Rotherham The Unofficial Website

www.rotherhamunofficial.co.uk

Brewing, Wines & Spirits

My reference books mention little about brewing in the town. Unlike Sheffield where there were large breweries I presume all the brewers around here were small concerns. I have heard of two breweries in the town itself and one based in Wath upon Dearne. There was also a considerable wines and spirits trade in the town judging by the size of the premises where they were stored.

Back in the good old days landlords and landladies used to brew their own ales, and were called respectively brewers and brewsters. In some towns and villages the parish used to actually own a brewhouse where all the equipment necessary for brewing and the maturing ales were kept. Ales were brewed for the parish and by the parish for drinking at religious feasts, harvest festivals (October Ales), weddings, christenings and wakes. I have no idea if the parish of Rotherham had its own brewhouse.

Brewing good ales was a necessary part of the duties of many housewives in the days before tea and when the water was often undrinkable. Certainly every farmers' wife would brew on a regular basis to provide the eight pints a day or more that farm labourers received as part of their wages. Beer was brewed in manor houses, country houses and all the way up to the royal palaces. It was not uncommon for the parish to set up a poor widow as a brewster by providing her with the means to brew ale, which she could then sell to earn a living instead of receiving benefits from the parish. In the days before big business took over brewing it was a task usually done by women on a cottage industry scale but that soon changed when the big boys realised there were large profits to be made.

Mappins Masbrough Old Brewery

Motto "Not to be Beaten".

I understand that Mappins was situated near Chantry Bridge. I have spotted a property called the Malthouse which is on Chapel Road or Chapel Walk - this I presume was Mappins. It is occupied by a gym. According to Darryl "I think Mappins Brewery was on what’s now a waste piece of land to the left Bailey House (old Grattan’s Offices) when you drive along Centenary Way with the bus station on your right. It was taken over by Bestobell Valves until they relocated then it was all demolished."

I have found odd snippets of information in various places which seems to add up to the following facts.

In the nineteenth century John Newton Mappin had a very successful brewery. He was born in Sheffield, the son of a fruit knife maker and engraver, and made his fortune from brewing. When he died in 1884 he left £15,000 pounds and his art collection of more than 170 pictures to establish the Mappin Art Gallery in Sheffield. Was this our Mappin? Well it is not a common surname being largely confined to the Sheffield area so I think it very likely, so the Mappins Masbrough Brewery was part of a much larger empire.

In 1914 Mappins Masbrough won a Five Guinea cup in the class for 'stouts of any gravity' at The Brewing Industry International Awards.

Mappins sold out to Stones in 1954, who sold out to Bass in 1968. Mappins IPA a brew still being made I believe.

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Bentleys Brewery

Robert Bentley came to Rotherham in the early 1820s and purchased land at Canklow Road convenient for its proximity to the River Rother and the Don Navigation Canal. Robert was one of the sons of Timothy Bentley, who founded the Lockwood Brewery near Huddersfield and whose sons controlled brewing interests in Yorkshire and Lancashire. In the 1840s Robert Bentley was joined by his son, Robert John Bentley. When Robert Bentley died in 1850, Timothy Bentley (I am not sure of the relationship but you can be sure that they kept things in the family) joined Robert John in what was by now a very lucrative trade.

Robert John Bentley lived at West House, Rotherham but in the 1850s fancied the life of a country gentleman and took a country house at Finningley Park near Doncaster. Not surprisingly, given the servant problems common in Victorian times, R.J. Bentley was pronounced insane in 1875 and later committed to an asylum. He died in 1890. From 1875 the business of Bentleys Brewery was carried on by an executor, one Henry Hirst, who appears to have been no relation at all. Sally has been in touch Just for the record, Robert J Bentley was married to Sarah Hirst, of Low Hall, Bradford. Hence the Hirst involvement with the Brewery!".

Throughout the rule of Robert and Robert John the brewery acquired many tied houses i.e. the landlord could only purchase beer (and often spirits and soft drinks as well) from the one brewery to which he was tied by a supply contract. This was of course common practice and a license to print money for a long time.

After 1910 a board of trustees administered Robert Bentley & Company until 1949, when the company was registered as Bentley's Old Brewery (Rotherham) Ltd. This was taken over in 1956 by the Hammond's United Breweries of Bradford and some time thereafter they ceased brewing in Rotherham. The name Bentleys disappeared except for the odd inscription on a pub sign or window.

The memory of hops and malt lingers on in the names Maltkiln Street and the Maltings but when I had a wander down that end of town I failed to find any relics, not even a plaque 'Bentleys woz 'ere'.

There is a large piece of open ground opposite the Old Alma Road School where the brewery where the Maltkiln used to be.

This is from Mike:-

"Bentley Brewery was located at the Bottom of Alma Rd on the corner of Canklow Rd. The brewery started at the bottom of Canklow Rd and carried on right up to the hospital Laundry Wall (ex workhouse). I don't know who owned it but I know they where still brewing there in the 60`s. I used to go all around the brewery when I was a nipper with the son of the person in charge who lived in the house tied to the site on Canklow Rd. The last family to live there where called Georgson and came from Scotland."

This is from Brian:-

"Regarding Bentleys Brewery, the Brewery was on Canklow Road, the building at the corner of Alma Road was the Maltings."

A gentleman by the name of John Longworth has kindly sent me a copy of a Bentleys beer pump clip that he recently found. Another espondent has been in touch and believes that this particular pump clip is from a different Bentley's, not the one in Rotherham.

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Whitworth, Son & Nephew

Whitworth, Son and Nephew, brewers of Wath-Upon-Dearne. They owned the Grey Horse Inn (previously the Merry Heart) in Effingham Square (like the brewery this is gone) and the Angel on Bridgegate which is still with us. All I have been able to find out so far is that the company sold out to John Smiths in 1958.

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Wines & Spirits

Even in Roman Times when an early form of global warming (probably from burning Christians) ensured that England was rather warmer than it is now, grapes were not grown further north than about Lincoln. After the Romans departed the growing of the grape and the production of wine died out. They were reintroduced in places by monks, but ceased in the Middle Ages when the climate became much colder and harsher, and the poor old vines were blasted by the frosts. So you see that there is no Rotherham Rouge, no Brinsworth Blanc to brag about. Canklow Champagne - now that's another story.

Nor have I found any evidence of large scale distillation in the town, no Wickersley Whisky or Rawmarsh Rum. However I'm pretty sure that, until the Government got very mean about it and introduced excise duties, there was plenty of cheap gin about town of the type generally known as rotgut or Mothers' Ruin. There may have been some better stuff around - there's still a Gin House on Ginhouse Lane, but I could be misinterpreting the word 'Gin' which does have other meanings. According to Rod this was actually an Engine House - I feel quite disappointed.

Having said all this, not unnaturally, Rotherham being Rotherham, the Wines and Spirits trade was prominent in the town. There were large vaults beneath the premises of John Coupland in Church Street, which extended towards the river. A well known Rotherham Character, John Curforthay, who was a surgeon as well as a wines and spirits merchant was 6' 3" tall and 40 stones in weight. When he died they needed a hook and pulley to assist in lowering his coffin into its grave in the Parish Church.

The South Yorkshire Wine and Spirit Company was founded in 1790. At one time the company bottled Bass's ales and Guinness, imported and bonded foreign wines and spirits, and was also a Havana cigar merchant.

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