Barrow boys with regular pitches and fly-pitchers who annoy shopkeepers
The full picture is published in Brighton in Retrospect in the East Sussex County Library Local History Series [1974] ISBN 0 900348 17 8
Barrows outside the grocer's & tea shop at the junction of West Street and North Street Brighton in 1875
Just as the Open Market today draws people to the London Road shopping area and benefits the larger shops, the stall holders with fixed pitches in streets such as Upper Gardner Street benefited the shops around by attracting custom to the area. Upper Gardner Street continues as a Saturday street market today. Shoppers should note that the main emphasis in Upper Gardner Street is on bric-a-bric, antiques and furniture. The best place for food remains the Open Market off the London Road. On a Sunday, when the Open Market is closed, it has been possible to obtain fruit and vegetables from Brighton's Sunday market in the railway station car park, though like the Upper Gardner Street market this is more for durables than consumables.
The barrow boys, who the shopkeepers really hated towards the end of the 19th century were known as fly-pitchers. The fly-pitchers threatened the livelihood of small greengrocers that were struggling to make a living. Just as fly-sticking (pinning unauthorized advertising to empty shop-fronts, lamp-posts or public monuments) is frowned upon today, in the 1880s and 1890s the fly-pitchers who moved their barrows from site to site intercepting the custom which small shop-keepers were dependent on, were not much liked except by shoppers on low incomes.
It is likely that the barrows seen in the black & white picture at the top of this page (taken in 1875) belong to the grocer and tea dealer, located in a beautifully rounded building at the junction of West Street and North Steet. The rounded building was demolished in 1925 and the site is now occupied by Waterstone's Bookshop. Together with City Books on Western Road (between Norfolk and Palmeira squares), Waterstone's carries a good stock of Brighton & Hove local history books, including QueenSpark and Brighton Books publications. Other bookshops carrying local history books by other publishers, include branches of British Bookshops Sussex Stationers (the main branch is in East Street), W. H. Smith's in the New Churchill Square Shopping Centre and The Royal Pavilion Souvenir Shop in Pavilion Buildings near the East Gate of the Royal Pavilion.
For second hand local history on Brighton & Hove, I would recommend the shop on the right towards the Gloucester Road end of Kensington Gardens. Walk on through Sydney Street, turn left into Trafalgar Street. The first bookshop you come to often stocks QueenSpark books that are no longer in print and there are a few more secondhand bookshops further up Trafalgar Street on the left. There is still a second hand bookshop on the north side of Duke Street at the end nearest the main (Ship Street) post office. Descend the spiral staircase and you will find a good selection of second hand books on Sussex, but not so much on Brighton & Hove.