Photo above: circa 1950s. Stands nrxt door to Stag & Pheasant
John Gisbourne was the licensee of the Barrel circa 1827.
1855 G Gerard licensee
During the 1860s the Barrel ran ‘free and easies’under the licensee William Cooper. William also was to run the Gladstone Music Hall in Wharf Street.
1873 Joseph Beadsmore landlord.
James Cleaver was to take over the Barrel in 1876. He briefly called the beer house the Rhine Wine Vaults before settling on the Tower Vaults in 1877. In 1887 Bartholomew Mason 34 a one legged man was found guilty of D&D in the Tower Vaults also of smashing the front window with his crutch.
James Cleaver (if one and the same) also licensee of the Victoria Hotel Granby St from 1881.
William Francis Taplow? 1914, Walter Spriggs 1919, Walter Spriggs of the Pelican Gallowtree Gate had previously purchased the Tower Vaults 1913 for £4,500. Everards would supply the pub as they also owned the Pelican. Walter died 1933 as well as the two aforementioned pubs he also held the licence for the Cattle Market Refreshment Rooms, licensees at the Granby Halls. catering at the Racecource, as well as the Agricultural Shoe among others. also a life governor of the Leicester Royal Infirmary.
Leonard Willett Bucklar 1931, William John Lake 1933 he died after a short illness April 1934.
The pub closed in the destruction of Humberstone Gate, to make way for the new Haymarket development. If ever planners got something wrong, this project was it: a dozen pubs and fine hotels were to become victims of council vandalism.
