Black Eagle Brewery

[1] The former buildings, warehouses and yards were redeveloped by The Zeloof Partnership as the "Old Truman Brewery" and now house over 250 businesses, ranging from cultural venues to art galleries, restaurants, and retail shops.

[2] The site's first associations with brewing can be traced back to 1666 when a Joseph Truman is recorded as joining William Bucknall's Brewhouse in Brick Lane.

Hanbury's nephew, Thomas Fowell Buxton, joined the company in 1808, improved the brewing process, converted the works to steam power and, with the rapid expansion and improvement of Britain's road and rail transport networks, the Black Eagle label soon became famous across Britain (by 1835, when Buxton took over the business upon Hanbury's death, the brewery was producing some 200,000 barrels (32,000 m3) of porter a year).

The Brick Lane brewery – now known as Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co – took on new partners in 1816, the Pryor brothers (the company's owners were renowned for their good treatment of their workers - providing free schooling – and for their support of abolitionism).

[4] In Charles Dickens’ novel David Copperfield (1850), the character Mrs Micawber makes specific reference to Messrs Truman, Hanbury and Buxton: In 2014/15 the Black Eagle Brewery featured in the fifth episode of the third series of the fictional BBC TV period drama Ripper Street, where protective employees harassed and killed London publicans who had changed supplier and were buying wares from breweries in Burton-upon-Trent.

While a fictional account, the storyline reflected the real concerns that the London breweries had in late Victorian times, as rival product was increasingly brought from the north of England by the expanding railway network.