A woolcomber is someone who works wool that has been from the skin of sheep.
The first known record of the Rambling Comber was in 1833. Its landlord, John Litchfield ( aged sixty-two), was by the infamous informer, Moses Pegg, and fined £2 for allowing card playing in his house. One man was reported drunk on the floor, and another on a settle after the hour of midnight.
Moses Pegg also accused John Litchfield of selling ale after time in June 1834. Pegg said he had been watching for some Litchfield for but the landlord’s vigilance had kept him out. Pegg resorted to sending two of his employees into the Ramblers early, one of which claimed he was lame. John Litchfield took pity on him by offering some food and drink. The scheme worked perfectly for Pegg, so he charged John Litchfield with out of hours drinking.
At court the landlord accused Pegg of a rascally and villainous transaction and never was a worse deceit brought to light. John Litchfield was fined 40/-.
April 1835 Pegg again charged Litchfield for selling ale on Good Friday, once again he was fined 40/-
Litchfield is still recorded in the Brewster sessions of 1840 as licensee of the Rambling Comber. John Litchfield himself was a woolcomber by trade, as was his son, Thomas, who also lived at the property in Royal East Street with his father and mother Elizabeth.
By 1845, the beerhouse was recorded as the Woolcombers, and in 1851 John Litchfield, now eighty-one, was still there.
Wife Elizabeth passed away in January 1860, aged ninety-seven, John following six months later, aged ninety-nine. Both still residing at the Woolcombers, they had lived together for seventy years, a remarkable and rare occurrence. The licence was passed to George Stone.
It seems as though John Litchfield owned the adjoining houses, which Thomas now inherited and moved into with other members of the Litchfield family.
By the mid 1860s, Ann Heywood was victualler of the Woolcombers, andwas fined 10/- for unlawful opening on a Sunday. She was still there in the 1871 census, aged seventy-two. Elizabeth Bunney then took over. Thomas Litchfield was still next door at 5 Royal East Street. At the 1881, census, John Halford was victualler and Thomas Litchfield, now aged seventy-nine, was still at no. 5 as a woolcomber, together with nephew John, John’s wife Sophia’ and their seven children.
The Litchfield’s family fortunes took a turn for the worse when Charles Tidd (having previously sold the West End pub), took over the beerhouse from John Halford in April 1882. Thomas Litchfield had inherited some property and a substantial amount of money from his father, John, in 1860 – including the Woolcombers.
Thomas was known to ‘like a drink’ and Charles Tidd often plied the elderly man with drink, therefore gaining some influence with him. Occasionally joining them for a drink was Alfred Oram, a solicitor who worked from both Leicester and Manchester.
Thomas died in 1885, the heirs to his estate automatically being the Litchfield family members, including nephew John and his family, still living with Thomas in Royal East Street.
Soon after Thomas’s death, Charles Tidd called on John to congratulate him on inheriting the nice property, at the same time suggesting to John it would be wise to check with solicitors in Leicester to see if a will existed. Tidd accompanied John but no will was forthcoming. Tidd then suggested they check with Alfred Oram, the solicitor in Manchester. A telegram was sent and Oram travelled from Manchester with a will ostensibly made out by Thomas. To the family’s horror, when the will was read, everything had been left to Charles Tidd – a complete stranger until a couple of years before, other than being a tenant and victualler of the family beerhouse.
The Litchfields assumed that as it was witnessed by a solicitor, it must have been genuine. Charles Tidd then gave John Litchfield £100 not to contest the will. John, who was now quite poorly, died shortly after. The will affair still festered and the widowed Sophie Litchfield then discovered that Alfred Oram had been sentenced to ten years imprisonment for arson and fraud. On behalf of the family, Sophia, contested the will in court.
At the hearing it was disclosed that Charles Tidd had taken Thomas Litchfield to Manchester on the pretext of looking at a property. Sophie declared that the octogenarian Thomas was feeble in mind and body at the time and when in drink he didn’t know what he was doing. She claimed it was a gross injustice to the family that a will had been made out by Thomas, with what was now known to be a convicted, felon – solicitor Alfred Oram.
The judge, however, directed the jury to find a verdict for the defendant Charles Tidd, taking into consideration the £100 given to John Litchfield as an agreement not to contest the will.
Eighteen months after the case, Charles Tidd sold the Woolcombers at auction. It possibly went to Everards and it seems Albert Green took on the Woolcombers tenancy, circa 1892. He was followed by possibly George Halford, circa 1898 and Arthur Page, 1900.
The property Charles Tidd sold shows the Woolcombers next to St Patrick’s school, with a 40ft frontage and 30ft frontage in Lower Garden Street. The Litchfields had lost a significant inheritance.
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