Bohemia Village Voice

North Star Pub, Clarence Road, Bohemia

Written by David Russell.

The North Star was built in the late 1860s by Joseph Wisden, previously a guard on the South Coast Railway.

He was granted a licence in 1871 and the pub opened with a new barmaid, Mary Jane Bell from Belfast, at £18 a year. She refused Wisden’s offer of marriage and a present of a hat, after which he treated her badly and tried to recover the fare from Belfast. In court she said she wanted to leave the North Star because ‘he has criticised everything I have done since I arrived’.

She must have been popular as several customers turned up to support her. The case went against the landlord and she was awarded two guineas. Wisden was hissed as he left the courtroom and the North Star lost a number of customers and a good barmaid.

Before the Newgate Estate was built there were complaints ‘of the hawkers and others who congregate around the North Star and the fairs that takes place there with a general turmoil of rough music, roundabouts, shooting galleries, coconut throwing, brawling and shouting by a lot of worthless vagabonds’.

The Bohemia Bonfire Boys met here in the 1880s. On November 5th they paraded around Bohemia and into town to join the main procession before returning to burn the guy. The processions started at the North Star and everyone wore fancy costume dressed up as navy, army, police, highwaymen, crusaders, clowns or demons. They were led by a Brass Band and the merriment went on into the night.

The previous pub sign showed only the pub name under the ubiquitous Watney’s Red Barrel. The current sign dates from the 1990s and shows a steam locomotive built by George Stephenson in the 1830s. At one point the engine was shipped to New Orleans but they could not afford the asking price and it was duly returned to England.

David Russell is interested in any Hastings & St Leonards’ pub memories and photographs. David Russell: 200227.