Probably not the right place, but move if it's not...I am seeking a little help from the sleuths and experts within, on a long standing interest I have in the Vernon Family of Hanbury Hall....and a fascinating (to me) Brum connection....featuring a Pub or Inn (naturally)...so here's a bit of a lead in....from approx 1790s on....
"Now this bit caught my ear as the lady historian told us the tale of Henry Cecil and his naughty wife Emma....here's his tale...The cuckolded husband Henry Cecil...
I must now undertake the sad task to relate what happened at Han'v Hall last June ... as I was undressing to go to bed, Emma came suddenly into my room, apparently frantic, & related to me in a broken & almost incoherent discourse, that she had been unfaithful to my bed & that she had been attached for 5 years; that she had used every art she was mistress of to subdue the object of her affections, that she at last had succeeded; that the situation she had brought Will S'd [William Sneyd] into had such an effect on his mind, that he was near going distracted; that he had procured the means & determined to destroy himself: that she had done the like & had been determined to follow his example ... that she had stolen away his poison on the approach of his late disorder: that as she had been the sole cause of his misery & loss of reason, she was determined at all costs to dedicate the rest of her life to the care of him ....
" P.S. This is the first time I have mentioned the subject of this letter
since I left H: Hall, & I hope it will be ye last. I have only one more thing to say about it, which is, that I harbour no revenge or anger against W. S., but sincerely pity him & his unfortunate companion."
.....Now this is the guide book's version of what happened to our Emma (1755-1818) subsequently.....Heiress to a fortune but not so fortunate in marriage, Emma wed Henry Cecil, heir to the 9th Earl of Exeter. The young couple moved into Hanbury Hall, but Emma found herself drawn to the local church curate, William Sneyd. They became secret lovers, but Emma found it impossible to lead this life of duplicity. When she confessed all to her husband, he gave her an ultimatum: if she broke off relations with Sneyd, she and Henry could continue as man and wife.
Choosing duty and obligation over love, she arranged a tearful farewell with Sneyd at a Birmingham coaching inn, accompanied by Henry and some others. However, whilst their backs were turned, Emma escaped out of the window and eloped with Sneyd to Lisbon in Portugal.
She returned after Sneyd's early death and lived near Hanbury, later marrying a local lawyer, John Phillips. Emma finally moved back into Hanbury after the death of her first' husband, by then the roth Earl of Exeter, who had also lived an unconventional life.
Now Birmingham Coaching Inn tickled my fancy a bit, so I asked the lady if she knew which one, as in her spiel she said it was "The FIGHTING COCKS"...and the only one of those I knew were the one in Moseley, and an old one in Deritend High Street....but she said it was on the site of the current Rotunda...and that's when I had to go....
So...I duly went digging in Joe McKenna's books on Brum Pubs, and old maps and the usual search places....to no avail...can't find any Fighting Cocks Inn around the end of the 1790s when, and allegedly where, they met...just the Swan Inn at the end of the Bull Ring, or the Hen and Chickens in nearby New Street....so....your challenge, should you wish to accept, is to shed any more light on this old Boozer....the floor is yours.....Phil?
