Tragic tale behind Norwich Walnut Tree Shades’ pub flagon

The sizeable flagon – a container used to store liquid – was made for George Dady, landlord of The Walnut Tree Shades, in Old Post Office Court.

But Mr Dady’s tenure as landlord of the city centre pub was shortlived and he died in a suspected suicide in 1859 at the age of just 27.

The Dady flagon and an earlier, earthenware bottle sold for more than £1,600 (Image: Woolley And Wallis)

His grieving widow took over the running of the pub. But, just a year later, she died in a freak gunpowder explosion in a gun-maker’s shop in Little Orford Street.

The couple’s two children were rescued from the blaze by a passing sailor and were cared for by their grandparents before being transferred to a London orphanage in 1865.

READ MORE: History of Norwich’s Walnut Tree Shades Victorian pub

The Walnut Tree Shades in Norwich (Image: Denise Bradley)

The bottle, sold alongside an earlier plain stoneware flagon, sold at an auction in Salisbury for £1,638.

They were among a number of flagons auctioned by Wiltshire-based Woolley and Wallis.

The lots were part of the collection of the late Jonathan Horne, a famed dealer in English pottery, who died in 2010.