Strouts: How Kent's White Horse came to be stabled in Sheffield

How Kent's White Horse came to be stabled in Sheffield

By Peter Moynihan

Strouts's Brewery Co. Ltd

Part One: Mr Cook's Notebook and the Mystery X Ale

(From BHS Newsletter 108 and 109, 2025)

Edd Mather sent me a query about the Fremlins brewing books which he had studied at the Kent Archives. Edd was looking at the notebook of G T Cook (1891ish) and he noticed that the X Ale therein did not tally at all with the nearest X Ale in Fremlin's own books (1888-89). Why would Cook's beer be at 1041.5° when Fremlin's was at 1064°, surely a brewer would not drop a beer by 20° within two years? Furthermore, the two beers use different sugars, those in Cook's notebook using Bostock's Yellow Glucose which Edd says tended to be used more by brewers in the north of the country. This is backed up by a reference in Cook's notebook to the yeast used being 'Ex Tennant & Co'.

I had certainly heard of G T Cook; he was Fremlin's Head Brewer, becoming a Director and latterly the Managing Director of Fremlins Ltd. Indeed, there were three George Thomas Cooks (father, son and grandson); for the sake of brevity, let's call them GTC1, GTC2 and GTC3.

GTC1 was born in Mereworth, Kent, in 1848, the son of Thomas Cook, a master tailor. GTC1 worked all his adult life for Fremlins. His census entries all list him as a 'Brewer's Managing Clerk', but it is doubtful whether he was a practical brewer. In June 1888, when GTC2 (born 1873) was attending Maidstone Grammar School, he was awarded a Mathematical Scholarship, open to boys under 15 and valued at five guineas. He was described as "the son of Mr G T Cook, of Kingsley Road, cashier at Messrs. Fremlin Bros". (Kent Times, 16th June 1888)

So, did GTC2 become a brewer? Well yes, he did. In the 1891 census (about the time the notebook was in use) he was not living at his father's house at 62 Earl Street, Maidstone, so where was he? Knowing that young men were often sent away to serve their brewing pupillage with relatives and being aware of the family connections between the Fremlins and the Leneys but also that a member of the Dover Leneys once brewed in Sheffield (also home to Tennant & Co) I had an inkling that Sheffield was the place to look. For once, the little grey cells did not let me down!

In 1891, Walter Leney (born Dover, 1865) was the brewer at Messrs Strouts's Brewery Co Ltd. He was living at the Brewery House in Burton Road, Neepsend, Sheffield, together with his wife Elizabeth and their three-year-old son, Claud, who had been born in Eye, Suffolk. The child would grow up to become the Major Claude Leney who, in 1926, leased his family's brewing interests, Alfred Leney & Co Ltd, of Dover, together with its subsidiary, Flint & Co Ltd, of Canterbury, to Fremlins Ltd. Also living at Brewery House was, and this should now come as no surprise, seventeen-year-old George Thomas Cook (GTC2), a "Brewer's Pupil". We now know that at this time he was keeping a notebook in which he would record the details of Strouts's X Ale and that his notebook has survived in the Fremlins' papers at the Kent Archives. If you want to see it, ask for U 3555 / F / BOX 2/2/1.

GTC2 was back in Maidstone by 1901, living with GTC1 at 62 Earl Street, now aged 27 and a 'Brewer'. He married Kate Mabel Bonny in 1906 and by 1911 they were living at 'Castlemaine', London Road, Maidstone, with young GTC3, who was then aged four years. GTC2 was very closely involved with the development of Fremlins from an albeit large free and family trade brewery with few tied outlets into a regional player, with an extensive tied estate. By 1939, he was a Director of the limited company which had been formed as the four Fremlin brothers were aging and passing away, eventually becoming the MD.

'FORMER BREWERY CHIEF PASSES. Mr. George Thomas Cook, ex-managing Director of Fremlins Ltd., with whom he had been connected for over 50 years, died suddenly at his home 'Lulworth', Queen's Avenue, Maidstone, yesterday. He was 83.' (Kent Messenger, 8th March 1957)

He left an estate valued at some £57,800, probate being granted to GTC3, a 'Medical Practitioner' and another gentleman, a 'Retired Stockjobber'.

My answer to Edd's query was originally posted on the 'Kentish Brewers and the Brewers of Kent' Facebook group and, in looking for something to illustrate the post, I found a Strouts's advertisement on the BHS website. Then I noticed that the company's Trade Mark had been Invicta, the rampant white horse of Kent. So, I wondered, what was the connection, if any, between Strouts and Kent? As so often happens, you seem to have answered one question, only to raise another! Well, the simple answer to this further query seems to be that Edward Strouts had been born in Hothfield, Kent, in 1841. His father, also Edward Strouts, was a farmer, grazier and hop grower at the oddly-named Yonsea Farm, two miles north-west of Ashford. Edward Strouts the younger appears to have learnt his brewing in Aylesbury, where he was a lodger in the house of Robert Judd, the local Stationmaster. The 1861 census describes Edward, aged twenty, as a 'Brewer (Clerk to)'. Ten years later, he had married, had two children, and was a 'Practical Brewer', resident at 15 Southwark Park Road, Bermondsey, Surrey, but with no indication of where he was working at this time.

The census in 1881 finds the family in Sheffield. Edward and Agnes's brood had expanded considerably and the children's places of birth seem, at first glance, to indicate that the family had moved around somewhat: - Barbara (9) Southwark, Surrey; Cecil (7) Holborn, Middlesex; Kathleen (6) Bath, Somerset; Winifred (5) Holborn, Middlesex; Robert (4) Holborn, Middlesex; Nellie (1) St Pancras, Middlesex; and Elsie (4mo) Sheffield, Yorks. Fortunately, Edward believed in announcing the births of his children to the world, so a trawl of newspaper 'Births, Marriages and Deaths' columns proved fruitful, as did baptismal records.

When young Cecil had been baptised in 1873, his father's occupation was given as 'Brewer' and his address as 'Liquorpond Street'. So it is probably safe to assume that Edward was now a brewer for Messrs. Reid at their Griffin Brewery. This is confirmed by the birth announcement of Winifred; '21st Jan, the wife of Edward Strouts, Reid's Brewery, delivered of a daughter'. (London Evening Standard, 24th January 1876) However, the birth of Kathleen in Bath does not necessarily mean that Edward brewed there; '13th inst., at 7 St. James' Square, to Mrs. Edward Strouts, a son (sic)'. (The Globe, 14th August 1874) Perhaps there were family connections to Bath? In 1880, Edward was an Executor of the estate of 'Elizabeth Dell, Spinster, late of 12 Park Street, Bath'. In a legal announcement, he was described as 'Of Reid's Brewery, London, but now of the Burton Road Brewery, Sheffield, Yorks'. (Bucks Herald, 24th January 1880) That this announcement appeared in the Bucks Herald would seem to imply a link back to Aylesbury also.

Edward was now a 'Common Brewer', living at Osgathorpe Cottage, in Osgathorpe Lane, Pitsmoor, Sheffield. Bearing in mind the birth dates of their two youngest children, the family had not been in Sheffield for very long. When Edward moved to Sheffield, his right to vote as an occupier of property was objected to in the Revisionary Court by the Liberals, implying that Edward was known to be a Conservative. 'Edward Strouts is a partner in the firm which owns the freehold brewery premises in Burton Road, Neepsend, and therefore one of the occupiers.' (Sheffield Independent, 22nd September 1881) On this basis, Edward's right to vote was allowed.

We have seen that Edward Strouts was a Man of Kent and therefore entitled perhaps to use Invicta as a trade mark. He had moved from Reid's Brewery in London up to Sheffield around 1879/80, and the Trade Marks Registry records show that registration number 36,952, Rampant Horse (Invicta), had an application date of 13th April 1884. But the application also stated that the mark had been in use for ten years prior to 1875! For an explanation it was necessary to look to the newspapers at the time of Edward's death from bronchial asthma and inflammation of the lungs on 19th April 1888. 'On Thursday last he felt unwell at the brewery and became worse on going home. He was intending to travel south on the following day, but he never really rallied and expired at four o'clock yesterday morning'. (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 25th April 1888)

A newspaper obituary (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 20th April 1888) rather helpfully goes on to state that:

'Up to 1865 the Burton Road Brewery, popularly known as "Neepsend Brewery", was the property of Messrs. Shepherd, Green and Hadfield, from whom it was purchased by Mr Wm. Henry Strouts and Mr Thomas Harryman and was then conducted under the style of "Strouts and Harryman". Afterwards Mr Charles Waterman entered the business, which carried on as "Strouts, Harryman and Waterman". Mr Waterman went out and the firm was changed to "Strouts & Co", and has continued that style ever since. Mr W H Strouts died on the 10th September 1878, and Mr Edward Strouts then became the active partner.'

While the above paragraph is very informative, one or two points are incorrect and others can be expanded in the light of further research. The three initial partners, Messrs. Shepherd, Green and Hadfield, had in fact been in operation since at least 1837, and while they did indeed refer to their business premises as the Neepsend Brewery, the third partner was actually Mr Hatfield, not Hadfield. Also, it was Thomas Harryman who left the later firm first, not Charles Waterman. The partnership of Strouts, Harryman and Waterman was dissolved in 1867 (Yorkshire Gazette, 23rd March 1867) and that between Strouts and Waterman in 1874. (London Gazette, 12th May 1874)

William Henry Strouts was Edward's older brother, having been born around 1829 in Lenham, Kent. Initially he worked in banking; 1851 saw him in Hastings as a clerk at the Joint Stock Bank. However, a decade later he was a 'Clerk to a Brewer' in Whitechapel, sharing lodgings in Red Castle Street with a 'Brewer', Edward Feast, three years his senior. A further ten years on and we find that William Henry Strouts had headed north, and gone up in the brewing world. He was living at Nether Houses, Grenoside, Sheffield and was a 'Master Brewer with 25 men'.

Let us now take a closer look at William Strouts's partners in the brewery at Neepsend. Thomas Harryman, like Strouts, he was also a Man of Kent, having been born in Mereworth in 1814. He worked at his father's Corner House Farm and by 1851 he was its proprietor, farming 397 acres and employing no fewer than 67 labourers. He was now a married man, having married Elizabeth Cosier, the daughter of an Uxbridge Printer and Bookseller, in Streatham in 1846. Perhaps Thomas was not such a good farmer, certainly his farm was much reduced in size by 1861, now comprising only fifty acres and his workforce just nine men and one boy. He seems to have given up farming by 1865 to become a Brewer in partnership with Strouts, with whom he had no doubt been acquainted in Kent. After leaving the partnership, we find him living in New Street, Henley on Thames, a 'Retired Brewer & Farmer'. He died on 1st October 1874 in Rothenburg, Bavaria, leaving effects valued at under £1500.

Charles Waterman was a Londoner. He had been born in Southwark in 1846, the son of John Henry Waterman, a brewer at Messrs Barclay's Anchor Brewery, who was a native of Gravesend. It is probable that Charles withdrew from the partnership in Sheffield on the grounds of ill health, as he died at his residence, The Elms, in Ealing, Middlesex, on 8th July 1874. That he had an interest in another brewery is evidenced by a legal notice advertising for claims against his estate:

'CHARLES WATERMAN, late of the Elms, Ealing, Middlesex, and of the Stingo Brewery, Paddington, Middlesex, and formerly of Brincliffe, Sheffield, Yorkshire.' The Executors of Charles's Will were Henry Browse, Shipbroker, and 'John Henry Waterman, of Barclay's Brewery, Southwark, Surrey'. (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 17th August 1874)

Some mystery surrounds William Henry Strouts's demise; he was admitted to the Lincoln Asylum on 28th January 1878 and died there on 10th September of the same year. His effects were valued at less that £5,000. Now that the second Strouts brother had also died, what was to become of the Burton Road Brewery?

Part Two: How Kent's White Horse came to be stabled in Sheffield

Let us look now at the continuing story of the Burton Road Brewery, Neepsend, Sheffield. It is now 1888, the principal, Edward Strouts, has passed away, but there was another partner in the business. Edward's widow and her brood of 'nine or ten children' are moving on. His cellar of vintage ports and fine old sherries was sold at auction and the house itself was sold as were the furniture and contents. Here it should be explained that the name of Osgathorpe Cottage does not do the house justice. The sale particulars state that it had a drawing room, dining room, library, school room, kitchen, storeroom, pantry, seven bedrooms, dressing room, bathroom, etc. Furthermore, the grounds, extending to some 5450 square yards, housed a lodge, ornamental grounds, stables, carriage houses, greenhouses, vineries, a stove house and outbuildings thereto …' Hardly what one might class as a 'cottage'!

Edward Strouts's partner in the business had been Robert Arnold Cosier, a prosperous London Hop Merchant, with a house in Grosvenor Street, Mayfair in London and a country retreat, 'Thamesfield', at Henley on Thames. Now Cosier is an unusual surname and we have seen that Thomas Harryman's wife was a Cosier. Her father, the Printer & Bookseller, Henry Grimsdale Cosier, was also the father of Robert Arnold Cosier. In brewing, as in so many other fields, who you know can be as important as what you know!

Unfortunately, Robert A Cosier had pre-deceased Edward Strouts, having died on 10th December 1886. His Will was proved by his son, Robert Watson Cosier, also a Hop Merchant, and Clement Upperton, solicitor, the Executors. Presumably they had been content to allow Edward Strouts to continue the business on behalf of his late partner's estate. But now, with both partners deceased, what was to be done? Trading had continued, under the auspices of Charles Harryman, the Brewery Manager and William Henry Camm, a Chartered Accountant, who had been closely associated with the brewery and its financial affairs for many years.

A solution to the issue was brokered; Strouts's Brewery Company (Limited) was registered on 27th December 1889, with a capital of £80,000, to adopt an unregistered agreement to purchase the Burton Road Brewery properties and business. The prospectus stated that: "The Properties and Business are being offered in consequence of the death of Mr Edward Strouts, in the year 1888, following shortly thereafter by that of his Partner, Mr R A Cosier and of the obstacles to the carrying on of a commercial undertaking by the respective Executors". (Derbyshire Times, 4th January 1890) The foregoing is not strictly true, as we have seen that Cosier had actually pre-deceased Strouts. 'The vendors are the Executors of the deceased partners and are, consequently, unable to invest the purchase money in shares, but beneficiaries in their estates have expressed such confidence in the undertaking, that they propose to take up share capital to the extent of £16,500 and to leave a further sum of £10,000 on loan at interest at £5 per cent. per annum, until such time as shall be agreed upon between themselves and the Directors.' (Ibid) The business was to be taken over, together with 46 freehold and long leasehold pubs at the end of the current financial year, ie 30th June 1890.

The flotation of the new firm was predicated upon a 'Contract dated 23rd December 1889, between Robert Watson Cosier, of the first part, Agnes Strouts, of the second part, and William Henry Camm (on behalf of the Company) of the third part'. (Ibid) Buried in the small print of the prospectus was the following: 'The services of an efficient Brewer have been secured, and such members of the present working staff are to be retained as will ensure an uninterrupted continuation of the business.' We now know that this 'efficient brewer' was, of course, Mr Walter Leney, of Dover, who would pass on his brewing knowledge to his pupil, George Thomas Cook, who would record the details of Strouts's products in his notebook.

The major force behind the creation of the new Company seems to have been Mr. William James Bedford. He was to be one of the three proposed Directors and the Chairman, together with W H Camm and Charles Harryman, who was also to be the Company Secretary (pro tem). Bedford was a local business man who, with his two brothers ran Messrs John Bedford & Sons, manufacturers of crucible steel, files, edge tools, hammers, spades and shovels, of the Lion Works in nearby Mowbray Street, on the banks of the river Don. Perhaps influenced by the successful flotation of the brewery company, the brothers floated the family steelworks, the origins of which dated from the 1790s, as a joint stock company in September 1897. John Bedford & Sons Ltd survived until 1972, when it was absorbed into Spear & Jackson, still based in Sheffield but owned by SNH Global Holdings Ltd.

It is tempting to wonder whether Bedford's logic in promoting the new brewery concern might have been the fact that his employees, having worked up a thirst at his Lion Works, liked to slake that thirst with Strouts's ales!

The Company seems to have been relatively successful, annual reports indicating that annual profits averaged between seven and ten thousand pounds, with dividends of 6% payable on the preference shares and 10% on the ordinary shares. In 1892, a horrendous double fatality occurred at the Burton Road Brewery. George Clow, aged 37, and Melling Hawley, aged 35, had been severely scalded by an overflow of boiling wort, both succumbing to their injuries. At the subsequent inquest the company was represented by Mr. Charles Harryman, the General Manager, Mr W J A Barnes, the Head Brewer (Walter Leney having already moved on, being in Bridge Street, Kings Lynn, Norfolk, by 1901, a 'Brewer & MD of a Brewery Co', possibly at the Lady Bridge Brewery), and the company's Solicitor.

Mr Barnes stated upon examination by the coroner that the wort was not boiling properly. He surmised that there was something the matter with one of the pipes, probably a quantity of hop leaf having stopped it up. He went beneath the copper with Clows "for the purpose of slightly raising the fountain and allowing it to bump upon the cushions in order to shake out any obstruction that might have collected in the pipe". He did not believe that the operation had done any good, so he and Clows returned to the copper stage where Clows put on more steam. For a few seconds he stood next to Clows and Hawley, then went to the other side of the copper. It was then that the accident occurred. "The top of the fountain made a sudden dash to the side of the copper on which I was standing and nearly the whole of the boiling liquid was shot over the deceased, who were standing a few feet apart on the other side of the vat." Evidence showed that the copper contained 36 barrels of wort, of which 27 barrels were thrown out. Barnes felt that he had a 'providential escape'. Verdicts of accidental death were returned, the coroner stating that steps must be taken to prevent a recurrence of the accident. (From a report of the inquest, Sheffield & Rotherham Independent, 25th February 1892)

Charles Harryman was the son of Thomas Harryman, W H Strouts's first partner. Maintaining the Kentish connection, he too had been born at Mereworth in 1858 and was educated in Brighton, but by 1881 was a brewer in Ross on Wye, Herefordshire, where he met and married his wife, Mary Bennett. He was an early cyclist; in 1880 he was offering for sale a '58in. TIMBERLAKE bicycle, thoroughly perfect, a Bargain' for £32. This would, of course, have been an 'Ordinary', otherwise known as a 'penny-farthing', fifty-eight inches being the diameter of the front wheel. By 1901 Harryman was living in Holly Road, Ordsall, Notts., a suburb of Retford, but he was not brewing there, he was now a Director of Strouts's.

Of the Directors of the company, Mr. Bernard Joseph Young, (JP, Gentleman and extensive landowner, of Richmond Park, Handsworth) Director and latterly the Chairman, died in May 1910, followed by Mr W H Camm, in December 1914. Camm had also been a Director of Carter's Knottingley Brewery. In August of 1917, it was reported to the company's shareholders at the annual general meeting that, although profits and thus dividends were holding up under wartime conditions, "The Directors have arranged with Tennant Brothers (Ltd) to brew the beer required for the period of the war and the arrangement is working satisfactorily." (Yorkshire Post, 14th August 1917) Likewise, this arrangement was confirmed at the Tennant Brothers annual general meeting. "Since 1st July, under an agreement entered into with Strouts's Brewery Company, Tennant Brothers have been brewing the whole of the malt liquor required by Strouts and will continue to do so until after the war." (Ibid, 26th September 1917) No doubt this move was brought about by the same labour shortages that had already forced Tennant Brothers to close their Don Brewery in Penistone Road, which it had acquired from Messrs Smith & Co two years previously.

The arrangement was not, in fact, to continue until the cessation of hostilities, at least not in its original form; in September 1918, Tennant Brothers' shareholders were told that "During the year an agreement (subsequently approved at an extraordinary general meeting, held on April 4th last), was entered into with Messrs Strouts's Brewery Company Ltd, whereby the business and undertaking of that company was taken over and merged with the business of Tennant Brothers. Your directors are confident that the amalgamation of the interests of the two companies will prove advantageous. At the extraordinary general meeting, Mr W J Bedford, who was the Chairman of Messrs Strouts's Brewery Company, was elected to a seat on your Board." (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 19th September 1918)

Charles Harryman retired at this time, spending the rest of his life in Ordsall, devoting himself to good works. But he was also still cycling; in August 1923 he was involved in an accident when he was knocked off of his machine by a hit-and-run cyclist. His bicycle was wrecked and he narrowly avoided becoming one of the first patients of the new Retford & District. Hospital, of which he was the Honorary Treasurer. He had to walk home; he was seventy-five years old at the time. Charles passed away in the same hospital on 5th February 1945, aged 86. He had two sons, of whom the younger, Geoffrey Charles Harryman, died in France in 1916. Frank Robert Harryman (1883-1952) was a 'Pupil in a Brewery' in 1901 and was a 'Brewer, Strouts's Brewery Co Ltd' in 1911, lodging with Tom Smith, who was the brewery's engineer. Frank seems to have spent the rest of his career in Wiltshire, where he died at Tisbury in 1952.

Edward Strouts's eldest son, Edward Murton Strouts (born 1869) was educated as a boarder at the Aldenham Grammar School, near Letchmore Heath, Herts. The school, which is still in existence and dates from 1567, when it was founded by Richard Platt, a Brewer in the City of London. Platt had been Master of the Worshipful Company of Brewers in both 1574 and 1581. Platt's property in London, which provided the endowment for the school, was compulsorily purchased by the Midland Railway in the 19th century and is now the site of St Pancras Station. Edward became a brewer like his father, being recorded as such in his entry in the 1891 census. Unfortunately, this entry gives no clue as to where he was brewing; he was a visitor in the household of Henry D Anderson, a Banker, at his house, Ridgehurst Lodge, Green Street, Shenley, Herts, on census night. An Electoral register for 1890 shows that E M Strouts was living at Brewery House, Clerkenwell Road, which had previously been named Liquorpond Street, so presumably Edward was brewing for Messrs Reid, just as his father had done before him.

In 1901 Edward was living in Long Acre, Westminster, a thirty-two-year-old brewer and in 1903, when his daughter was born, he was living in Buckingham Palace Road. Then, from about 1907 he settled at 28 Palace Street, Pimlico; these addresses indicate strongly that Edward was now brewing at the Stag Brewery of Messrs Watney, Combe, Reid & Co Ltd, Reid's Griffin Brewery having been closed in 1899. When his daughter married in 1935, her father's occupation was given as a 'Brewery Manager'. Upon retirement, Edward Murton Strouts moved to Kent, where he died at his home, 'Little Fowlers', Hawkhurst, on 16th January 1954.

In conclusion, what started out as a simple enquiry regarding Fremlins brewing staff, had unexpectedly turned into the story of the Neepsend/Burton Road Brewery in Sheffield, with which a total of four Men of Kent were associated for over fifty years, from 1865 until 1918. Although the brewery closed in the latter year, the story doesn't end there. The premises found industrial uses, latterly as a spring factory and some of the buildings survive. Then, in 2020, the Neepsend Brew Co., which had been established just around the corner in 2015, moved into part of the old Burton Road Brewery premises, re-establishing brewing on the site after a hiatus of some 102 years.

Peter Moynihan