Beer & Dickens London 2024: A Pub Crawl

I was back in London for one day, and what better way to spend it than adding a new pub crawl to my Beer & Dickens London series. It was time to tidy up some loose ends from two years ago with the help of a great book I received as a gift called Liquid History. It pointed out a couple pubs with a Dickens link that I wasn’t aware of. There is no city like London which marries its literary past with its pub culture. It is a city where every self-respecting pub tries to find the most minute link to a famous writer. Even if it is a six degrees sort of thing, no matter how remote the link is, you have to find a way to put the name Dickens on your wall. I was staying in the Clerkenwell area which made it very convenient to start the pub crawl flaunting my Dickens Fellowship membership for free entry to the Charles Dickens Museum.

Beer & Dickens London – Introduction

What do Dickens and beer have in common?

Continue reading Beer & Dickens London – Introduction

by itsabrewtifulworld June 25, 2022December 25, 2022

The Lamb

Just a few blocks from the Dickens Museum is this really nice pub which dates from the 1720’s. Thus, it existed while the Dickens Museum was actually his home. Given it was in his general neighborhood, it is not a stretch to assume Dickens stumbled accidentally or with intent upon the pub at least once while out for a walk. This idea that Dickens was “reputed to have frequented”¹ is perpetuated by both Liquid History and The Lamb’s wikipedia page. It is a nice bit of promotion as evidenced by yours truly being there. However, that is as tenuous a link as it gets.

It was a beautiful Friday mid-afternoon and the pub was just starting to buzz with the after work crowd. In fact, everyone was lined up out front while the inside was empty. The bar still contains snob screens which were used to hide the faces of the bar staff from any highfalutin patrons. To avoid the noisy crowd out front and the lonely interior, I sat in the cozy little garden area out back and sipped my ale channeling any Dickensiana I could summon from The Lamb whether Dickens actually drank here or not.

From The Lamb, it is a zig-zaggy walk through Holborn and Covent Garden to arrive at the next pub.

The Lamb & Flag

Situated in the corner of a slightly hidden pedestrian alley, the Lamb & Flag proudly boasts of its literary as well as its pugilistic history. Dickens “worked nearby” reads a placard and logically must have stopped in on occasion for a pint after work. As I read the placard, I was never so sure in my life that Dickens drank here. Just look around. Why would he not? The work they are referring to was his former office a couple blocks away where he produced the All The Year Round publication. I visited that site in my Day 3 pub crawl a couple years ago.

Benjamin Franklin House

I saw this randomly on Google Maps as I was looking for pubs. Good ol’ Ben pops up from time to time in my posts so I had to pass by here. In fact, for the second time on this trip to England (the other being in Twyford), the great American stateman makes an appearance. He lived and worked in this house for sixteen years. Doing what, I have no idea. But those were pre-Revolution days.

Ye Olde Cock Tavern

A historic pub on Fleet Street with an impressive resume of associations with literary figures including Dickens. Here the sign makes it perfectly clear that “Dickens drank here“. That settles it for me. However, all of these cool connections occurred when the pub existed on the other side of the street. In 1886, to make room for a new branch of the Bank of England, Cock Tavern, as it was known then, had to move. The sign also claims some association, like a guy who once was a neighbor of a future movie star, with The Da Vinci Code. At least I have read The Da Vinci Code since the tavern has moved to its current location. But I am still not sure what the Temple Church and Da Vinci Code have to do with this pub. Does that mean Dan Brown drank here? The honorary Ye Olde moniker was given to it in more recent times.

To get to the next stop, taking a tube from either Leicester Square or Covent Garden to Borough is suggested.

Marshalsea Prison

Not every association with Dickens is a pleasant one. Imagine your problem with debt being forever etched in a stone tile. Then imagine looking down and seeing it spelled out in an artistic spiral.

“In the story of “ Little Dorrit,” the Marshalsea Prison holds a very prominent place. We have in a previous chapter referred to the fact that Dickens’s acquaintance with the place was of a personal nature, and that therefore no one could be more eminently qualified than himself to describe the life in, and to show up the evils of, a debtor’s prison.”
Dickens’s London by T. Edgar Pemberton (1876)

The George

“Fire was certainly the chief enemy of the Southwark inns, but we must be thankful that this portion of one of them has been spared, in a quarter of rumbling drays and large, shabby, Dickensian warehouses, to remind us of the former spick-and-span importance of this great traffic terminus of the old London.”
The Old Inns of England by A.E. Richardson (1934)

The “portion of one of them” referred to above is The George. People coming in by coach would arrive to this Southwark neighborhood where there were many of these coaching inns. The George is the last man standing. This is prime pub history here. It was about 6pm and the Friday after-work crowd was rubbing shoulders with lots of tourists. I was happy to see a house ale, The George Inn Ale. The first one of the day. There is no association here with Dickens, but he used a neighboring inn, The White Hart, as a setting in Pickwick Papers. So I am sure that means he drank here.

Southwark Brewing Company

For the final ‘official’ stop of this pub crawl, I was stepping out of the Victorian era and into modern times. Southwark Brewing Company is a stalwart of the London craft beer scene. They are located in a stretch of elevated railway called the Royal Mile leading to and from London Bridge station.

Since I was staying in the Clerkenwell area, I took the Tube from London Bridge to Angel. On my way back to my Airbnb, I stopped for a night cap at a pub that wasn’t originally on my list.

The George & Monkey

The George & Monkey isn’t flashy (I forgot to take a picture of it) and doesn’t claim any literary connections, but it is a great pub with an impressive array of craft beer on tap.

Final Words

If you enjoy composing historical pub crawls, there is no better place than London. The wealth of amazing pubs and historical associations gives a seemingly infinite variety of possibilities, even if some of those associations are more wishful thinking than fact. But I find a great charm in the ‘Dickens (might have) drank here‘ classification of pub. Somehow, someway maybe while mingling with these ghosts, some of their talent may rub off on me. At least I will do a better job than Dickens of telling the world where I did or didn’t drink a beer. The next morning, I caught the train back to Belgium looking back at three straight years of immersing myself in the pub culture of England. Whether it is Dickens, Shakespeare, Best Bitters, or Whisky, the British Isles keep calling me back. My next stop would be Italy, and would be much more challenging. Beer & Renaissance anyone?