The Old Nag's Head sandwiched beween the burial ground the tannery and those dark secret courts

© 2013 Peter Topping

The Nag’s Head is one of those pubs most of us find by chance.

You take a short cut from Deansgate up towards Albert Square and there it is.

That said it does offer up a second opportunity to find it because it has another entrance on Lloyd Street which runs parallel to Jackson’s Row.

Now this second entrance is less impressive than the first so we shall stick with Peter’s painting which captures the place from Jackson’s Row on a bright summer’s day.

It is what you would expect of an old city centre pub but the dates on the wall obscure the fact that it was open for business by 1824, and maybe even earlier.

In 1824 Charles Vale was pulling the pints and a little later a James Wood.

Not that either would have recognised the pub today or indeed Jacksons Row.

Back then and into the next few decades this was one of those typical Manchester streets fronted by houses which in turn hid dark courts of smaller properties, which were accessed along narrow passageways opening into closed almost secret areas where few but the residents went.

Jackson's Row in 1849

And to add to the gloom the immediate area was dominated by factories, a tannery and a handful of timber and coal yards.

Still there was one bit of open land on the corner of Jackson’s Row and Deansgate which might have afforded a place to sit for a few minutes but given that this was the Quaker’s Burial Ground I doubt that it was much of an attraction.

So anyone wanting a bit of cheer was forced back on the Nag’s Head in the middle of the Row, or The Far Tavern opposite the burial ground with an option on visiting the Coach Makers Arms at the other end of the street hard by the coach factory.

I first fell across the Old Nag's Head back in the early 70s and was intrigued by the coffin in the rear of the pub, which is another story for another time and will lead me to that now lost pub Tommy Ducks.

Map; Jackson’s Row and the surrounding area from the OS map of Manchester & Salford, 1844-49, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

Painting; The Nag’s Head, © 2013 Peter Topping, 
Facebook; Paintings from Pictures, Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk