Norfolk Mills - Emneth steam mill

St Edmund's Brewewry, Paradise Road, was founded soon before 1872, when bought for £400 by William Newell. In 1874 it was listed as Ward & Newell. On 3rd November 1894 it was sold for £1400 to Charles Reginald Phillips (b1864 Colchester). His brother, Percy Herbert Phillips was listed in 1896 and 1900, having been in the town from around 1892. In 1904 Phillips & Co. moved production from Downham to Elm Road in Wisbech. The Elm Road brewery was converted from a mill in 1900 by Frederick Woods and in 1903 was owned by Henry T. Herbert. Phillips was listed from 1908 until 1911. Charles Reginald retired in 1910 and Percy Herbert continued the business.
The general assumption is that a fire on 24th May 1911 at Wisbech caused production to return to Downham. However, P.H. Phillips of the Downham Market Brewery was bankrupt 16th September 1911, when trading as Phillips & Co., Downham Market Brewery. He was operating the Elm Road Brewery, Wisbech where he lived. The latter site closed in 1946. The Downham site was later a motor cycle showroom and some buildings remain at both towns. Charles and Herbert's father Arthur, had run a grocer's shop in Leatherhead and their grandfather Samuel had been a maltster at Lexden near Colchester in 1839. No links with the other brewing Phillips have yet been established; however, it is worth noting that some of Herbert's children were born in Oxford 1890/91, a time of change at the Phillips brewery there.
William Smith - 22nd May 2012


Theresa Neale c.1850	William Newsham Neale c.1850