The building that originally stood on the corner of Market Place and Sileby Lane was once a pub called the Red Lion and was put up for sale by John Bacon on the 6th March 1815.
At that time it consisted of ‘a roomy dwelling house with a butchers shop at the front, a malt office, tenement, two stables and slaughter house in the yard and a large garden adjoining the River Soar’.
We don’t know what happened to the pub but in 1828 Thomas Simpson was the butcher and around 1850 it was taken over by George Gee. In 1883 George’s son Albert was the butcher but two years later he unfortunately died in a traffic accident.The shop was then run by his mother Harriet and after that his brother in law, Fred Pepper,followed by John Goodwin.
Is this the butcher,standing outside his shop? Is it John Goodwin, or could it be Fred Pepper or even George Gee? We think it is Fred Pepper.
The sign on the shop door says ‘Midland Railway Parcels Receiving Office’.
Source material
Leicester Journal 3rd March 1815
Leicester Chronicle 21st March 1885