6.

The old offices of the Derby Mercury on the corner of Sadlergate and Irongate. Windows have been added on the left side and the ground floor exterior has totally changed from Ward's time.

The two storeys above the shop were John Drewry's residence. The shop sold medicines, books and newspapers. At the back of the ground floor was the printing press. John Drewry ran a lending library for his dissenting friends from here. One of the members was William Ward.

This corner of the Market Place used to be known as the Market Head, and still looks across the Market Place towards Full Street, where Dr. Erasmus Darwin lived for a time.

To the right is what used to be the George Inn.

Today the building still exists but only half is used as a pub, the other half is a music shop. The stables have been built on and the Assembly Rooms at the rear (where the Mercury was printed in the 19th century) no longer exists.

In the 18th century the George Inn was one of the two most important public houses in Derby (the other being the King's Head in the Cornmarket, where the Torys met). In Ward's time the George was a coaching inn where stage coaches left for London and Manchester. It was also a Post Office. The Whigs (including the town's MP Lord George Henry Cavendish) held their grand dinners there. At the back was an Assembly Hall where those who were not deemed part of the gentry held their Assemblies. The gentry held their's (the vicar of All Saints, Rev. Hope, was one of the Presidents of the Assembly) at the newly erected Assembly Rooms in the Market Place.

The photograph is taken from a spot where, in Ward's time, there were two rows of buildings (now demolished) called The Shambles which housed butcher's shops.

 

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