A memory of the Drummer Boy

This poster is one of few memories we have of the Drummer Boy in fairly recent days. It advertised live music at the pub.

Poster for live music at The Drummer Boy in 2006

We think this was 2006 – like many posters it gives no year but there was a Friday 16^th June that year. Bob South was a successful touring guitarist and no doubt he gave his audience a night to remember with his mix of rock classics, bluesy flavoured music and even more folk stuff.

The Drummer Boy has gone and we still await thoughts on what happens next. So far all plans for converting to housing have been turned down.

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Drummer Boy memories

As this is written, the Drummer Boy pub stands idle and empty. The sign still hangs over the pavement, the blackboard still announces upcoming events, but this pub has now been closed for some time as it awaits new owners and, probably, conversion to dwellings.

It took the name of The Drummer Boy in about 1970 to commemorate the legend of the dead drummer. Events in that tale are supposed to have happened up on Salisbury Plain in the parish of Market Lavington. Formerly it had been The New Inn. It wasn’t new in anybody’s memory but the name changed when accommodation was no longer offered. Places called ‘Inn’ offered overnight stays so the name had to change. At the time, with the new Fiddington Clay estate being largely military, a name implying a soldier was probably a good idea.

We have some photos, some given to us by the daughter of a former landlord who still lives in the village, but other memorabilia has largely evaded us. However, we have a menu – probably from the 1990s or maybe even the early years of this millennium.

Curry menu from the Drummer Boy pub

The Drummer Boy clearly tried to find custom by being a curry house.

Of course, in a fortnight we open for our 2016 season which features a display on the pubs in our two villages so you can discover and enjoy more by visiting the museum.

The Drummer Boy Pub

 

This was recently bought as a blank greetings card and it shows the Drummer Boy Inn on Church Street in Market Lavington, probably during the 1970s.

Church Street and the Drummer Boy pub in about 1970

Before describing the picture, we’d like to mention the issue of copyright as we understand it. The paragraph below comes from https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/305165/c-notice-201401.pdf . It is thus a statement of copyright law.

The length of the copyright period will depend on when the image was created. Generally speaking, copyright in images lasts for the life of the creator plus 70 years from the end of the calendar year of their death. That means that images less than 70 years old are still in copyright, and older ones may well be, depending on when the creator died.

The image above is thus in copyright for any photo less than 70 years old, by definition is. In this case we at Market Lavington Museum know that the photographer was Peter Francis. Peter died in 1998 so this photograph is copyrighted to his heirs or assigns until 2068. Peter had no specific descendants but was closely involved with the museum and orally, he assigned copyright to us. We therefore believe this card should not have been published without permission from us.

But let’s now leave that on one side and take a look at the image. It shows Church Street and its poignancy at the moment does concern the Drummer Boy pub which recently closed. We expect it to be converted into housing. This Peter Francis image shows what it looked like and has the sign hanging outside.

This was the sign as taken by our curator in 2014. It is a different sign from the one in the Peter Francis photo.

Drummer Boy sign 2014

 

The other change in the photo is that the single storey shop front further up Church Street has gone. It was once Mr Milsom’s garage and had also belonged to the Hopkins family and more recently was held by a company called Sutech. Where it stood is now a part of Milsom Court – a small group of village houses.

Other than that the scene is pretty much unchanged in the last forty years.