Talk- Miles Jenner

“The heyday of the brewery industry in Cliffe was in about 1860, when there were five different companies producing beer at the same time”, Miles Jenner, the head brewer of Harveys, tells me. Miles is giving a talk this week on the subject of Cliffe’s beer-making history as part of the Cliffe Independence Day event. “Of course people used to drink much more beer in those days, because of the risk of cholera from drinking water,” he continues. “In fact it has been calculated that 24% of the average family’s income would have been spent on beer.”

He tells me the first brewery in the area was the Bear Brewery, set up in 1766 on Bear Lane. “They would have produced porters and stouts: the type of beer that heralded the advent of the industrial revolution, which could be produced in large quantities maintaining contemporary standards of quality”. Cliffe was the industrial heart of the area, and brewing was one of the most important industries. The other four breweries were the South Malling Steam Brewery, the Southdown and East Grinstead Brewery, Leneys and, of course, Harveys, the only one to survive today. Contrary to popular belief, Harvey’s beer is not made from Ouse water. “It’s drawn from a vast artesian well”, Miles explains, “and is made from fresh spring water, in which Lewes is particularly rich”. Cliffe’s five breweries weren’t the only ones in town. “The old adage at the turn of the century was that Lewes had seven breweries, seven churches, and seventy pubs”. AL