The Hop and Barleycorn, Lower Gornal, Sedgley, Black Country, West Midlands

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The Hop and Barleycorn Inn

New Street, Lower Gornal.

This was quite a large but short-lived enterprise that has long gone.
It's exact location is unconfirmed, but probably in the New Street area of Lower Gornal.

1861: London Gazette, June.

Thomas Gordon Bunch was born in Tipton, he married Mary Ann Smih in 1846, he was a Parish constable and butcher of Coseley before he moved to Gornal.

Thomas was living in New Street, Lower Gornal age 33 by 1861 and in a bankruptcy notice was described as a butcher, maltster, brewer and commission agent. The household included his wife Mary Ann, also 33 years of age, along with their children Mary Ann, Matilda, Henry and John G.

It appears that Thomas Bunch got into financial difficulties around 1861.

In 1864 an application for a licence was put forward by Mr. Bunch, but was refused, some objections from the Queens Head in New Street and other establishments located nearby.
This could be the reason the enterprise was sold off the following year.

1865 Sale: Wolverhampton Chronicle, June 7.

IMPORTANT SALE OF
FREEHOLD BUSINESS PREMISES, MALTHOUSE,
FLOUR MILL, BREWERY, PUBLIC HOUSE, AND
BUILDING LAND
At GORNAL WOOD, in the Parish of SEDGLEY

MESSERS. POWELL and SON will SELL by AUCTION (by order of the Mortgagees of Thomas Gordon Bunch), at the BUSH HOTEL, HIGH STREET, DUDLEY, on Thursday, the 15th day of June instant at six o'clock in the evening, subject to conditions, the undermentioned valuable PROPERTIES,-
Lot1. All that FREEHOLD PUBLIC HOUSE, Twelve-quarter MALTHOUSE, BREWERY, Steam FLOUR MILL, with three pair of Stones, smut mill, dresser, grinding gear, store rooms, stabling, with loft over, harness room, sheds, large yard, garden, and out-offices, situated at Gornal Wood, in the Parish of Sedgley aforesaid; the whole containing, inclusive of the site of the buildings, 1,700 square yards or thereabouts, and now or late in the occupation of the said Thomas Gordon Bunch.
This lot is a corner Property, with three frontages, and is situated at an angle off the road leading out of the Dudley and Himley turnpike Road towards Upper Gornal and Sedgley.
Lot 2. All that desirable Piece of FREEHOLD BUILDING LAND, situated opposite and nearly adjacent to Lot 1, having double frontages, one of 23 yards and the other of 14 yards, to roads, and containing 516 square yards.

Thomas Bunch and family emigrated to America in 1864, living in Union, New Jersey, they had a further three children; Mathew E, Victoria and Maud V, his occupation was a brewer.
After his wife Mary Ann died, he married Cassandra B. Hunt on 6 May, 1878.

The exact location of the malthouse and Inn is open to speculation, the malthouse possibly between New Street and Brook Street, and the malthouse was possibly the one used later as a Roman Catholic school started by John Coulson around 1865.
The Catholic mission failed due to lack of numbers, this was later taken over by Rev. James Y. Rooker of St. James where it continued as a school until the new school opposite the Church was erected.
It is probably that the malthouse was also the church of 'St. Pauls', noted in this same location and shown on Ordnance maps in the late 19th Century.

Purely speculation, but due to the near proximity of the later Pear Tree Inn that appeared around 1870, could this previously have been the Hop and Barleycorn Inn?

Licensees:
1861, Thomas Bunch.
1864, Henry Bunch - probably the son of Thomas Bunch.
1865, sold.

1863: Bilston Licensing Session.

THE HOP AND BARLEYCORN, LOWER GORNAL. Mr. H. Underhill, solicitor in applying for a license for this house, which is kept by Henry Bunch, prefaced his application by reminding the Bench that on previous occasions the principle on which the Bench had generally acted granting or refusing applications for licenses was first as to the locality in which the house for which license was asked was situated, and secondly the requirements of the public for further public house accommodation in that neighbourhood. But now it seemed to be pretty well established as a rule by certain Magistrates and he referred them particularly to what had recently been done by the Liverpool Bench—that the best principle which they could act was to grant a license to every person applying, so that it was proved to them first that the house for which application was made was suitable in every respect for a licensed house, and provided the necessary accommodation, and secondly that the character of the person applying would bear the strictest investigation, and such as to satisfy the Magistrates that he was fit and proper person to conduct a house of that description in respectable and satisfactory manner. This principle had now been acted upon in Liverpool for some time past, and was stated, the last licensing meeting held in that town, to have worked well. And (Mr. Underhill) trusted, therefore, that the Magistrates before him would be induced to at least give the principle a trial on the present occasion. With respect the application he had to now make, would simply state that the house for which his client applied was situated the lower end of Lower Gornal, where the population was both large and increasing, and where public-house accommomodation was very inadequate. The house itself possessed every accommodation both as to size, number of rooms, and stabling, and put in testimonial numerously and respectably signed as to the character which his client had previously borne, likewise asked permission to refer the Magistrates the Rev J. Y. Rooker, who was sitting with them, to the necessity for further public-house accommodation in that neighbourhood.

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