Oliver Cromwell, 125 Bridgeman Street

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The Oliver Cromwell was situated on Bridgeman Street, on the corner of York Street and Back Coe Street, neither of which are still in existence. It dated back to the middle of the nineteenth century.The Sir Sidney Smith was just three doors away until that pub's closure in 1934.

In September 1854, landlord Ralph Fairhurst fell foul of the recently-passed Sale Of Beer Act. The act forced pubs and beerhouses to close between the hours of 2.30 and 6pm on a Sunday afternoon with another closing time of ten o'clock on a Sunday night. Fairhurst was charged with having a number of persons in his pub at 5.30 one Sunday afternoon. He argued that he was at his wife's funeral at the time in question and had left his brother-in-law in charge. As Fairhurst had no previous complaints against him he given just a 5 shilling fine. [Bolton Chronicle, 2 September 1854]

The Oliver Cromwell was one of David Magee's first pubs. Magee was at the Good Samaritan on Derby Street in 1853 but he snapped up pubs as he tried to find a market for his beers. One of those pubs was the Oliver Cromwell.

In 1869 Magee ran into a problem when the Oliver Cromwell's licence was revoked. This was on the grounds that the licensee, William Burtonwood, was a drunken person and had twice been fined. [Bolton Evening News, 15 September 1870]. The case went as far as an appeal to the quarterly Salford Hundred Quarter Sessions in November 1869 where it again refused. Burtonwood was given notice to quit by Magee and the pub remained closed for over a year until new landlord Edmund Charlesworth was eventually granted a licence in November 1870.

For many years, from the late-1870s until 1916, the pub was run by the Barrow family who lived in nearby Burns Street according to the 1871 census. The pub was initially run by Joseph Barrow, a man who was to become well-known to the police and courts.

In March 1879, Barrow appeared at an inquest regarding the death of a local man, John Andrew Sykes, who lived in John Taylor Street just yards from the pub. Sykes was hit with the double blow of losing his job at Norris's timber yard on Bridgeman Street and being rejected by the object of his affections, a girl working as a servant in a local public house. On Friday 21 March 1879, Sykes walked into the Oliver Cromwell and told those present that he was going to drown himself. He added that he had one penny left to his name and that he would buy a gill – half a pint – of ale with it. Landlord Joe Barrow said that if he had a penny then he should have a full pint and he served him with one. Sykes then asked four other people in the pub to drink with him. He emptied his pockets giving away his pipe, his tobacco and two buttons, one of which Joe Barrow nailed to the wall of the tap room as a memento. Barrow also asked for a lock of his hair, a wish that Sykes was unwilling to grant. Then, rather chillingly, Barrow advised Sykes that as the water was so cold he ought to find a warm-water lodge in which to drown himself. Nobody sought to try and talk Sykes out of his suicide. As Sykes left the pub he said: “Good neet, owd lad. Tha'll never see me any more.” Barrow responded by suggesting to Sykes that he went home to bed but the following morning Sykes' body was fished out of the lodge at Marsden's mill on Cochrane Street at the top of York Street. A verdict of 'temporary insanity' was given. [Bolton Evening News, 25 March 1879; Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer 25 March 1879].

Joe Barrow liked a bet but it was to get him in trouble on two occasions. In December 1879 he was sued by William Sheppard for £10, the sum being a bet Sheppard had with Barrow over a foot-race between Sheppard and a man named Hall. The race wasn't run but Barrow kept the money, anyway, claiming it was part of a written agreement. But as neither he or his solicitor were able to provide a copy of the agreement the judge found against him. He also ordered him to pay costs on the grounds that he was a pub landlord. “They have these things to bring people to their beerhouses in order to drink,” the judge told his barrister.

But Joe Barrow faced a far more serious charge the following year. On Sunday 17 October 1880 police raided six pubs in the Bolton area. Around 60 officers were despatched to the Oliver Cromwell, the Kay Street Arms and the Black Horse both on Kay Street, the Ancient Shepherd on Bold Street, the Turk's Head on Bridge Street and the Sun Ray on Mill Street. Officers were placed at each entrance of the six pubs to prevent anybody from leaving. Other officers entered the pubs and took away betting books, papers, lists and telegrams. Among the publications found were the Sporting Life and McColl's Turf Calendar. Sixty men were arrested and some of the pub landlords were found with as much as £10 on them – a huge sum in those days. The men were taken to the Town Hall where a large crowd of people gathered and remained until midnight.

When the came case to court at the end of October the number of defendants was reduced to 50 – the charges against ten men in the Ancient Shepherd having been withdrawn. The case against Barrow hinged on PC Gaskell eavesdropping on a conversation about betting odds while he was outside the pub. However, Gaskell couldn't say for sure that the voice he heard was that of Barrow and the case was dismissed.

Joseph Barrow died in June 1893. The Oliver Cromwell was taken over by his sister Ellen Barrow who remained there until she died in 1916. Ellen had previously worked as a servant to the Sparling family on Manchester Road. By 1901, one of the Sparling children, Hannah Sparling (born 1868) was also living at the Oliver Cromwell along with Ellen and Ellen's nephew who was also named Joseph Barrow.

The Oliver Cromwell became a tied of Magee Marshall in 1888 when that firm was formed by merging David Magee's properties and the brewery he had built on Cricket Street, off Derby Stree, with Daniel Marshall's pubs and his Grapes Brewery on Water Street.

When the area between Bridgeman Street and Lever Street began to be cleared in the late-fifties Magee’s saw an opportunity. The fate of the Oliver Cromwell and a nearby pub, the Peels Arms on Sidney Street, had already been sealed and the two pubs were due for demolition. But Magee’s – recently taken over by the Warrington-based Greenall Whitley -  were building a new pub, the Morris Dancers on the corner of Sapling Road and Morris Green Lane. The brewery did a deal with the licensing magistrates whereby the licences for the doomed Oliver Cromwell and Peels Arms were surrendered and a full licence obtained for the MorrisDancers.

The Oliver Cromwell closed in 1962. The building was demolished shortly afterwards. In his reminiscences of the area – see comment below- Fred Spencer, who was born at 1 York Street, writes that the last landlady was Mrs Duffy.

CHARGE OF OBTAINING MONEY BY FALSE PRETENCES. 

A middle-aged man named John Young, described as a millwright, was charged with obtaining 2 shillings and 6 pence, from James Dawson, of the Oliver Cromwell beerhouse, Bridgeman Street, by false representations. Mr John Gordon conducted the prosecution, and Mr Richardson appeared for the defence. It appeared that the prisoner went to the house, represented himself as a millwright just engaged at Messrs Hargreaves mill, and after obtaining lodgings there, borrowed 2 shillings and 6 pence, which he said he wanted to release his luggage from the railway station. The prosecution, however, did not succeed in establishing the fraudulent pretence, and the prisoner was discharged. It was stated that there were a number of other cases of a similar character against him. 

- Bolton Chronicle, 9 May 1857.

INGENIOUS DETECTION OF A BEERHOUSE OFFENCE. 

William Cromwell, landlord of the Oliver Cromwell public house, Bridgeman Street, was charged with opening his house for the sale of intoxicating liquors at improper hours on Sunday morning last. Mr Ramwell defended. Police-constable Greenhalgh said that, at half past eleven o'clock, he, in company with Police-constable Dearden, went to the defendant's beerhouse, and observed three men go into the house by the back door. He saw them come out again, and the officers then went into the house and found defendant's wife with a half-gallon jug and a glass in her hand. She then went downstairs followed by the officers who saw her spill the ale in the jug all over the floor. Upon Greenhalgh attempting to get hold of the jug, she threw what was left of the ale in his face. Police-constable Dearden corroborated this testimony, and the magistrates fined the defendant 20 shillings and costs. 

- Bolton Evening News, 21 January 1869.

Bridgeman Street pictured in September 2014 (copyright Google Street View). The Oliver Cromwell was situated on the right-hand side at the bend in the road and opposite the entry to  Lecturers  Closes on the left.

Article re-written 3 October 2018.