VILLAGERS are banding together to try to save a 192-year-old pub which is earmarked for closure.

The Lord Raglan, in Walmersley Old Road, Nangreaves, is set to shut at the end of the month when its current landlord, Terry Leyden, retires.

And with a buyer yet to be found, Nangreaves residents are hoping to step in to prevent the pub from closing.

‘The Friends of Nangreaves’ group held their first meeting to discuss their options at the pub on Thursday, October 12.

They are set to meet again on Thursday at 7.30pm, and now have a Facebook group called ‘Future of The Lord Raglan Pub, Nangreaves’.

The group’s founder Hannah Hunt, aged 26, said: “We were only told about it closing the other week and a few of us got together and said ‘we don’t want this’.

“If the pub shuts then the community will have nowhere to go because the Masons Arms is also going to be closed down.

“We want to try to make it a community asset and to keep it open as the community hub.

“The response so far has been very successful and everybody seems to be in support of keeping it open.”

Ms Hunt, of Mount Pleasant, Nangreaves, says that the date residents have been given for the closure is Saturday, October 28.

When contacted by the Bury Times, Mr Leyden said that he did not wish to comment.

The Lord Raglan, known locally as ‘The Rag’, has been in the same family since 1954.

During the 19th century, the building was home to a butcher’s shop, which was a popular stopping off point for merchants and travellers on the main pack horse route from Manchester to Burnley.

It later became a pub and was given the name ‘The Lord Raglan’ after the Commander of the British Army during the Crimean War.

The pub previously had its own microbrewery, Leyden Brewery, which shut down earlier this year.