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A "mushroom Hall" Alehouse


RichardB

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The prisoner, having confessed of whom he obtained the songs, was taken before a magistrate, and committed to the house of correction, less as a punishment for any offence of his own, than to secure his appearance against the printer to whom

"the trick of selling a straw, and giving something not worth one, was new"

though a similar ruse had been practised just before Montgomery came to Sheffield, by a fellow who had in one night built a "Mushroom Hall" upon Crookes Moor, and on the following Sunday opened it as an alehouse !

http://books.google.com/books?id=Q5EVAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22crookes%20moor%22&pg=PA194#v=onepage&q=%22crookes%20moor%22&f=false

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I turn to other customs relating to the ownership of land. Near the back of the Weston Park Museum is a house which bears the singular name of Mushroom Hall. It was so called because it was said to have been originally built in a single night. " The story was," says Hunter, " that it was built, covered in, and a pot boiled between sunset and sunrise, and this, it was alleged, gave a right to the ground on which it stood, according to the custom of the manor. It stood for many years, and with additions and improvements afforded what they thought a sufficient habitation for the family by whom it was first erected, and I believe occasioned some trouble to the commissioners when the commons came to be enclosed."

It certainly caused trouble to the Enclosure Commissioners, and I have seen an advertisement on the subject by them in an old Sheffield newspaper.

Now this is a very ancient and widespread custom, and we must remember that it was the kindling of a fire which gave the right. In Hampshire there was an old tenure called " keyhole tenure," by which if a squatter could build a house or hut in one night, and get his fire lighted before morning, he could not be disturbed.

SH link .. Customs of Hallamshire

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