The Sir John Oldcastle, Farringdon

I do agree with the generally downbeat comments about this pub, though one of the most miserable of the East European staff (female) surprised me by turning out to be English, after all. There was no trace of a foreign accent when she glided over 2 minutes after the last bell & instructed me to finish my drink. Moreover, the air conditioning had been freezing us all evening. After an hour or so, I'd asked the manager if he could please adjust it; maybe turn one part of it down so there would be at least some place in the pub where it would be warm to sit. He was quite willing to in principle, he explained; but unfortunately it was impossible: the system was 'all one thing' He then chuckled to himself & went upstairs, carrying a full till tray.

21 Aug 2007 21:30

The Blind Beggar, Whitechapel

For the record, Ronnie Kray preferred the Grave Maurice (pron. 'Grarve Moreece') slightly further down Whitechapel Road. It was George Cornell - sadly for him - who established the pub's notoriety by deciding to have a drink in the Beggars at a moment when Ronnie desperately wanted to kill him.
But Ron would not have liked the scruffy dive the Maurice was to become. When Alan and his family ran the place, in the 60s and 70s (with its tasty good-value English food, log fire, nicotined ceiling, & plush red antimaccassared seats arranged for privacy, & the huge oak table that 20 people could sit round & have a meeting) it was a place well worth visiting. Alhough if 'the firm' happened to be in the Saloon Bar and you didn't belong, then you had go into the Public Bar. But the twins would occasionally buy all the old people a drink, plus a drink for the guv'nor and the guv'nor's wife.

17 Aug 2007 22:42