Wincing Devil, in a 1999 thread I can't find again Graham from Guernsey explained:
"Firstly the Old Dun Cow was a pub in London back in the days when the fire brigade ONLY attended fires where the premises had a plaque on the wall proving they were fully paid up members of that fire club. Some of these plaques still exist and can be seen (so I'm told) around London Birmingham and Liverpool. Macintyre was the fire chief of one of these brigades and was not strictly honorable in his attendances (unprovable now of course)."