Dog and Partridge, 90 Moor Lane

The Dog and Partridge, Moor Lane pictured in the 1960s. Partridge Street runs to the right of the pub, to the left is what was once Back Lupton Street. The houses and Lupton Street and Partridge Street had already been cleared when the photo was taken. The pub itself followed soon afterwards.

Not to be confused with the pub of the same name at the bottom of Manor Street, this Dog and Partridge was situated on Moor Lane at a time when it was a quiet lane heading towards Deane Moor. The pub opened towards the end of the nineteenth century, pre-dating the Dog and Partridge on Manor Street by just a few years. [1]

When the Dog and Partridge opened on Moor Lane the Britannia at the junction with Derby Street was the only other competitor. After the 1830 Beer House Act a number of smaller pubs opened and competition was fierce.

Life as a pub landlord appears to have been as precarious in the nineteenth century as it is now. John Welsby spent nine years running the Dog and Partridge only to petition for bankruptcy in July 1843. By then he had moved out of the pub and was working as a labourer while living in Middle Street just a hundreds away from the pub on the other side of the railway line. [2]

 Around that time the Dog and Partridge was notable for having its own private theatre, as did the Duke Of York in Spring Gardens not far from where the town hall now stands. A look at the three-storey building in the photo above shows plenty of scope for a theatre in one of the upper floors.

The pub had a street named after it during the second half of the nineteenth century when the council decided to rename Green Street, which along the side of the pub, to Partridge Street.

The Dog was owned by William Tong’s whose Diamond Brewery was situated on Pikes Lane (now Deane Road) at the top of Balshaw Lane. Tong’s sold out to Walker Cain of Warrington in 1923. They in turn merged with Joshua Tetley of Leeds in 1960.

The bottom end of Deane Road, right down to the west side of Moor Lane, was cleared away in the late-sixties, as can be seen in the photograph above. A compulsory purchase order was served on the Dog and Partridge in 1969, along with Howarth’s fruit and potato merchants - which can also be seen in the photo – and the nearby Lancashire Dairy Ration Company.

The Dog and Partridge was subsequently demolished and the new fire station was built on the site. The entrance to Partridge Street was retained as the vehicular entry to the fire station.

[1] Bolton Pubs 1800-2000, by Gordon Readyhough. Published by Neil Richardson.

[2] The Gazette. Retrieved 7 September 2014.

Bolton Fire Station on Moor Lane, pictured in  April 2012 (copyright Google Street View). The entrance to the fire station was once Partridge Street. The Dog and Partridge was situated to the left of the entry where the swathe of grass is.