1897 Jubilee Plaques

There are things I knew would recur along the walk. I started at a marble arch, and I will finish at another.  There are recurrent themes of milestones and tollhouses, and all those other bits of road infrastructure. But here's one I didn't expect.

Here's a zoomed-in detail from a picture I took along the walk of Primrose Cottage in Atherstone. I thought I recognised this tile, dating from Queen Victoria's 1897 jubilee.

I checked when I got home - and I've just got round to taking a picture of it. This is at 'Jubilee Buildings' on the High Street in Bangor, and part of the route I will be walking later on. (As I have now planned phase 2, I can say that I will pass this again on September 21st).













Sure enough, the plaques are identical. I thought these must have been mass-produced at the time, and somebody, somewhere must know about these. It didn't take me long to find out more online: here's what they are.  I will alert them to the Bangor plaque.

Inns 5: Completely Disappeared Inns

Lastly, I explored one or two sites along Watling Street where once there were inns of some sort, but now they are gone.

I referred earlier to the old White Horse in Hockley and the Flying Fox . Between these on the road, Harper, writing in 1902, referred to an impressive redbrick house, set back off the road to the left, and which had once been the Peacock Inn. I looked out for the building, hoping see another old inn. The most likely candidate was Checkleywood Farm -  but the building didn't really match Harper's description, and could easily have been built more recently than 1902. The best that could be said was that it might have been built on the footprint of the old Peacock. I wrote this off as a completely disappeared inn.

Ogilby's map has an inn, the sign of the Man & Boy Bush, at the right, on top of a hill some two miles north of Towcester. I found this spot, where a bridle way leaves the road to the right - and which is suggested here to be a junction with the much-older Oxenford Way. The present-day road is in a shallow cutting, probably a turnpike age improvement. A copse above the road on the right has some humps and bumps, a rectangular form suggestive of a building's foundations. Might an archaeological dig here reveal the Man & Boy Bush?

Inns 4: Closed Inns

Reflecting the troubles of this age, I came across a number of pubs and inns which were evidently no longer open for business. One or two I was told had recently closed, and a number were in reasonably good condition, with current 'To Let' signs, suggesting that they could yet see some life.

Sadder were the hostelries, still identified by their signs, fallen into dilapidation, where reopening does not seem in prospect at all:

The Bald-Faced Stag in Burnt Oak (the area earlier known as Red Hill), an inn of this name, if not this building, traceable here since the early 19th century at least.

The Hollybush, Elstree, a former pub which in part dates back to the 15th century, now looked after by 'Space Sitters'.

The Rising Sun in Brownhills at least still gives its name to a roundabout. It has the distinction of Britain's oldest finger post (or actually, a replica, because the original is in a museum) standing outside.




Two very grand old inns along the road were the former White Horse in Hockcliffe and the former Four Crosses.

The old White Horse is an attractive and imposing roadside building. No sign now, but very clearly once a grand inn. It's been many things and is now a private home, and was for sale when I walked past. This is a place with real potential.

The Four Crosses, west of Cannock, just looks so 'Olde Worlde', with its 1636 date, its Latin inscription  and having had the benefit of an early 20th century restoration. Somebody must love this building enough to keep it this way.







Then there were the old inn buildings now repurposed as something different, keeping them in use, still looking a bit like an inn: The Halian Vet Centre in what was once the Red Cow, the Shifnal Cottage Indian restaurant in the former Hare & Hounds being just two examples.

I also enjoyed looking for buildings which were once inns but hardly showed it. Smockington was once a major crossroads, and very close to the site of a Roman Villa. In Ogilby's Britannia, the Hereford to Leicester road crosses Watling Street here, at a staggered junction, where Celia Fiennes, a noted 17th century traveller referred to "a little place called Smockington, fitted for inns, very commodious". Those inns were the Greyhound at Smockington Hollow where the Leicester road joins, then the Red Lion, where the road leaves towards Hereford. Harper in 1902 referred to "a hamlet in a bottom, with some reminiscences of a coaching age". That staggered junction became the junction of the A5 and A46 - but today, the long-distance traffic takes the M69, and what was once the A46 is now a minor road, B4114. Smockington is no longer a crossing-point justifying inns. The Red Lion is now just Red Lion Farm. A much modernised house at Smockington Hollow looks unconnected - but the Georgian doorway gives away its past: this must be the Greyhound. 

Inns 3: 20th Century Pubs

It wasn't really in the plan to write about something as new-fangled as the 20th century, but there were just a few attractive pieces of modern pub architecture along the way. They belong to the age of the motor-car traveller.

 Once called Turf Lodge or Turf Inn. 

 The Spreadeagle

Domino's, formerly the Buck's Head

Inns 2: Inns and Pubs Still Going Strong

Not all inns at Watling Street were coaching inns: there were far more ordinary wayside public houses where the walking or riding traveller could stop for refreshment. It's nice to see a some that are still going, essentially providing the same function.

The Waggon & Horses looks like a nice place, and says it's being going since 1471, something I'm going to try and follow up. It was before my breakfast time when I passed this one, with nobody around.



  
The Flying Fox (historically The Fox & Hounds) is part-thatched and has this quaint look about it. I stopped there for a decent enough lunch, but I suspect it is not all as old at it tries to look: there was something too contrived about its appearance; the main building is probably 19th century, and the thatched part newer.

By far the most interesting old inn that I stopped at was the Fountain Inn. Considering that this is part of a modern chain (Harvesters) and in the Milton Keynes conurbation, this was a surprising place to find such a charming place. The way it had been adapted over apparently some centuries, then tastefully modernised, keeping many of these features, lent it some authenticity which I didn't find at the Flying Fox. I had had stopped here for breakfast, and one of the kind staff who served me suggested it was 16th century - and I would not demur.

What has surprised me is that this place does not, as far as I can  see, appear in any lists of historic buildings or descriptions of architectural merit. I've been to find a little of its 20th-century story, when apparently it was a spit-and-sawdust place - perhaps why it was passed over by the likes of Pevsner?   I have found 19th century mentions of it, but nothing that enables me to go back further. I will be enquiring further.



The Old Talbot in Potterspury was another surprising find later the same day, mostly because my pre-walk research had indicated I would find a Steakhouse chain here. It has recently been taken under new management, and is now more of traditional (and busy) country pub.  





I stopped at the Crossroads in Weedon, a corner pub incorporating part of an old tollhouse (which I didn't mention under the earlier post on tollhouses). Like the Fountain, it provides dining to modern expectations, but within the context of using authentic internal features. The staff I spoke to had nothing to contribute on the place's history.

The Queens Head is another attractive old pub. I didn't go in this one - once again, wrong time of day when I passed - but I would love to have done, just to go through that front doorway.

And there were very many more attractive historic pubs which are continuing to bring in custom enough to provide a service and pay the bills. I can't list them all.

Inns 1: Some Old Coaching Inns

All along the walk of Watling Street, I had been looking out for the old inns and pubs that have served travellers along the route: those that are still doing so, and others. There are very many: I could not possibly have found every one, and even of those that I saw, I can't write about them all. This is inevitably a selection only.

This first post deals with a few coaching inns. These would once have been regular stops for the coaching routes, and are distinguished by being able to service coaches. Usually that means a wide alley through the street frontage of the inn, wide enough and high enough for a coach and horses to drive through to stables behind. There would have been adequate stabling room to provide a change of horses, with both new and old ones to be fed and watered: such spaces are often car parks now. It would also have meant bigger and better rooms, for the higher class of travellers who were able to travel by coach. Those inns that are still going may still be offering those rooms.

Stony Stratford really was the best place along Watling Street to see some fine old coaching inns, mostly with huge signs stretching over the street to advertise their presence - but I wasn't stopping off here so I did no more than appreciate their street-facing architecture (pictured: The Bull).

In Towcester, I stayed at the Sarcen's Head, once known as the Pomfret Arms. It's one of those places you see in country towns which announces that the local Rotary Club meets there once a month.  I happened to be there on that very day, which was a little unlucky for me as it meant a longer wait for my food and a very busy bar. To be fair, they did warn me of this, but with sore feet and needing time to write up my blog, I wasn't in the mood for searching out anywhere else that evening. It also has the distinction of having been mentioned in Dickens' Pickwick Papers. I suspect they're resting on their laurels a bit, hoping that will be enough to bring in the punters. The interpretation of Eggs Benedict at breakfast left much to be desired.

(I wasn't going to do hotel/food reviews here, on the grounds that I had principally selected my places to stay and eat on the sole criterion of proximity to my route, so it would be unfair to mark them on other grounds. But where I happen to have gone into a place which markets itself as an old coaching inn, and implies some quality, it seems to reasonable to say a word about them.)

The Red Lion in Atherstone is another one, distinguished by that 100-miles-to-London milestone just outside. The wide alley for coaches is now internalised, and is the bar and reception area, with a glass roof over. It's rather cleverly done, because you can see the former usage very plainly, but the space is effectively used for modern purposes. The place is themed around the Battle of Bosworth, with rooms named after various protagonists.  I suppose for most visitors that doesn't seem too far away, but for me that was two day's walking ago, so seemed a bit remote. I would stay here again.

The Bradford Arms was a lunch break for me. It stands on a residual strip of the old road at Ivetsy Bank, where a modern improvement has lowered the road in a cutting (pictured). It seems to have been a coaching inn, but doesn't have the obvious infrastructure any more. It's the equivalent of the motor age: a place you would drive to. This was a good stop-off: home-made food rather than standard pub fare, and a landlord who could tell me a bit about the place.