OUR NEW SERIES! Our round-up of our favorite London pubs on or near the routes of our London Walks. We’ll be posting reviews, giving recommendations and directions and from time-to-time delving into the stories behind the pubs and pub names. As always, we want to hear your suggestions, too. Send your Best Pub In London suggestions to the usual address or leave a comment below.
Dirty Dick’s, 202 Bishopsgate, EC2
Clean up your act, please, folks, is doesn't mean THAT. Dirty Dick's was named for Nathaniel Bentley (c. 1735 – 1809), owner of the Dirty Warehouse ironmongers in Leadenhall Street in the City. A fashionable man about town once known as “the beau of Leadenhall”, ol’ Nat is rumoured to have turned to a life of squalor and miserliness after the death of his fiancée the night before his wedding. His mucky ways inspired a tavern landlord to buy up some of his manky goods and chattels upon his death to, er, decorate his pub and – weird one this – attract custom. And so Dirty Dick’s was born.