I would expect many people to be familiar with this phrase but did you know it was the name of a Southowram pub?
This pub, known to locals as 'Ba Gum Who Could A' Thowt It', was just down Walterclough Lane (off the corner of Law Lane). It sold it's last drink as a pub on Boxing Day 1933, and was demolished in 1945. The stone going towards the rebuilding of Coventry Cathedral
It is said to have been licensed from the 1860's following the enactment of the Beerhouse Act in 1830. There were hundreds of Beerhouses opened at this time. The licensing aspect for Beerhouses came in 1869 when these houses were then subject to a 'Justices licence' for the sale of beer.
This new regulation killed off many of them but a few did survive, including the 'Ba Gum'. One reason for the new law was the amount of drunkenness due to the vast number of places offering beer.
pictured is Mrs Ada Jane Thornton (licensee)
A particular case at the 'Ba Gum' became the topic of conversation throughout the town for months after. In 1904, John Tidswell, the then licensee, was found drunk on the premises with a number of his customers in a similar state by the police. The outcome at court was a foregone conclusion and he was found guilty and fined 7/6d for allowing the customers to be drunk and a further pound for being drunk himself.
The talking point was not the case itself but the fact they had actually got caught in the first place. It had been known by everyone but the police that customers had been drinking to an excess and for hours beyond closing time for years. Whenever the police sergeant knocked at the pub door, the licensee would wait a few moments and then let him in and naturally everyone had gone.
It was later discovered there was a secret passage that led to adjoining cottages.
After the days of being a pub, the premises had a short spell as a café.
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