Compasses

Above photo, circa 1907, kindly sent by Rory Kehoe.

Above photo date unknown.

Above sign 2012.

The following information has been taken from http://www.cliffehistory.co.uk/pubs.html

The "Compasses" once stood as a local beer house towards the end of Reed Street in Marsh Lane and is now a private dwelling. Although now quite faded the beer house name can still be seen on its northern wall and on the south face can be made out the name of the brewery.

The first recorded landlord of the "Compasses" was a Mr. Samuel Rumbel who, in 1851, was 73 years old and lived at Cuckolds Green in Reed Street with his daughter Sarah Seamark and granddaughter Julia Seamark. At that time a nearby neighbour, also living in Reed Street, were William and Sarah Seamark who were soon to move to Salt Lane.

Mr. William Seamark, a local shepherd who ran the beer house in the 1860's with his wife Sarah. William and Sarah lived in Salt Lane and were next door neighbours to George and Mary Cloake who, at the time, were in charge of the "Royal Albert" beer house in Salt Lane.

It was Julia Seamark, William's cousin, who took over the running of the establishment in 1869 and she married shortly afterwards, in the late summer of 1870 on the Isle of Sheppey, to George Laws who then became the licensee.

After George's death Julia was once more left with the running of the beer house but it would appear that help was at hand from her cousin Thomas, a market gardener by trade, who lodged with Julia and her daughter Agnes at the "Compasses." Thomas took up the reins for a short time in 1888.

The following year the name was changed to the "Iron Compass."