Breweries from outside the Midlands region are included as, particularly nowadays, beers from other parts of the country are sold across the counters in the Midlands. The section is growing as more images are obtained - not all relevant to the area but, hey, I love beer and it's great fun.

Statto Corner 130 Pages 145,885 Words 190 Pubs Featured 482 Pub Photographs 78 Breweries Featured 51 Brewery Photographs 96 Other Photographs 115 Inn Signs 109 Beer Labels 114 Pumpclips 22 Maps 15 Building Plans

Licensees of the Grapes Inn 1850 - Isaac Cresswell 1861 - Sarah Cresswell 1882 - Sarah Ann Williams 1891 - William Walker 1895 - Frederick Poole 1899 - James Harrison 1912 - William Edward Dickens

This photograph of the Grapes Inn was taken around 1912 when William Edward Dickens was the licensee. He can be seen stood on the doorstep in the second image with a few of the regulars of the Grapes Inn. The first photograph shows the pub's location on Hayfield Road in an area known as Burrfields. Indeed, early records of this building list it in Burrfields Bottom. It looks like William Dickens has just lit the fires as there is a good deal of smoke billowing from the chimneys. Notice the bunch of grapes mounted on a lantern bracket above the front door. The sign on the end of the building is advertising the 'Celebrated Ales' of the Burton Brewery Co.Ltd., a company that was acquired by Worthington's in 1915. An old stone building, notice that there is an adjacent cottage to the pub - this was known as Grapes Cottage. A good number of innkeepers came and went during the 19th century though the Cresswell family had an extended spell of running the Grapes Inn during the middle of the Victorian period.

Isaac and Sarah Cresswell were both in their 70's when they were in charge of the pub in the early 1860's, a time when they had been running the Grapes Inn for more than a decade. Isaac Cresswell was born in Chapel en le Frith around 1785; a couple of years younger, his wife Sarah hailed from Hayfield. Those living near the pub were generally engaged in the cotton trade at a mill, worked with locally-quarried stone or were employed on the railway. Following the death of her husband, Sarah Cresswell took over the licence of the Grapes Inn and was still serving ales well into her eighties.

Another widow was the licensee in the early 1880's. Sarah Ann Williams was born in London in 1829 though her father was from Hayfield. As a widower in his eighties, Thomas Thornhill lived on the premises and no doubt helped with some of the duties around the pub. Sarah Ann Williams employed Chinley-born Elizabeth Waterhouse as a general servant. William and Fanny Walker were mine hosts of the Grapes Inn during the early 1890's. Both were born in the Leicestershire town of Ashby-de-la-Zouch in 1848. At this time the adjacent cottage was occupied by Richard Winton, a carpenter on the railways, and his wife Caroline. They had moved up to Derbyshire from the Forest of Dean - perhaps to seek work or, indeed, as part of the nature of working on the railway; their son William also worked as an engine driver. The occupancy of the Grapes Inn and the adjacent cottage had changed again by the dawn of the 20th century. In the cottage next door was the family of Thomas Burden, a railway signalman from Dorset.

At this time the Grapes Inn was run by James and Jane Harrison. Born in Gamesley in 1859, James had previously worked as a carter whilst Jane was employed as a cotton weaver in her home town of Glossop. They moved to Chapel en le Frith in 1898 where their daughter Louisa was born. Eldest son Charles worked in the pub as a barman.
© Copyright. All images from Digital Photographic Images and reproduced with kind permission.