There used to be an Hindle Arms Inn on Richmond Hill. It is
no 376 in George Miller's book "Blackburn's Old Inns". In 1847 James
Kenyon qualified as a voter because he lived in a public house, 7 Richmond
Hill. In 1854 Jane Byrne lived at the Hindle's Arms Inn, Richmond Hill. In
1893 there was an official report on all the public houses in Blackburn.
The Hindle's Arms Inn was fully licensed and tied but it did not say to
which brewery. It had no accommodation and the vaults and cellars and
backyards were very small. " It is a very old house in want of repair. The
old buildings in the yard should be pulled down or repaired" said the
report.
It was a very old house, and still is. The date on the
rainwater head is 1791.
In 1928, the building became a warehouse for J.Stott and
Sons, wholesale stationers and clothing manufacturers. Kathleen Barnes
(nee Stott) inherited the building from her father. She learned from her
father that it had been a public house. There were stables and stone
troughs for horses at the back. She was also told that it was a stopping
place for carriages bringing prisoners from Preston. Until the building of
the Police Station and courts in Northgate in 1912, the Law Courts and the
cells were accommodated in the rear of the Town Hall. If there was an
overflow of prisoners they were temporarily housed in the cellars of
various inns.
The Stotts' business has now been moved to better
accommodation so the building will probably be demolished eventually. Part
of the extension has already been set on fire by squatters and demolished
for safety.
