In a recent blog post we wrote about the “Donkey Box” – the snug at the Town Wall Tavern. CovSoc member, Fred Luckett, who has written several books about pubs in Coventry tells us more about the origins of this little room. Fred writes…..
The ‘donkey box’ was in fact the old ‘jug and bottle’ department, what we today would call an off-licence. As such it was quite a commonplace feature and not unusually small. Some of us older drinkers can remember the ‘donkey box’ at the Admiral Lord Rodney, which had similar dimensions, but has gone now. Generally speaking, these small rooms have been incorporated into the body of pubs as walls and partitions have been removed.
I can remember suburban pubs, such as the Craftsman in Beake Avenue, being built in the post-war period with small off-licence bars. With the opening-up of the off trade to shops and supermarkets the need for off-licence counters in pubs disappeared and the rooms’ original function became forgotten, leading to the belief that these were just small bars and the jokey references to donkeys proliferated. A sort-of urban myth in a way!
Off-licences were created by the Beerhouse Act of 1830. Until that time there had been no distinction between on and off sales. Inns, taverns and alehouses performed both functions. Then in 1830 the off-beerhouse was created and the numbers and types of off-licences increased throughout the nineteenth century.
Off sales counters were fitted into existing licensed premises. These counters acquired the occasional bench or chairs as they performed the function of a women’s snug. Since ‘respectable women’ were excluded from the main rooms of an inn, tavern, public house or beerhouse, women would regularly go to the off-sales counter to fetch a jug of ale to accompany a meal.
Whilst there they might take the opportunity for a mug of beer, make conversation with their friends and neighbours, perhaps peel the potatoes and in this way the off-sales department would become a safe space for women, an unacknowledged women’s snug.
No doubt there are a number of other such ‘donkey boxes’ that survive in the country, but can we spot any more in the Coventry area?
