In the 1860s a bare-knuckle fight took place at the Harrow Inn on the Watling Street near Hinckley. Leicester spectators returning home stopped at the Crown Inn in Hinckley and said to the landlord - We see they put hats on the pumps in Hinckley. They had seen an upturned bucket on top of a pump.
Mr Orton, the landlord, ran a drinking booth at Leicester races and decided to use a huge Tin Hat (said to hold 34 pints of ale!) on top of a pole as an advertisement, and soon Hinckley folk became known as Tinhatters.
The Tin Hat was later sold to Mr Pratt of the Three Cranes in Humberstone Gate, Leicester, and in 1972 was brought back to Hinckley when it was purchased from Mr Pratt's widow for ten guineas by the Hinckley Times newspaper.
