Interview about living and working at 'The Royal Engineer' public house in Wolverton.

Mrs. Pinfold lived and worked at the Engineer public house in Wolverton for several years before she married one of the Pinfold boys.

She recalls in detail, her work at the pub and the part the Wolverton Works played in her memories of the Engineer. When the whistle blew all the staff had to be on duty behind the bar. She ‘only went in the bar during the rush time when the men come out of the Works dinner time and then again at half past five till six o’clock’. Several breweries supplied ale, including beer from a small local brewery at Newport Pagnell, now closed (1976). There were ‘two sets of pumps and taps all along for the… Scotch, Irish, gin, rum, brandy nearly all beer… it was good class working trade’. The Works came out at half past five but the majority of the men couldn’t stay very long as they had to go home for dinner. They all behaved themselves and ‘when I was behind the bar you never heard no bad language’. Bitter was 8d. A pint of ordinary mild was 6d.

The bar was the length of a cricket pitch and on pay day about a hundred pints would be pulled and lined up on the counter. A hundred pounds in change would already have been drawn from the bank, ‘the change used to be put up in envelopes 19/6d. A red envelope I believe I’m right and 9/6d for a… change from 10/- because beer used to be 6d a pint then’. They could then pass the change to their wives waiting in the old tap room prior to doing their shopping. Children were not allowed on licensed premises.

She recalls during the general strike seeing the men all out, sitting ‘all day long along the pavement’. Her reminiscences of Wolverton include the railway cottages, the little houses in the little streets and the demise of the local Friday market with the opening of Budgens supermarket.