History
Trade directories from 1785 show our public house was first opened by victualler Sam Fallows (although slightly too late to appear on Thomas Hanson's map below).
The building can be seen on the 1808 map, marked as Spring Gardens. Described as ‘pleasant tea gardens … having pretty walks, grottoes, and arbors …. This rural retreat.’,a and a ‘most pleasant place’, a public house called “Spring Gardens”, so named from the very beautiful gardens…trees, … flowers, … shady walks, …summer houses, …eminently pretty, and well worth a visit’.
According to Walter Showell’s Dictionary of Birmingham, Spring Gardens closed ‘its doors July 31, 1801.
Spring Gardens, 1785 - 1801
Who nicked our top floor???
We weren't sure this was our place until we saw the Floodgate Street and Little Anne Street road signs on the side of the building.
The blocked up windows are likely a response to property tax based on the number of windows. This tax ran from 1696 until 1851 but many windows remained blocked long after this time, even to this day.
Some of the later pictures at the bottom of this page show a slight change in the brickwork just above where the second floor windows were previously.
It seems we were 'The White Swan' for a while, along with the other White Swan on Bradford Street, and in line with M&B and Ansell's practice of copying the names of each others pubs.
These final few pics take us from the 1950's up to the present day and reflect the decline of industrial Digbeth and it's more recent regeneration.