BRIDLE LANE INN – TAVERN, JUNCTION ROAD/BELGRAVE GATE

Originally called Bridle Lane, it was renamed as Junction Road circa 1862.  Everards seemed to have bought the inn circa1902, although it was there much earlier, the building looks closer to the 1840s.  A court case of 1845 proves it was a beer house by then.

In November 1868 John Davis, the landlord of the Bridle Lane Inn, dropped dead whilst serving behind the bar.  He was reported to have been only thirty four years old.  His wife, Harriett, told the inquest that her husband was a fit and strong man, who only an hour previously had thrown a drunk customer out of the house.

The surgeon reported that Davis had suddenly died by syncope (like fainting) due to his heart stopping, possibly due to the excitement of ejecting a customer earlier in the day.

John Davis wife, Harriett, carried on with the license at the Bridle Lane.  It looks as though she soon remarried as in 1870 the licence was transferred from Harriett to Walter Elton, her now husband.

Owner was John Irson

By 1874, William Hall held the licence.  In a strange case, the police objected to the renewal of his licence as he had recently bought a quantity of boot material and refused to hand over a portion to the police.  The leather had been found later to have been stolen with a man convicted and imprisoned for it.  The magistrates granted Hall’s renewal on the grounds that as he had never been charged or prosecuted for receiving, no crime had been committed.

Joseph Hurst licensee 1877, Hurst was fined 10/-for allowing drunkenness and being drunk himself in Sept that year, John Tooley 1882, William Mansfield 1883, Benjamin Issac 1885, James Liquorish 1886, Charles Paxton 1887, Frederick Bircumshaw 1890, John Tailby 1893, Arthur West Page 1901, Zachariah Onions 1906 (dec) Sarah Ann Onions 1920. Dudley Ryder Onions 1927. Lawrence Charles Bentley 1930.

By 1959 Len Taylor with his wife ‘Eileen Lily’ who trod the music halls and clubland boards were mine hosts-ad from Leicester Mercury

After a refurbishment c2019 the Bridle Tavern seemed set for a new lease of life, Beautiful painting of a horse-representing its Bridle Lane past-

(Photo Leicester Mercury)

Suddenly boarded up around June 2024, apparently was purchased with surrounding land by the “Big Yellow Storage Co Ltd” which suggested the writing was on the wall for the Bridle Lane Tavern, their excuse was lack of trade owing to too many tenants over the past few years, and will not look to open again, I’m afraid covid pandemic and the subsequent cost of living crisis has hit most pubs, the Bridle Lane wont be the last-a real shame to lose another Leicester gem, especially with its unusual triangler architecture.