This large pub, named after the nearly stainless steel manufacturing firm of Samuel Fox and Co. Ltd. opened in April 1963. At the time of closure (Spring 2019), the interior was very little changed with two bars, off sales and a rear passageway with some seating, The upstairs functions room remained virtually untouched. The entrance led into a passage with doors to the tap room on the left and lounge bar on the right. There were two hatches to the servery in the passage that were the original off sales.
The public bar on the left retained the original bar counter front that has a number of mirrored panels and a wooden surround but, like, lounge bar on the right the original light oak wood had a very dark stain. There was a hallway at the rear with one table and a few chairs in a tiny area on the far left. The gents retained the original urinals but had modern wall tiling. Upstairs had the intact original function room had a dado of Japanese quartered oak. It retained the servery with its curved panelled bar counter and bar back of oak still with the original stain.
In June 2020, the pub was purchased from Trust Inns by a local property company, Fish Developments. In September 2022, planning permission was granted in order to demolish the building and erect eleven dwelling houses with associated parking.
Following the success of the 2023 pub heritage guided walk booklet, CAMRA Sheffield & District have produced a second booklet focused on Little Chicago. Publication will coincide with the forthcoming 48th Sheffield Steel City Beer Festival: Kelham Island Museum, 16-19 October.
This new booklet (A5, 32 pages, full colour throughout, £2.99 RRP) takes you up the hill from West Bar to Scotland Street before heading towards Kelham Island. In addition to information about the three excellent pubs en route (the Crow, the Kelham Island Tavern, and Shakespeares), copious historical detail is included. This includes references to George Orwell, the temperance movement, and the Sheffield gang wars.
Festival events concerned with the booklet include both a guided historical walk and an illustrated talk.
The short walk will explore both the pub heritage aspects of the area and the streets featured in the book, Sheffield 1925: Gang Wars and Wembley Glory, with a narrative explaining how Sheffield briefly became the most turbulent city in Britain due to an escalating gang war involving the Gas Tank Gang, the Mooney Gang, the Park Brigade, and many others. The walk will also explore the beer, social, and industrial heritage of the area, examining the myths and reality of a tumultuous period in Sheffield history.
The talk will concentrate on the area covered in the booklet, taking you from the 19th century up to the current day. Along the way, mention will be made of the 1884 Sheffield Drinks Map, the establishment of a coaching inn, and the Sheffield pub with the most local CAMRA awards. A similar talk will take place at the Crow on Thursday 10 October at 20:00.
The talks and walks will be led by local historian and writer John Stocks and Sheffield’s Real Heritage Pubs editor Dave Pickersgill. This booklet is the second in this growing series. The 2025 edition will focus on Neepsend, with the following year looking at Kelham Island.
Sponsored by Abbeydale Brewery and the Crow, the booklet is available from a growing number of local outlets, including: the Biblioteka, Crow, Draughtsman (Doncaster), the Famous Sheffield Shop, Hop Hideout, Kelham Island Books and Records, Kelham Island Tavern, Millennium Galleries and Saint Mars of the Desert tap room. For retail inquiries and postal copies, please contact: pubheritage@sheffield.camra.org.uk.
Dave Pickersgill and I represented CAMRA Sheffield & District at Sheffield Town Hall (Silver Room) for one of many Heritage Days in September. We were joined by Paul Crofts and his wife, Tina. Our goal, like other heritage projects, is to campaign for the preservation of historic buildings and their features for future generations.
Stalls included a wide range of organizations such as the Sheffield Castle Project, The General Cemetery, and The Home of Football, along with relative newcomers like the University of Sheffield’s The Wave building.
A gathering of around 60 people heard a speech from the Right Worshipful Lord Mayor of Sheffield, Jayne Dunn, who launched the month-long programme of events. The launch was toasted with Prosecco or orange juice.
Heritage pub guided walk outside the Fat Cat – photo by Pete Mudd
Our contribution to the Heritage Open Days programme is Dave Pickersgill’s ever-popular guided pub walks, where he shares insights into pub history and points out key heritage features.
The Big Gun (13-17 Wicker, S3 8HS), a pub with interior features of Special Heritage Interest, closed in September 2023. In May, several months after building work commenced, a retrospective planning application (24/01523/FUL) was submitted to Sheffield City Council (SCC). Work completed includes the creation of a new shop front, the replacement of windows and the fitting of roller shutters.
In July, SCC produced their verdict: ‘Grant Conditionally’ – hence, the current owners have retrospective planning permission for the building work they have done (and stated that they intend to do). Some Victorian fittings are lost forever.
In the SCC documentation, the Planning Officer Report mentions, that change of use from a pub has not been applied for and refers to the building as a pub throughout. In addition, the decision states: ‘Planning permission will be required for the change of use of the pub (Sui Generis) and ancillary residential accommodation and storage use to commercial use (Class E) and residential accommodation (C3/C4).’
To summarise, there is no planning permission for ‘change of use:’ the Big Gun has been a pub for over 200 years, and will remain so. We await developments, with interest.
As part of Heritage Open Days 2024, we are leading a pub heritage walk. On Sunday 15 September at 2pm, we’ll be in Kelham Island. The walk will include Victorian tilework, terrazzo flooring, art deco glasswork, a mention of long-gone Sheffield breweries and much more…..
The Big Gun (13-17 Wicker, S3 8HS), a pub with interior features of Special Heritage Interest, closed in September 2023. Recently, several months after building work commenced, a retrospective planning application was submitted to Sheffield City Council (SCC). Work completed includes the creation of a new shop front, the replacement of windows and the fitting of roller shutters.
The closing date for comments was 13th June. We commented, noting that the planning application has several errors and omissions. For example, the submitted ‘existing plans (ground floor)’ do not show (i) the internal wall which is perpendicular to the front external wall in the ‘Commercial Space’ and (ii) the possibly unique Victorian draught screen which is inside, to the right of the corner door. Both these features are on plans of the pub included in the Licensing File (Sheffield Archives) and were in place when the public house was last open to the public. As they are not included on the documents submitted as part of this planning application, we can hope that there is no intention to remove these, and other, heritage features.
The planning application also has no mention of potential ‘change of use.’ Hence, the assumption which has to be made is that the current owners intend to reopen as a public house. However, it seems that this is not the case.
Due to these errors, we have suggested that the application is withdrawn until all errors and omissions are rectified. We await decisions from SCC Planning.
After over 200 years, the Big Gun (13-17 Wicker, S3 8HS) closed in September 2023. Building work has since taken place. This includes the creation of a new shop front and the replacement of windows.
Sheffield City Council Planning are aware that these works have been carried out without appropriate permission. No planning application has been submitted and they are not aware of a proposal for a change of use in the building. Their Planning Enforcement Team is currently investigating.
The Big Gun has an interior of special historic interest and, as such, is listed on the national CAMRA Pub Heritage website: ( https://pubheritage.camra.org.uk/pubs/12118). We hope that the owner has not destroyed the many unique features, especially the Victorian fixed seating and the, possibly unique, draught screen. If this is the case, we expect that SCC will use their full powers to ensure that appropriate remedial action is taken.
A beer house has been on this site since 1796. The present building was built around 1900 by Messrs’ Wheatley and Bates Ltd, a local wine, spirit and cigar merchants. At the time of closure, there were many heritage features. For example, the right hand side of the snug had two bays of Victorian fixed seating with decorative bench ends that resemble a (acanthus) leaf.
It seems that the demolition, on 10 January, took place, in error: Sheffield City Council told Now Then magazine: “Our initial belief was that the top turret on the building had collapsed under its own weight on the morning of 10 January.”
“New information has since come to light which shows the demolition company were instructed in error at 11:53am to continue with demolition. As a result of this order, our understanding is the turrets fell because of the recommenced demolition works.”
In early 2020, Carlsberg and Marston’s announced a joint venture: the Danish corporation taking 60% of the new Carlsberg Marston’s Brewing Company (CMBC) with Marston’s holding 40% and receiving a cash payment of over £270M. At the time, we commented that we had concerns regarding the future of the internationally unique Burton Union System as used in Marston’s Albion Brewery. http://tinyurl.com/498ss642
Almost four years later, these concerns have come to fruition: CMBC have announced plans to retire the historic Union System, a method of brewing using an arrangement of wooden barrels and pipes which recirculates beer and yeast during the fermentation period. This system was developed in Burton-on-Trent, patented in 1838, and used extensively for many years. Brewing scientists regard the system as unparalleled for the production of bright, clean, strong-tasting pale ales.
For example, Draught Bass, the best-selling cask beer in the 1970s was brewed using the Union System. Over the following decades, Bass fell into decline, in both quality and sales. The turning point came in the early 1980s, when Bass decided to rip out the System that had been used to produce its flagship Pale Ale for over 150 years.
Across town, Marston’s established their Union System in 1898 when they relocated from their Horninglow Brewery (built 1834) to their current site, the Albion Brewery on Shobnall Road. Described by Roger Protz as, ‘The Cathedral of Brewing,’ there are ten sets of Burton Unions in a single brew-house, mostly used to produce, Pedigree (4.3% abv), a beer originally introduced in 1952. In recent years, volumes of Pedigree have declined and only four of the sets were in use during 2023. Until earlier in January, the Marston’s website described Pedigree as ‘the only beer to come through the Burton Union System. It gives Pedigree it’s one-of-a-kind taste. No Burton Union. No Pedigree. End of.’
After 125 years of use, including over seventy of Pedigree, Marston’s are now to follow the lead of Bass, leaving, world-wide, only one variation on this unique brewing method. The Firestone Walker Brewing Company (Paso Robles, California, USA) use a modified Burton Union system: forty, 65-gallon, American oak barrels.
This decision will see a unique, and historic, part of Britain’s brewing heritage extinct. Ideally, CMBC would reverse their decision or, at least, make the Union Sets, in situ, available to others. This is unlikely to happen – I’d hope to see them, as, at least, a working museum piece. However, with the recent closure of the National Brewery Museum, this is unlikely. For many years, one of the Bass Union sets was on display in the museum car park.
It seems Carlsberg have no care for the heritage they have acquired in the UK – in addition to this backward step, recent years have seen the closure, or disposal, of several cask breweries: Eagle, Jennings, Ringwood and Wychwood. In their home country, Carlsberg have a reputation as a patron of the arts and a respecter of heritage and tradition. However, not in the UK, where a race to the lowest common destination seems to be the plan.
Carlsberg: probably the worse respecter of brewing tradition in the world.
December brought news that the Market Tavern (Exchange Street, S2 5TR) is to be demolished. While asbestos removal work was in progress, it was discovered that the chimneys were structurally unsound.
The pub opened in 1797, was rebuilt to follow a new street line in 1909 and then completely rebuilt by Sheffield brewery, Thomas Berry & Co. in 1914. Opinion is divided regarding the origin of the then ‘Rotherham House’ name. Either this was due to ownership by Rotherham-based, Bentleys Brewery, or proximity to the start of the Rotherham tram service.
1961 plans illustrate the installation of a Wimpy Bar on the front of the pub (N.W.Oldfield, Architect & Surveyor for Tennant Brothers Limited: see Sheffield Archives: MC/DC/235 ). Introduced to the UK in 1954, Wimpy is a multinational hamburger restaurant chain.
In 1968, the pub became the ‘Old No.12,’ a Berni Inn, one of a chain of British steakhouses, established in 1955. Berni Inns, a forerunner of today’s pub restaurants, provided Tudor-looking false oak beams and white walls. 1982 saw a take-over by Mecca and a change of name to the Garden. In 1995, it was sold to Whitbread and rebranded as Beefeater/Brewers Fayre.
