goldsmith who had been using the black horse as his symbol throughout the previous century.

The Times

The Times has been a daily national newspaper published in the United Kingdom, thundering on since 1785; at that stage it was known as The Daily Universal Register. Three years later it changed its name to The Times. Richard would have known of it, but never recorded having bought it.  

Pickfords

The removals company first entered the wagon trade in the 17^th Century. Their site records that the company was operated from Manchester but opened in London in 1720. They say:

‘1771 - Pickfords invents the fly wagon, named for its speed, to carry goods and passengers. The fly wagon makes the London to Manchester journey in four and half days, travelling just over 42 miles a day’.

Garrard & Co

According to Wikipedia ‘The company that was to become Garrards was founded by George Wickes (1698–1761), who entered his mark in Goldsmiths' Hall in 1722. Wickes set up business in Threadneedle Street in the City of London in 1722; the company moved to Panton Street off Haymarket in central London in 1735 as a goldsmith and provider of jewellery and other luxury items to aristocratic patrons. Wickes was an accomplished silversmith known for his work in the rococo style, and gained the patronage of Frederick, Prince of Wales. Two apprentices of Wickes, John Parker and Edward Wakelin, purchased the company following Wickes’ retirement in 1760, replaced by John Wakelin and William Taylor in 1776. Following the death of William Taylor, Robert Garrard became a partner in the company in 1792. Garrard took sole control of the firm in 1802…’

Yardleys of London  

Yardleys of London is one of the oldest cosmetic companies in the world. Established in 1770, it became a major producer of soap and perfume. Whether Richard used their products - or indeed those of their rivals - is open to doubt!

Guinness

Arthur Guinness started brewing ales from 1759 at the St James's Gate Brewery in Dublin. Ten years later on 19 May 1769 Guinness exported his ale for the first time, when six and a half barrels were shipped to England. There is however  some evidence to show that the Guinness product had found its way to the mainland some time earlier - possibly as extra ballast or maybe as surplus beer intended for the voyage. There are for instance records of a pre-1769 advertisement placed in the Gentleman's Magazine. Richard's brother in law William Snooke kept a diary - and this records a purchase of Guinness.

Wilkinson Sword

Established in 1772 in London (unlike that johnny-come-lately Gilette, named after  King Camp Gilette who founded his company in 1895. I mean, who calls a child 'King Camp'?)

and then there are the ones designed to fool us into thinking they are that old.....

Thomas Pink shirtmakers

Pink was set up in 1984 by three Irish brothers – James, Peter and John Mullen. 'Their idea was to reinvent the traditional Jermyn Street shirt, taking it to a wider, aspirational audience'. The brand name Thomas Pink came from an 18th century London tailor known for making sought-after red hunting jackets. If you were lucky enough to own one, you were said to be ‘in the pink’

Crabtree & Evelyn

Nice try but the company was   founded in 1972 in Cambridge Massachusetts by a Mr Harvey. The first retail store was opened in 1977 in the Philadelphia area. It is now owned by a Malaysian rubber company.

If Richard were to return to London – would there be any businesses he recognized? What firms have stood the test of time? Well, here are a few:

Berry Brothers & Rudd. Their own website gives these details:

‘The business was established in 1698 by the Widow Bourne at 3 St James's Street, London. Today members of the Berry and Rudd families continue to own and manage the family-run wine merchant.

By 1765, at the 'Sign of the Coffee Mill', Berrys not only supplied the fashionable 'Coffee Houses' (later to become Clubs such as Boodles and Whites) but also began weighing customers on giant coffee scales..

Berrys first supplied wine to the British Royal Family during King George III's reign and has continued to do so until the present day. Today, Berrys holds two Royal Warrants for H.M. The Queen and H.R.H. The Prince of Wales’.

Fortnum & Masons

From their website:

Fortnum, meet Mason

‘In 1705 Hugh Mason had a small shop in St James’s Market and a spare room in his house. The Fortnum family had come to London from Oxford as high-class builders in the wake of the Great Fire, helping to establish the St James’s and Mayfair areas as the most fashionable in London. William climbed another rung by taking a post as footman in Queen Anne’s household - and the room at Mr Mason’s.

The Royal Family’s insistence on having new candles every night meant a lot of half-used wax for an enterprising footman to sell on at a profit – so while the Queen’s wages paid the rent, William’s enlightened side-line melted down into enough to start a respectable business. The rest, as they say, is grocery’.

Christys’ hats

Richard would certainly have known about them – they were hatters just down the road from where he lived in Southwark. Their site says:  ‘Miller Christy, the founder of the Christy dynasty set up his first manufacturing unit in Whitehart Court in London in 1773. Six reigns of royals and eight generations of the Christy family have forged the brand of Christys’ London since its foundation over 200 years ago. Christys’ is the only company in the world still making high quality top hats and bowlers in the traditional way, using hatting skills established over 200 years ago and thus helping to keep a valuable industry very much alive!

For Richard, Christy's would have meant fine beaver fur  hats, since Mr Bowler didn't appear on the scene until after Richard's death.

Schweppes

Wikipedia says it all:  ‘In the late eighteenth century, Johann Jacob Schweppe (1740–1821), a German-born naturalised Swiss watchmaker and amateur scientist developed a process to manufacture carbonated mineral water, based on a process discovered by Joseph Priestley in 1770, founding the Schweppes Company in Geneva in 1783. In 1792, he moved to London to develop the business there. Mainstay products include tonic water (the oldest soft drink in the world – established in1771).’

Twinings

They say:  ‘In 1706 Twinings was one of the first companies to introduce tea drinking to England. To compete with the many coffee houses in London, Twinings opened a tea shop in the Strand. Soon, Twinings Tea became de rigueur for people such as Jane Austin (sic), Charles II and Earl Grey.

Actually that is a bit wide of the mark, since Charles II died in 1685, a full 21 years before Twinings appeared on the scene. And Jane Austin – didn’t she invent a motor car?! Still, we get the picture.