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Among the most popular You & Yesterday articles are those in our 'Lost Derby Pubs' category. Here Peter Seddon considers the demise of the handsome Victorian establishment which was The Roebuck.

The Roebuck in 1938 when landlord W. J. Whitehall had his name over the door. The pub was demolished in 2008

Unlike some of the 'lost Derby pubs' featured on this site, The Roebuck did not disappear in the dim and distant past. Indeed it was serving customers in 2007.

Yet by spring 2008 the site had been levelled and the pub is no more - one week it was there and the next it wasn't.

So what has been lost? Yet another small piece of social and architectural heritage? Or perhaps very little of real importance? That is a question for debate.

The Roebuck stood on the corner of Stockbrook Road and Amy Street in an old-established part of Derby just off the Uttoxeter Road near the Rowditch.

The reason for the pub's name is unclear, but thought to be a hazy reference to the Buck in The Park on the town arms of Derby.

It was built around 1895 to serve the needs of the large residential community in the grid-pattern of terraced streets which surrounded it. In its heyday between the wars it was owned by Alton's Brewery.

The Roebuck was built of handsome red-brick with a curving two-storey facade topped by an unusual triangular pediment carrying its name carved in stone. Although very much of the Victorian age the eclectic style was one later dubbed 'Jacobethan' - its mullioned and transomed windows were vaguely redolent of the solid country house splendour of an earlier period.

Architecture apart, it was first and foremost a place for drinking, a commodious establishment which in many ways became the hub of a community - something like a real-life 'Rovers Return' - at least for those who used it.

For regular customers 'the local' served as a sort of 'neutral territory' in which friendships were formed, gossip exchanged, plots hatched, the world put to rights, and arguments settled - The Roebuck saw it all and survived two world wars into the bargain.

But what happens when the community a public house was built to serve stops using it? Or arguably when that 'community' as an identifiable entity ceases to exist at all.

Throughout the eighties and nineties The Roebuck struggled to survive. Despite a succession of landlords offering a range of ideas to tempt customers - big-screen sport, barbecues in the beer garden, quiz nights, cheap beer, happy hours - not a single 'mine host' was able to make a sustainable or worthwhile profit.

Quite simply the customers neither came in sufficient numbers nor regularly enough. In consequence the brewery decided that The Roebuck had no future as a public house - at least under their auspices.

It was put up for sale and offered to the market with 'redevelopment potential' - a somewhat shadowy phrase perhaps, but of necessity the best way to maximise its selling price, indeed possibly the only way to attract any interest at all in a Victorian corner-house pub in the outer-suburbs of Derby.

In the course of time a willing buyer paid £325,000. Then early in 2008 a demolition crew arrived. And in no time at all the 'commodious corner establishment' which had once been the 'cornerstone of a community' was reduced to a pile of rubble.

By spring 2008 the site had been neatly cleared to await its next incarnation, almost certainly residential apartments or starter homes.

So does it 'really' matter that The Roebuck has gone? Some would cry a heartfelt 'yes' and others a blithely indifferent 'no'.

But it is worth remembering that there are thousands of 'Roebucks' in Great Britain. And as long as local planning officers and their seemingly tame committees continue to sanction permission for 'redevelopment' they will keep on being demolished.

Some would say that the disappearance of a public house like The Roebuck is merely indicative of 'the inevitable march of progress'. Those of a more sentimental or jaundiced bent might equally see the pub's demise as symbolising a 'breakdown in community values'.

Nor are pubs the only buildings so affected - countless single residential dwellings in large suburban gardens are being demolished ito make way for 'new homes' or other profitabe schemes.

The entire issue of this so-called 'brown site' development has led to hot debate and much gnashing of teeth in certain sectors of the community. Which side one supports depends on personal perspective.

In that sense only one element of this particular story can be expressed with absolute certitude - the 'commodious corner establishment' which was once The Roebuck has vanished without trace forever. Gone in the blink of an eye.

If you have memories of The Roebuck you can add them here. Or perhaps you hold a particular view on 'pub demolition' or 'brown-site' development in general. Just click 'edit' or 'discussion' and begin writing.

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County:  Derbyshire