John’s insistence upon being granted admission to any pub he chose, however late at night, was showing no sign of abating by May 1860, when he turned his attention to Shoreham. John had a good knowledge of the Shoreham harbour area, as this was where his timber business had been based since the 1840s, and he still owned at least one tract of land to the far east of the harbour near Copperas Gap.
During his legal troubles throughout May 1860 perhaps John was craving some temporal means of escape by leaving Brighton and visiting Shoreham-by-Sea and its surrounding villages and hamlets. His nocturnal jaunts included the clifftop area between Fishersgate and Hove, an area which used to be known as Copperas Gap but which is now known as Portslade-by-Sea. These districts had considerably less inhabitants, and the occupants of the small cottages thereabouts were worlds apart from the ‘men of letters’ who John was having to keep at bay in Brighton. In many ways they had more in common with the residents of rural Heathfield where John spent his childhood and early teens. That is not to say that they were uneducated people, but they were certainly less cosmopolitan as a rule, described as ‘artisans’ in some contemporary local guides. At night, were it not for John, these coastal hamlets would largely have been very peaceful.
No such peace was to be found on Shoreham High Street on the night of Thursday 3rd May 1860, when John decided to pay a midnight visit to the King’s Head. This old public house has now been demolished, but this rather lovely painting by former landlord Ron Lynn sets the scene very well:
John had obviously been drinking elsewhere before he rocked up at the pub, which had closed for the night as per the licensing laws of the time. We can actually see, courtesy of Ron Lynn’s painting, the windows through which John thrust his cane when the landlady Mrs. Hinton refused him admission. When harangued for breaking one window, he deliberately broke another – in it for 1s, might as well make it 2s being his manic rationale. This must have been quite a frightening situation for brave Mrs. Hinton, who had doubtless encountered John before – and likely when he was ‘excited’. Fortunately for Mr. Starley, the landlord of the nearby Bridge Inn, the sound of the rumpus John was causing must have carried on the night air, as he managed to secure his windows before they too were smashed:
The logic behind John’s theory, which we have already encountered – that smashing pub windows would encourage landlords or ladies to come down and initiate a lock in – is inpenetrable. Doubtless John’s perplexed, and almost naive response was “But I am John Harmer!”.
The following morning an attempt was made to serve a warrant on John for his assault upon Austin at the King and Queen, but this was not immediately possible. ‘The last heard of John Harmer, was that he was at Shoreham over-night, fighting with a flyman, and Mr. Runnacles said he understood he was now gone out of town to play a game of skittles!’ [Brighton Gazette, 8th May 1860]
John was back at the Bridge Inn two months later, on Wednesday 11th July. This time his Brighton to Shoreham pub crawl had begun at ‘Paines Hotel’. This would have been the Terminus Hotel immediately adjacent to Brighton Railway Station, which was at the time run by a George Payne. We know that John regularly frequented other pubs in the area, including the Admiral Nelson in Trafalgar Street, and the Railway Hotel in Surrey Street (both still standing). The Terminus Hotel has now been demolished, but here is how it looked in the 1920s:
This particular ‘bender’ of John’s (as we would call it today!) is relayed to us via the Brighton Gazette of 25th July 1860, which covered the claim for a 12s fare brought against John by William Jenner, a fly cab driver. We don’t know who John’s male companion was, but it seems that the two men asked Jenner to take them to Shoreham. It would be sensible of us to listen to Jenner’s version of events first, as he was probably the only sober party. According to Jenner, he took John and his friend to Shoreham, stopping at ‘different places along the road’ on the way there. These obviously included inns or beer houses. John then asked him to ‘put up’ at the Bridge Inn. After this they got back in the cab and headed back towards Brighton, but John wanted to stop at the Half Way House inn at Copperas Gap where he and his friend remained for ‘a considerable time’. John became ‘very noisy’ and his friend requested to be driven home, which Jenner did, before returning to collect John as per John’s instructions.
Upon alighting at the Half Way House Jenner asked when John would be ready to go home, but John did not want to leave the pub – quelle surprise!! John then made use of ‘a very nasty expression which is not fit for publication’. Jenner left without being paid by John for any of his to-ing and fro-ing.
In John’s version of events Jenner was hired to take him and his friend to the Swiss Gardens in Shoreham; these were pleasure gardens, which incorporated a ballroom and various other night time entertainments of a respectable nature. According to John (who was aware that the press were present and reporting upon the case) his friend had some arrangements to make there, and after that Jenner took them to the Half Way House. Jenner took John’s friend back to Brighton and then returned to Copperas Gap where he found John in the back parlour, and asked him, in a ‘very surly manner’, “are you ready to come home?” before insulting him. According to John ‘if he engaged a cabman he would require him to remain all night at a place till he would be ready to go home’. John ordered Jenner ‘out’, considering that ‘cabmen were always so abusive that he was determined to keep them in their place’. When asked by the Judge what time he got home, John conceded that it was about 3 o’clock in the morning, suggesting that he ended up walking back to Brighton – which is exacly what he deserved in my opinion, despite my fondness for him. John was ordered to pay Jenner the 12s fare due.
I am sure that many readers have not wished to leave a pub at the end of a good night out – we’ve all been there. However by this point in our understanding of John’s life we can’t avoid the obvious observation that he was in the grip of alcoholism. That said, regardless of his relationship with alcohol John was repeatedly avoiding returning to Brighton – perhaps it had become a symbol to him of everything that was going wrong in his life, or at least causing him intense stress which he was struggling to cope with. The low clifftops at Shoreham and Copperas Gap certainly afforded the expansive sea views which John sought during his solitary late night walks upon the cliffs at Brighton.
