History
A POTTED HISTORY
This is just
a short potted history of The Cockerel. We hope to add to it as we
have time to do more research.
As far as anybody can tell the building dates back to 1765 but has
been added to over the years, the latest additions being the
customer toilets and house porch which were added in about 1989.
We know it was a pub, 'The Cock', until 1967, but was almost
certainly three or four cottages in the early years. When these were
knocked through and made into a pub we don't know.
The earliest record we have of it as a public house is 1830. We know
this as Thomas Hasdell is listed as the licensee and certainly was
until 1845.
By 1851, and until 1865 Benjamin Harris was the landlord and from
1869 until 1881 John Bates took over.
In 1883 James Neal kept The Cock, and in 1888 it was Frederick
Sallabank. In 1890, and certainly until 1892, William Bennett took
over but we cannot find out who kept the pub until 1908 when
Frederick Palmer is listed as the licensee until 1912. In 1916
Albert Palmer (Frederick's son?) was in charge and by 1922 John
Craigie was the landlord.
By 1933 the records are good and the landlords and the date they took over are:
Charles Hedge - 23.05.1932
Henry Hipperson - 16.10.1939
Henry Willsmer - 11.12.1950
Ernest Thornton - 21.06.1954
James Sowerbutts - 14.02.1955
William Saunders - 25.02.1957
Joseph Hickey - 31.10.1960
Michael Rix - 13.09.1965
I have met some local
people who used "The Cock Inn" as their 'local' until it closed and
they insist that Jo Hickey was the last landlord. It looks as if
Michael Rix held the license on behalf of Steward & Patteson (The
owning brewery) but did not actually participate in the running of
the pub. (If you know better please let me know).
Local memory also insists that The Cock closed as a pub in 1967 but
the only official date I can find for closure is Feb. 2nd. 1966 as
agreed at the meeting of Steward & Patterson's Rationalisation
Committee. The reason given for closure was that the pub was no
longer economic, having sold only 51 barrels of beer in its last
year of trading.
We have a picture of Mr Charles Hedge, taken in about 1933 standing
outside the pub.
The original hangs in the
restaurant. They certainly had some stiff competition to contend
with in those days as there were no less than 14 pubs in North
Walsham at that time.
The outbuilding which is now used as our freezer room / dry store
was once housed the North Walsham Newsham fire engine in the days
when human muscle worked the pumps. This engine purchased in about
1725, was designed to be operated by 22 men, 9 on each side
operating the hand bars and 4 on top operating a treadle. The pump
was drawn by horses who were also stabled in our outbuilding.
Up until 1883 the fire officer (there was only one!) use to enlist
the help of anybody near to hand to operate the pump which could
deliver 170 gallons of water a minute and throw it up to 100 feet.
Stored in the Market Cross for about 70 years until it was
vandalised in 1971, the pump was then moved to the parish church for
three years and is now on display at Bressingham.
After the place closed as a pub we don't know what happened, we
don't know if anyone was living here or indeed whether the brewery
continued to own the premises of if they sold it fairly quickly.
What we do know is that in the late 70's it was a private house and
had fallen into a poor state of repair. It was bought in 1979/80 by
Peter and Ann Downes who undertook the daunting task of renovating
the whole building and an excellent job they did retaining a lot of
the old basic fabric and certainly all of the charm.
An indication of the task they undertook can be seen from the 'work
in progress' picture below
After completing the
renovations, in 1980, the Cockerel Tea Room opened offering Morning
Coffee, Light Lunches and Afternoon Tea. Mr and Mrs Downes continued
to operate the Cockerel until they eventually sold to Colin and
Sheila Allen who operated the Cockerel on similar lines until about
1998 when Al and Joy Plane took up residency, expanding the menu to
offer much more in the way of lunches. The Planes also obtained a
restaurant drinks license and the Cockerel Tea Room truly became the
Cockerel Tea Room and Restaurant.
Al and Joy also had some internal structural work carried out to
remove a redundant passageway and to consequently enlarge the
kitchen, a very much needed alteration.
It was then owned by Andy and Alison Gray from 2002 until we then
took over in May 2007. We have been doing some extensive research
into the building and we will update the history soom with the new
information.