London's brewing history
There was a time when West London was dominated by a particularly pungent industry.
Three major breweries – the Griffin Brewery (Fuller’s) in Chiswick, the Ram Brewery (Young’s) in Wandsworth and the Stag Brewery (Watney’s) in Mortlake – employed thousands of people, many of them for their entire working lives. Together, the hop-laden trinity dominated a whole stretch of the Thames.
Now, with two of the three closed for good, the race is on to record their history. Enter Brewing Stories: a fascinating film and series of interviews that capture the memories of those who have worked in the breweries – from the 1940s to the present day – produced by arts and educational charity digital:works.
“I grew up in Wandsworth and remember the smell of the hops, but I hadn’t realised the richness of the history,” explains the charity’s Matthew Rosenberg, who now lives in Tooting. “The breweries go back hundreds of years. Some families worked there for generations.”
Co-founded and run by Matthew and his colleague Sav Kyriacou, digital:works provides training and creative assistance to help communities deliver arts and media projects. Oral history is at the heart of it: past initiatives have told tales of Savile Row, Hatton Garden, Fleet Street and Twickenham’s legendary Eel Pie Island, along with the life of London’s cabbies, dock workers, Thames lightermen and more.
“Oral history is the history of those who don’t usually have their stories written down,” says Matthew. “Children learn about prime ministers and the kings and queens of England, but they don’t often hear about people who actually make history on the ground – the people brewing the beer or driving the trains.
“Slowly but surely, with no huge plan, we’re documenting the lives of Londoners; of those whose contributions might not otherwise be recorded, but which are key to the history of our city.”
Brewing Stories, the latest project, got off the ground with funding from Unite – Britain’s second-largest trade union – and the Lottery Heritage Fund. After some initial research, the team contacted the local archives at Wandsworth, Chiswick and Richmond, consulted leading beer historian Martyn Cornell and recruited a team of 12 local volunteers, training them in interviewing, the operation of recording equipment and more.
“The volunteer roles were open to anyone interested in learning oral history skills and in discovering the history of these breweries. We had a fantastic team. They conducted all the interviews themselves, so it was people in London interviewing people in London.”
Finding the workers to interview was slightly more challenging. Fortunately, the Griffin Brewery remains operational, employing 350 people, so current and ex-workers were relatively easy to contact, whilst Fuller’s itself proved helpful and supportive. Locating former employees of the other two breweries, however, was less straightforward.
“The Ram Brewery in Wandsworth closed in 2007 and most of it is flats now,” explains Matthew. “But there’s a wonderful guy called John Hatch who used to work there and who still brews beer in the old stables! Thanks to him, it remains the site where beer has been continuously brewed for longest in London, and he’s still in touch with lots of other workers at Young’s.
“Mortlake was trickier, as Watney’s stopped brewing there in 1997 and the workers have long since dispersed. But we did get a phone call from a guy called Robert Mole, who grew up in Mortlake and started work at the brewery in 1940. His son, who worked there too, saw our Facebook post. Some of [Robert’s] memories are amazing.”
In total, the team conducted 34 interviews with employees as diverse as draymen (delivery men who used horse-pulled drays), master brewers, chemists, cask line operators, bottling hall workers and stable hands. Anyone who played a part in getting the beer brewed and into barrels and bottles.
“They all said that it was the job of a lifetime, and there are certainly some wonderful stories,” recalls Matthew.
“Like the fact that the draymen would have two pints of beer when they started work at 4 am and then go out on deliveries. At every stop, the publican would give them another pint, so they’d end up having about eight during the day. One woman describes them all falling out of the cab and crawling along the cobbles, before loading up to go out again!
“And then there was John Young. He was the chairman of Young’s in Wandsworth and he loved animals, so he kept the horses on when all the other breweries were getting rid of them in favour of trucks. He also had pheasants, donkeys, goats and ducks – all on-site! They used to call the Ram the farmyard. The pheasants would fly over the fence and escape, but the locals always brought them back because they knew they’d get a free pint for returning them!”
Other fascinating figures include Denise Annon, who worked in the bottling hall at Wandsworth and led a deputation to demand equal pay for women. And then there was the beer vending machine at Fuller’s – evidently a character in itself – which dispensed two pints of beer per day to each worker in exchange for tokens from their wage packet. When the machine was eventually closed, the brewery workers held a service for it.
All the employees speak with humour and affection of the family atmosphere, of the relationships between workers and of how it was all so much more than a job. The West London breweries were a way of life.
And yet, for all the amusing tales and fond recollections, we all know how the story ends.
“People talk of how the North of England was deindustrialised in the 1980s, but London was too. London had lots of industry – print, power stations, brewing. Now, most of the buildings that housed it all have been turned into flats.
“Some of the most poignant moments during the interviews concern the closures. People not only worked at the breweries but socialised there too. Losing a job is hard, but letting go of all those connections was a really difficult thing.
“Interviewees also had a strong sense of the history of these places. They knew that what was being lost was not just their own occupation and social life, but a real slice of the past – just gone.”
Well, not entirely – thanks to Brewing Stories. In addition to storage in the three local archives, the TUC archive and the historic Bishopsgate Institute, all of the interviews can be heard in full on the project’s website – 36 hours of fascinating listening. Also available is the accompanying 56-minute film: a mix of interview footage and unseen archive material that provides a window on the larger project.
And now something else is brewing. The big beer factories may increasingly belong to the past, but there are more than 200 small craft breweries registered in the capital. While there’s life, it seems, there are hops.
Published in the September 2019 issues of The Barnes Magazine, The Richmond Magazine, The Chiswick Magazine & The Wandsworth Magazine, and online at Essential Surrey and SW London.
