The 32nd Derby Summer Festival (launching July 8th), which incorporates the Derby Beer Festival, apparently has a special guest in Dr Samuel Johnson this year. Johnson married Elizabeth Porter in Derby’s St Werburgh’s church in 1735, an event which the good people of Derby re-enact annually. 'He was a friend of Bosworth,’ drivels the website, ‘and also a frequent visitor to The Green Man in Ashbourne’. The reference is, I think, to the Grammar School he co-founded in Market Bosworth (unless they’re confusing it with Boswell), and as for The Green Man (which he referred to as ‘a very good inn at Ashbourne’), he apparently drank there so often that you can witness the great man’s chair if you visit the pub. Having been to Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, just around the corner from Gough Square, which also claims to display Johnson’s chair - and Johnson’s bench too - you do begin to wonder if these breweries have got some sort of a deal going.
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