On the night of Wednesday June 7th 1780 the cries of “No Popery”, “Down with the Papists”, “Lord George” echoed around Bank End, close to the Anchor Brewery. Gordon led his anti-Papist mob across London for six days of rioting, looting and burning before King George II ordered soldiers “to fire and be damned”.  The target for Gordon’s Southwark mob was Henry Thrale’s Anchor Brewery. As Southwark’s MP, he was targeted because he had taken an unprejudiced view of the rights of Roman Catholics and therefore presumed by the mob to be a Papist. Thrale himself was not in London at the time but had left the brewery in the capable hands of its manager John Perkins. With admirable presence of mind, Perkins lent the mob horses from the brewery and led them to a neighbouring public house where he entertained them fifty pounds worth of meat and ale. Meanwhile troops had been summoned and the rioters were driven back, thus saving the Anchor Brewery from certain ransacking.