FEATURE
The Black Bull Deeping Gate
In pride of place at the foot of Deeping St James bridge is The Black Bull. Now a family home, there has been a public house on this site since at least 1770 and probably years before that.
remember food being served was when piles of bread had to be buttered to make sandwiches when a darts match was being held – they were part of a very active local league.
then lay empty for a number of years until 1980 when Mike Crowson moved in and spent years recreating an authentic old Victorian pub in the front rooms, replete with pewter mugs and oil lamps.
But for Pamela Stevenson (nee Burton) this was also a happy family home, with chickens in the yard, a dog, paddocks and gardens running down to the river, a copper in the scullery and a mangle to dry the washing! There was an aviary with budgies and in the house across the road on the corner, thought to have once been the toll house, was Mrs Sneath whose ducks would swim in the dyke. Pam’s dad William Henry Burton (known as Harry) was the last but one landlord of this local hostelry. One of five Burton siblings (we wrote about his sister Cissy in issue 6 of this magazine) he was born in a cottage in Church Street, Deeping St James, and married the diminutive Minnie Rawlinson from Fletton in 1925 after seeing army service in the First World War where he suffered from the effects of gas. During the Second World War, Harry worked in the munitions factory at Peter Brotherhoods leaving Minnie, assisted by members of the family, to run the pub. Just wet trade then: the only time that Pam can
Local children had a carefree childhood. Pam can remember going with her friends on their bikes to Hannah Smith’s in Bridge Street to buy sweets, and one memorable occasion when they all jumped on their bikes to ride over to Frognall where they heard a plane had crashed during the war.
When Harry and Minnie had moved into the pub in 1937 it had recently been renovated for Soames Brewery by well-known local builders and stonemasons, Horace and Arthur Day of Towngate. It originally had four upper and four ground floor rooms. Now the ground floor became one large room, separated by a partition so the room could be opened up for social functions. The bar and serving area were behind. A half cellar was built on the side and there was a lounge at the rear. The sash window at the back of the original pub became a serving hatch into the
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Harry remained the landlord until his death aged just 58 in 1951. At first the pub had been owned by Soames Brewery but they had sold out to Stewart & Patterson in 1949. Minnie was left at the helm until 1955 when she retired and went with Pam to live with her eldest daughter, Jean Haycox in Eye. The esteem in which the locals held Minnie was reflected in her retirement gifts of an oak linen chest and a clock. Sadly she died just two days into her retirement. The last licensee was Sidney Mitchell who was at The Black Bull when it closed in 1971. It
