Photo above: Late 1950s picture of the Plough, owned by the well known Leicester family and beer bottlers, Hartopps.
A Crown and Plough is recorded in Humberstone Gate in 1815. No other records have been found, so might be a mistake in recording or the Plough.
Richard Toon, victualler in 1794. The pub referred to as the Plough.
March – April, 1838, sale of the Plough by auction was advertised. Mrs Draycott named as the owner, Thomas Barrell the landlord.
During the 1840s and 1850s, it was known as the Old Plough.
Sometime during the 1860s, it became the Crystal Palace presumably after the Great Exhibition of 1851.
On the exchange of licence in 1881 from Thomas Loyley to Joe Simpson, the sessions named the licence as being Plough Inn or Crystal Palace.
In 1883, Wright’s directory still called the inn the Crystal Palace. From here on records show as the Plough.
At one time a court yard of cottages stood at the back, leading to the rear of the George in the Haymarket.
‘During its latter years, the Plough was frequented by some dubious characters and ladies of easy virtue. As a young lad working for Pollards Brewery, we would take some of Hartopps deliveries there. This was a fascinating insight to pubs of the time near the Clock Tower, many of which had a ‘reputation’. Unlike some others, however, it wasn’t intimidating, just the last remnant of a bygone pub era. Closed and demolished circa 1972, another to fall in the abortion that became the Haymarket Shopping centre. This mix of Georgian, Victorian Gothic and Deco Buildings lost forever.’
Barry Lount
This would apply to many pubs around the clock tower (photo credit unknown)
The encroaching Haymarket development c1970 (by David Hillas, colour by Rob Hubble) shows the still standing Plough