The George Inn
(Now called D Lafferty & Son)
The George Inn
he shrill sound of a post horn
announced the arrival of the London
to Manchester coach as the tired
horses picked up and flew through
the streets of Derby. The large wheels
clattered on the cobbles of the tiny
road leading from Bold Lane to the
George Inn in Iron Gate.
s the coach pulled up in the George
Yard, off Sadler Gate ostlers rushed
out to hold the horses, and the
coachman, wrapped in large
overcoats, one on top of the other, put
away his whip and climbed down
from the box.
assengers going further had a
little time for a meal in the coffee
room. The George Yard was now as
busy as a railway station at rush hour,
with ostlers, coachmen and passengers
going about the business of
changing horses and getting the
coach back on the road again within
a quarter of an hour.
he George Inn was one of the most
famous coaching inns in Derby and
was built around 1693. By this time
there was a distinction between inns
and taverns, as inns were not only
coaching houses, but also a place
where gentlemen could stay if they
did not own a townhouse in Derby.
Many gentlemen certainly did stay at
the George. The Duke of Devonshire
frequented it on many occasions and
during the 1745 Jacobite uprising,
used it as his headquarters, holding
the inaugural meetings which led to
the formation of the regiment of
soldiers called the Derby Blues.
n December 1745, the Blues held
their first drill on the Holmes in
Derby. They were dispatched to their
billets and the duke and his officers
went back to the George. At 7.30 that
evening the news came that the
Pretender's troops were at Ashbourne.
The Duke of Devonshire held a brief
council of war in the George. Would
the local troops attempt to prevent
the Highlanders entering Derby?
After all, wasn't that why they had
been formed? But no, the duke
marched out of the George, took his
position in front of his troops on the
Market Place and gave the order: "The
Derby Blues will retire". Thus they
marched away towards Nottingham
and left Derby to its fate.
he following
morning two
Highland officers
rode into Derby.
They inquired
after the mayor
but he had also
left the town, so
they hammered
on the doors of the
George and
demanded billets
for thousands of
troops.
any other
gentlemen stayed
at the George
during its long
history. In 1763, Prince Viktor
Freidrich Von Halt-Benburg stayed
there for two nights. The George also
played host to the Duke of York and
Louis IX of Hesse, Damstadt in 1771.
nns of the 18th and 19th century
fulfilled many roles in the community,
providing a place for courts,
council meetings, recruiting offices,
the buying and selling of animals.
Doctors and dentists and vets held
surgeries within the inns. In 1776, the
George also took over as the post
office while the one in Queen Street
was being rebuilt. It also acted as a
funeral parlour in 1773 when the
body of Godfrey Heathcote, the Duke
of Devonshire's comptroller, lay at
the George en route for burial at
Chesterfield.
he George, of course, has many
ghosts and mysteries, none more
bizarre than the 'George
Skull'. This female
human skull, with a
damaged cranium, was
found by workmen 4ft
down in a pit beneath
the cellar floor. With it
were animal skulls and
bones, old shoes and
strips of leather. Work
was stopped and the
skull was taken to
Nottingham for forensic
testing which showed
that it was very old.
ow one's imagination can run riot.
Perhaps this unfortunate female
was murdered and thrown into a
pit or 'midden' that
would have been dug in
earlier days. Animals
would once have been
killed on the premises
to feed travellers and
the unwanted parts
thrown into a pit.
Perhaps the woman was
also thrown in there to
conceal the murder.
et no other human
remains were found,
other than the skull. Perhaps she was
not murdered. Perhaps those
workmen digging in that cellar in
1992 came across something quite
different as the George stands almost
on the corner of Iron Gate and Sadler
Gate, the heart of Viking Derby. 'Gate'
is an old Danish word for 'street'. Iron
Gate was where the blacksmiths
traded and Sadler Gate was where the
leather workers set up business.
erhaps a Viking leather
worker's shop on the site,
of the George was
uncovered, which would
account for the shoes and
the discarded leather
strips. The animal bones
and skulls could have
come from the animals
killed for the leather
makers. The hides would
have been stripped and
tanned and the off-cuts
thrown into the pit.
aybe the damage to
the side of the skull was
simply done by a spade
because in 1693, when the
George was built, it was
still customary to bury
beneath the foundations
of new buildings a human
skull, a pair of shoes and
a dead cat to ward off evil
spirits and witches.
f that was the purpose
for which this skull was
buried, then it has not
done its job very well as
the George is decidedly
haunted. On two occasions
a long-haired man in
a blue coat has been
spotted walking along the landing in
the middle of the night. He has been
followed down the stairs into the bar
where he disappeared, although there
was apparently nowhere for him to go
as the George was well secured.
Crockery moves itself from the racks
in the kitchen, but never breaks.
The cobbled George Yard, to the rear of the George Inn,
once a busy coaching and business route, today little used.
ince the refurbishment and
extension of the cellar, bar staff have
had strange experiences there: one
found that stainless steel buckets were
being thrown at him from a table;
another who went down to change the
beer barrels on a Friday night had to
evade the plastic taps used on the beer
kegs as they were hurled at him
across the cellar floor.
disembodied human groan has
been heard in the cellar and on three
occasions, in the presence of
customers, thick pint pots have
shattered, cutting the hands of
barmaids and the landlady. There has
been no explanation for any of the
occurrences.
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The information on this page is supplied courtesy of Wayne Anthony (author) and Richard Felix (local historian).
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