The Anchor Brewery was a brewery in Park Street, Southwark, London, England. Established in 1616, by the early nineteenth century it was the largest brewery in the world. From 1781 it was operated by Barclay Perkins & Co, who in 1955 merged with the Courage Brewery, which already owned the nearby Anchor Brewhouse. The Park Street brewery was demolished in 1981.
The brewery was established in 1616 by James Monger Sr. in Southwark, on land adjacent to the Globe Theatre. [1] On his death, the brewery passed to his godson, James Monger Jr. [1] James Child acquired the brewery after the younger Monger's death in 1670, and owned it until his death in 1696. [1] His son in law, Edmund Halsey, managed the business with James Child from 1693, and subsequently as sole proprietor until his death in 1729. [1] The brewery was then purchased by Ralph Thrale, the brewery manager and a nephew of Halsey, for £30,000 in instalments over 11 years. [1]
Barclay Perkins & Co was founded in July 1781 after chief clerk John Perkins and Robert Barclay (of the banking family) acquired the Anchor Brewery from Henry Thrale's widow, Hester for £135,000, to be paid over four years. [2] They additionally paid her for permission to keep using the Thrale & Co name until 1795. [3] : 223 In 1782, 85,700 barrels were brewed. [4]
By 1809 the venture had an annual output of 260,000 barrels, making it the largest brewery in the world. [2] Between 1809 and 1853 the Anchor had the largest output of any brewery in London. [5] The brewery produced exclusively porter until 1834, when it began to brew pale ale. [6]
A fire at the brewery in May 1832, caused £40,000 worth of damage, destroying many buildings and resulting in considerable rebuilding of the site. The new brewery attracted considerable interest: visitors included the Prince of Wales, the German statesman Otto von Bismarck, Prince Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt, the Austrian general Julius Jacob von Haynau, who was attacked by draymen while touring the brewery in 1850, and the Italian nationalist Giuseppe Garibaldi in 1864.
In 1867, Barclay Perkins brewed 423,000 barrels. [7]
Barclay Perkins was an early adopter of lager production in the UK, with the Anchor brewing lager from 1922. [5]
In 1955, Barclay Perkins merged with rival London brewer Courage. [2] Brewing continued at the Anchor site until the early 1970s. [2] In 1981 the brewery buildings were demolished, although the former brewery tap, the Anchor Tavern, remains.
The brewery was well known for its Russian Imperial Stout, which continued to be brewed by Courage and later Scottish & Newcastle until 1993. [2]
The nearby Anchor Terrace was built in 1834, after the fire of 1832, for senior employees of the brewery and stands on top of William Shakespeare's original Globe Theatre.
Stout is a dark, top-fermented beer style which includes dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout and imperial stout.
John Smith's Brewery in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, England, produces beers including John Smith's, the highest selling bitter in the United Kingdom since the mid-1990s.
Henry Thrale was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1765 to 1780. He was a close friend of Samuel Johnson. Like his father, he was the proprietor of the large London brewery H. Thrale & Co.
McEwan's is a brand of beer owned by Carlsberg Marston's Brewing Company. It was originally brewed by William McEwan's Fountain Brewery in Edinburgh, Scotland. The McEwan's brand passed to Heineken in 2008 after their purchase of Scottish & Newcastle's British operations. Heineken sold the brand to Wells & Young's in 2011, who sold their brewing operation, including the McEwan brand to Marston's in 2017. Cans and bottles are now brewed in Bedford, England.
Full Sail Brewing Company is a craft brewery in Hood River, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1987, Full Sail was the first commercially successful craft brewery to bottle beer in the Pacific Northwest for retail sale, and one of Oregon's early microbreweries. The first beer packaged was Full Sail Golden Ale, followed in 1988 by Full Sail Imperial Porter, Full Sail Amber Ale, and Wassail Winter Ale.
St. James's Gate Brewery is a brewery founded in 1759 in Dublin, Ireland, by Arthur Guinness. The company is now a part of Diageo, a company formed from the merger of Guinness and Grand Metropolitan in 1997. The main product of the brewery is Draught Guinness.
The Anchor Brewhouse was a small brewery by Shad Thames in Horsleydown, near Tower Bridge in London. The brewhouse was bought in December 1787 by John Courage. In 1955, the Courage Brewery merged with the nearby Anchor Brewery, then owned by Barclay, Perkins & Co Ltd, to become Courage, Barclay & Co Ltd.
James Watney was an English brewer and landowner who resided at Haling Park, Croydon, and Beddington, Surrey. He was born to Daniel Watney (1771–1831) of Mitcham, Surrey and Mary Galpin (1771–1830), daughter of James Galpin of Mitcham, Surrey. He was the grandson of John Watney (1747–1814) and great-grandson of Daniel Watney (1705–1780) of Wimbledon, Surrey who was an ale conner.
Anchor Terrace is a large symmetrical building on the east side of Southwark Bridge Road in London, situated very close to the River Thames. It was built in 1834, and its original inhabitants were senior employees of the nearby Anchor Brewery, Southwark, which was then owned by Barclay Perkins & Co. Ltd. The building was later used as the brewery's offices. It overlooks the site of the former brewery and is next to the headquarters of the Financial Times.
McMullen's, known locally as Mac's, is a regional brewery founded in 1827 in Hertford, England, the United Kingdom. The brewery expanded during the second half of the 19th century by purchasing other breweries and their associated pubs. In 1902 it was the second largest brewery in Hertfordshire. The brewery has occupied several different sites in Hertford and moved to its current location in 1891. There have been several breweries on this site and the current one opened in 2006. As of 2021, members of the 6th generation of the McMullen family are still involved with the business.
Courage Brewery was an English brewery, founded by John Courage in 1787 in London, England.
The Anchor is a pub in the London Borough of Southwark. It is in the Bankside locality on the south bank of the River Thames, close to Southwark Cathedral and London Bridge station. A tavern establishment has been at the pub's location for over 800 years. Behind the pub are buildings that were operated by the Anchor Brewery.
Watney Combe & Reid was a leading brewery in London. At its peak in the 1930s it was a constituent of the FT 30 index of leading companies on the London Stock Exchange. It produced Watney's Red Barrel.
Camerons Brewery is an English brewery established by John William Cameron in Stranton, Hartlepool, County Durham, in 1865. It is the largest independent brewer in the North East of England, with a brewery capacity of 1.5 million hectolitres and a tied estate of 75 houses. It is one of the oldest industrial concerns in Hartlepool, and has historically been one of the largest employers.
Cream ale is a style of American beer which is light in color and well attenuated, meaning drier. First crafted in the mid-1800s at various breweries in the United States, cream ale remained a very localized form with different styles until the early 20th century. During Prohibition in the United States, a great number of Canadian brewers took up brewing cream ale, refining it to some degree. Following the end of Prohibition, cream ale from Canada became popular in the United States and the style was produced anew in both nations.
David Barclay of Youngsbury (1729–1809), also known as David Barclay of Walthamstow or David Barclay of Walthamstow and Youngsbury, was an English Quaker merchant, banker, and philanthropist. He is notable for an experiment in "gratuitous manumission", in which he freed an estate of Jamaican slaves, and arranged for better futures for them in Pennsylvania. His legacy was as one of the founders of the present-day Barclays Bank, a century ahead of its formation under that name, and in the brewing industry.
Camden Town Brewery is a Camden, London-based brewery founded in 2010, and owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev since 2015.
Porter is a style of beer that was developed in London, England in the early 18th century. It is well-hopped and dark in appearance owing to the use of brown malt. The name is believed to have originated from its popularity with porters.
Henry Perkins (c.1777–1855) was an English brewer, known as a bibliophile.
Edmund Halsey, of St. Saviour's, Southwark, Surrey and Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire, was a British brewer and Whig politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1712 and 1729. He enjoyed a rags-to-riches career, from working as a ‘miller’s boy’ at St. Albans to becoming the owner of one of the largest breweries in the London area.
