Tuesday 20 December: THE SARACENS HEAD, HERTFORD (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, David Room, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, John Westwood)
COMMENT: Christmas week and a big turnout braving the near-zero parking around the Saracens Head. We all made it. This was a nice small pub with a roaring fire (on the TV screen), decent pub food but a cliff edge attitude to real beer. When we arrived two of the three real ales were off. The Adnams which was still on was good, but I was on tenterhooks in case, for the first time in 50 pubs, the pub ran out of real ale while the Odyssians were in need. Well, I thought, at least it would teach the (many) latecomers to be on time. Sure enough, the Adnams did run out, but they immediately brought on Greene King IPA, so we all breathed again.
The Saracens Head is rather obviously a pub name that relates to the famous Crusades mounted by European Knights to reconquer the Holy land from the Muslims; nine crusades in all, between 1095 and 1271. (The Europeans characteristically called Arabs or Muslims "Saracens"). The name got into pubs in an oddly roundabout way. Most European noble families had members who went on crusade, including English noble families. On return from crusade, the family often incorporated a saracen's head into their coats of arms. Pub names and signs are, as we have seen before on the Odyssey, closely related to noble families and their coats of arms (think of the Red Lion and the White Hart for instance). In time the saracen's head migrated to pub names and signs in the same way as other elements from coats of arms.
All this may seem long ago and far away, but it isn't really. There are many reasons for the high degree of tension in our times, often erupting into actual violence, between many Muslims and the Western World. However, the memory of the Crusades in the Islamic world is not the least important of these reasons. The Muslims regard the Crusades, with considerable justification, as an aggressive and barbaric attack on them, their territory and their culture marked by appalling massacres and most brutal behaviour. Of course, as always happens, the Muslims in response behaved with similar brutality towards the Crusaders. Relations between the Christian West and the Islamic world, by no means always bad before the Crusades, plummeted to new depths during and after these religious wars. There is a good case for regarding the events of September 11 2001 as being just the latest round in a grim process in which the crusades provided one of the worst periods.
However, fascinating as all this is (to me at least) it has very little bearing on the Saracen's Head in Hertford. It's not an ancient pub at all, it only goes back to about 1845 when it was the tap for the long-vanished Crown Brewery, which stood behind it. In 1852 it was kept by Richard Skegg, plumber and glazier. (Glazing has a local history, Hertford Glass was close by.) Presumably someone just called the pub the Saracens Head because they liked the name! So much for history!
Tuesday, 20 December 2011
Monday, 12 December 2011
Pub Odyssey 49
Monday 12 December: THE WHITE HORSE HERTINGFORDBURY (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: The White Horse is definitely a hotel, not a pub, which was made clear to us when we had our meal and beers (fine, as usual) in a vast restaurant in which we were the only customers. If we had swept away the other empty tables we could have had a ballroom in which Andrew could have entertained us with a display of Salsa dancing. At least, he could have done if he had been on time instead of 40 minutes late as usual. Andrew being late and Roger Clarke never replying to his emails are two of the fixed points of Tewin village life and both got fully discussed along with the state of the world economy, Jeremy Clarkson's status as iconic oaf, Mike's bionic legs, and Chris Haden's future as Santa Claus.
Unsurprisingly, the White Horse was a coaching inn, a staging post on the road from Reading to Cambridge. It has a Georgian facade but bits of the building are more than 400 years old. Hertingfordbury, like Datchworth with its V1 last week, makes a contribution to the strangeness of English history, in this case a grim story. In the churchyard is the unmarked grave of Jane Wenham, often stated to be the last person sentenced to death for witchcraft in England- at a court in Hertford in 1712. Jane, fortunately, was not hanged or burned. She was reprieved and later Queen Anne gave her a pardon. It is estimated that about 35,000 people were executed for witchcraft in Europe between 1450 and 1750, over a thousand of them in Britain. Between 75-80% of the victims were women. A woman, Janet Home, was executed in Scotland as late as 1727. So Jane Wenham was lucky to escape.
COMMENT: The White Horse is definitely a hotel, not a pub, which was made clear to us when we had our meal and beers (fine, as usual) in a vast restaurant in which we were the only customers. If we had swept away the other empty tables we could have had a ballroom in which Andrew could have entertained us with a display of Salsa dancing. At least, he could have done if he had been on time instead of 40 minutes late as usual. Andrew being late and Roger Clarke never replying to his emails are two of the fixed points of Tewin village life and both got fully discussed along with the state of the world economy, Jeremy Clarkson's status as iconic oaf, Mike's bionic legs, and Chris Haden's future as Santa Claus.
Unsurprisingly, the White Horse was a coaching inn, a staging post on the road from Reading to Cambridge. It has a Georgian facade but bits of the building are more than 400 years old. Hertingfordbury, like Datchworth with its V1 last week, makes a contribution to the strangeness of English history, in this case a grim story. In the churchyard is the unmarked grave of Jane Wenham, often stated to be the last person sentenced to death for witchcraft in England- at a court in Hertford in 1712. Jane, fortunately, was not hanged or burned. She was reprieved and later Queen Anne gave her a pardon. It is estimated that about 35,000 people were executed for witchcraft in Europe between 1450 and 1750, over a thousand of them in Britain. Between 75-80% of the victims were women. A woman, Janet Home, was executed in Scotland as late as 1727. So Jane Wenham was lucky to escape.
Pub Odyssey 48
Monday 5 December: THE TILBURY, DATCHWORTH (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Chris Parkinson, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, Rupert Stanley, Jeff Tipper, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: Back at the posh end of the market at the Tilbury, but a good occasion with excellent beer and food quickly provided for a big group; but not cheap. We were honoured by a guest appearance from the deviser of the "Pub Odyssey list" of 87 pubs, Chris Parkinson, who after the labour of drawing up the list wasn't able, because of work, to come to any of the first 47 meetings! Talk about labouring for the benefit of your fellow man and not yourself!
The Tilbury website is keen to tell you how good they are (and they are good) but doesn't tell you anything about the history of the pub. The pub's site at a crossroads would normally be a sign of great antiquity as would the fact that Datchworth is on a really old road, a Roman road in fact, from St Albans to Puckeridge. However, its not so simple. There was in the eighteenth century a pub called the "Tilbury Fort" near Datchworth church- named after Queen Elizabeth I's great speech to her troops at Tilbury on the Thames in 1588 as they waited to repel the Spanish Armada. In the early nineteenth century the licence was transferred to the current site and the pub then there, called the Three Horse Shoes, was renamed the Tilbury (God knows why). In 1975, again God knows why, the name was changed to the "The Inn on the Green". Now it's gone back to being the Tilbury. All a bit of a tangle and its hard to see who gained anything from it. But be it ever so remote, the connection is with Good Queen Bess and stuffing the Spanish Armada in 1588.
Datchworth has some other entertaining historical oddities. The last enemy-action incident of any kind on British soil in the Second World War occurred in Datchworth at 9am on 29 March 1945 when a V1 flying bomb struck a nearby field.
COMMENT: Back at the posh end of the market at the Tilbury, but a good occasion with excellent beer and food quickly provided for a big group; but not cheap. We were honoured by a guest appearance from the deviser of the "Pub Odyssey list" of 87 pubs, Chris Parkinson, who after the labour of drawing up the list wasn't able, because of work, to come to any of the first 47 meetings! Talk about labouring for the benefit of your fellow man and not yourself!
The Tilbury website is keen to tell you how good they are (and they are good) but doesn't tell you anything about the history of the pub. The pub's site at a crossroads would normally be a sign of great antiquity as would the fact that Datchworth is on a really old road, a Roman road in fact, from St Albans to Puckeridge. However, its not so simple. There was in the eighteenth century a pub called the "Tilbury Fort" near Datchworth church- named after Queen Elizabeth I's great speech to her troops at Tilbury on the Thames in 1588 as they waited to repel the Spanish Armada. In the early nineteenth century the licence was transferred to the current site and the pub then there, called the Three Horse Shoes, was renamed the Tilbury (God knows why). In 1975, again God knows why, the name was changed to the "The Inn on the Green". Now it's gone back to being the Tilbury. All a bit of a tangle and its hard to see who gained anything from it. But be it ever so remote, the connection is with Good Queen Bess and stuffing the Spanish Armada in 1588.
Datchworth has some other entertaining historical oddities. The last enemy-action incident of any kind on British soil in the Second World War occurred in Datchworth at 9am on 29 March 1945 when a V1 flying bomb struck a nearby field.
Wednesday, 30 November 2011
Pub Odyssey 47
Tuesday 29 November: THE WHITE HART, HERTFORD (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, John Westwood)
COMMENT: I really like the White Hart. Its an obviously ancient pub, in an attractive central square in Hertford, Salisbury Square. The earliest reference to it I know is on 6 March 1802 when John Carrington, the Hertfordshire diarist, went there to pay for "3 Lds peas" and bought four more- another indication of the role pubs and inns played as a venue for commercial transactions in past times. But the pub is clearly much older than this. A bit puzzlingly, its described in earlier times as being in "Market Square"- whether this means it changed venue or whether Market Square was merely renamed Salisbury Square, I don't know.
However, although ancient, the White Hart has been well modernised by McMullens as a sports pub with three large screens to which I quite often cycle down to watch the football on Sky. This is a very nice experience. The pub is frequented by large numbers of Arsenal and Spurs supporters. I remember a lovely Saturday lunchtime with a game between these two north London giants, the fans, noisy and partisan, but friendly, sitting down in family groups to have lunch and watch the game. Their kids dressed in Van Persie and Gareth Bale football outfits were running around the pub in severe danger of kneecapping the the bar staff as they brought out the food. (Incidentally, not only Arsenal and Spurs. Last Sunday, Liverpool v Manchester City, there were a couple of little Luis Suarezes running about.) The staff are good fun too, friendly and helpful in my experience, on the Odyssians' visit bringing out the drinks as well as the food to our table thus saving us lazy geriatrics from even having to walk to the bar to get our beer.
COMMENT: I really like the White Hart. Its an obviously ancient pub, in an attractive central square in Hertford, Salisbury Square. The earliest reference to it I know is on 6 March 1802 when John Carrington, the Hertfordshire diarist, went there to pay for "3 Lds peas" and bought four more- another indication of the role pubs and inns played as a venue for commercial transactions in past times. But the pub is clearly much older than this. A bit puzzlingly, its described in earlier times as being in "Market Square"- whether this means it changed venue or whether Market Square was merely renamed Salisbury Square, I don't know.
However, although ancient, the White Hart has been well modernised by McMullens as a sports pub with three large screens to which I quite often cycle down to watch the football on Sky. This is a very nice experience. The pub is frequented by large numbers of Arsenal and Spurs supporters. I remember a lovely Saturday lunchtime with a game between these two north London giants, the fans, noisy and partisan, but friendly, sitting down in family groups to have lunch and watch the game. Their kids dressed in Van Persie and Gareth Bale football outfits were running around the pub in severe danger of kneecapping the the bar staff as they brought out the food. (Incidentally, not only Arsenal and Spurs. Last Sunday, Liverpool v Manchester City, there were a couple of little Luis Suarezes running about.) The staff are good fun too, friendly and helpful in my experience, on the Odyssians' visit bringing out the drinks as well as the food to our table thus saving us lazy geriatrics from even having to walk to the bar to get our beer.
Thursday, 24 November 2011
Pub Odyssey 46
Tuesday 22 November: THE NORTH STAR, near Oaklands (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, Jeff Tipper, John Westwood)
COMMENT: There is something a bit mysterious about the name of this pub The "North Star" was a famous railway engine, the first and last "Broad Gauge" engine on Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Great Western Railway. But the GWR operated many miles from Hertfordshire, why name a pub here after one of its engines? The pub itself is clearly a between-the-wars construction, built like so many then to resemble a very large commuterland house, in this case in "stockbroker Tudor" style. It would have been designed to catch either, or both, of road and rail traffic on the major arteries going north. As usual, McMullens provide very little information about the pub, but unusually for them they did provide an information gem on one of their beers, an excellent dark beer called "Pope's Porter".
This beer, according to a McMullens card beside the handpump, celebrated the only English pope, Adrian IV (ruled 1154-59). Adrian was born in Abbots Langley, Hertfordshire, with the name of Nicholas Breakspear, became a monk and eventually a successful cardinal and diplomat before being elected pope.
McMullen commented
"Adrian IV often had to deal with the troublesome Normans and reputedly sent for Hertfordshire ale to quell any uprisings. He died in 1159 choking on a fly in his wine. Should've stuck with the beer!"
It's a good story but the spoilsport Wikipedia suggests that Adrian probably died of quinsy (a complication of tonsillitis). I've also seen suggestions Adrian was poisoned, quite a likely explanation; medieval cardinals and popes were often as lethal in their political methods as medieval kings. Perhaps the tradition persists; conspiracy theories abound about the sudden death in 1977, after a reign of 33 days, of Pope John Paul I.
In all this historical guff I should have said the food and beer were good and as usual we had a good time!
COMMENT: There is something a bit mysterious about the name of this pub The "North Star" was a famous railway engine, the first and last "Broad Gauge" engine on Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Great Western Railway. But the GWR operated many miles from Hertfordshire, why name a pub here after one of its engines? The pub itself is clearly a between-the-wars construction, built like so many then to resemble a very large commuterland house, in this case in "stockbroker Tudor" style. It would have been designed to catch either, or both, of road and rail traffic on the major arteries going north. As usual, McMullens provide very little information about the pub, but unusually for them they did provide an information gem on one of their beers, an excellent dark beer called "Pope's Porter".
This beer, according to a McMullens card beside the handpump, celebrated the only English pope, Adrian IV (ruled 1154-59). Adrian was born in Abbots Langley, Hertfordshire, with the name of Nicholas Breakspear, became a monk and eventually a successful cardinal and diplomat before being elected pope.
McMullen commented
"Adrian IV often had to deal with the troublesome Normans and reputedly sent for Hertfordshire ale to quell any uprisings. He died in 1159 choking on a fly in his wine. Should've stuck with the beer!"
It's a good story but the spoilsport Wikipedia suggests that Adrian probably died of quinsy (a complication of tonsillitis). I've also seen suggestions Adrian was poisoned, quite a likely explanation; medieval cardinals and popes were often as lethal in their political methods as medieval kings. Perhaps the tradition persists; conspiracy theories abound about the sudden death in 1977, after a reign of 33 days, of Pope John Paul I.
In all this historical guff I should have said the food and beer were good and as usual we had a good time!
Wednesday, 16 November 2011
Pub Odyssey 45
Tuesday 15 November; THE BULL, WATTON AT STONE (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, David Room, Rupert Stanley, Andrew Swift, Jeff Tipper, John Westwood)
COMMENT: A big turnout for a recently renovated pub; in fact a much bigger turnout than I had expected and booked for but the pub coped well and the food and beer were good (Woodforde Wherry available, first time I had seen it on the Odyssey I think).
"The Bull" sounds the most English and agricultural of pub names but it isn't necessarily so. In fact it very likely relates to that very un-English institution, the papacy. The first "Bull" pubs, in the Middle Ages, were apparently referring to a papal bull, the lead seal attached to papal edicts (Latin bulla). Nor was this the only pub name which referred to the Pope. Any pub called the "Cross Keys" is showing a papal symbol. St Peter, the first Pope, is often shown holding the keys to the Kingdom of God. For some reason "Bulls" and "Cross Keys" survived the Protestant Reformation in England whereas a lot of pubs called "The Pope's Head" or "The Cardinal's Head" hastily changed their names to "The Kings Head" or "The Bishop's Head" to avoid unpleasant questions from the authorities.
I don't know if the "Bull" at Watton refers to religion or agriculture but my bet would be religion. The pub is another Grade II listed building which goes back to the mid-16th century and has a "priests hole" hidden behind the large fireplace (a priest's hole was a hiding place for Catholic priests in the period in the sixteenth and seventeenth century when they had to move and preach in secret in England because persecuted and indeed often tortured and executed by the Protestant government.)
COMMENT: A big turnout for a recently renovated pub; in fact a much bigger turnout than I had expected and booked for but the pub coped well and the food and beer were good (Woodforde Wherry available, first time I had seen it on the Odyssey I think).
"The Bull" sounds the most English and agricultural of pub names but it isn't necessarily so. In fact it very likely relates to that very un-English institution, the papacy. The first "Bull" pubs, in the Middle Ages, were apparently referring to a papal bull, the lead seal attached to papal edicts (Latin bulla). Nor was this the only pub name which referred to the Pope. Any pub called the "Cross Keys" is showing a papal symbol. St Peter, the first Pope, is often shown holding the keys to the Kingdom of God. For some reason "Bulls" and "Cross Keys" survived the Protestant Reformation in England whereas a lot of pubs called "The Pope's Head" or "The Cardinal's Head" hastily changed their names to "The Kings Head" or "The Bishop's Head" to avoid unpleasant questions from the authorities.
I don't know if the "Bull" at Watton refers to religion or agriculture but my bet would be religion. The pub is another Grade II listed building which goes back to the mid-16th century and has a "priests hole" hidden behind the large fireplace (a priest's hole was a hiding place for Catholic priests in the period in the sixteenth and seventeenth century when they had to move and preach in secret in England because persecuted and indeed often tortured and executed by the Protestant government.)
Pub Odyssey 44
Tuesday 8 November: THE SIX TEMPLARS, HERTFORD (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Andrew Swift, Jeff Tipper)
COMMENT: I travel fairly frequently into London so J D Wetherspoon pubs are familiar to me. I remember a few years ago, before the financial meltdown, sitting in a JDW near Liverpool Street station watching as young versions of Attila the Stockbroker (they looked about 17) came in and slapped huge wads of banknotes on the bar; the one with the smallest wad had to buy the drinks. Probably all the teenage Attilas are struggling to hang on to their jobs now. Going back to that JDW would tell me more about the progress of the recession than any number of speeches by Mr Osborne.
The Attilas may not have been very lovable (they made Lord Sugar's apprentices look like a set of Albert Schweitzers) but they certainly gave central London JDWs an atmosphere. Atmosphere was a bit lacking the the Six Templars. The food was OK, the selection of beers first class, the service good and prompt- no complaints at all really; but it was a bit like having a pub lunch in a bank. We made our own atmosphere, there being seven of us, and had a good time, but I wouldn't have called it cosy or intimate. A Wetherspoons looks its best crammed to the gunnels with people, loud, cheerful, even raucous, but in Hertford it probably doesn't get like that very often.
These are not criticisms, I think J D Wetherspoon is a Good Thing. They are great supporters of real beer and have done a lot to bring the product into the modern world. Also, for someone like me who loves the oddities and eccentricities of British life J D Wetherspoon has made a big contribution. What could be more eccentric than a pub chain founded by Tim Martin, a 6 foot 6inch Irishman-New Zealander (went to 11 schools in Ulster and New Zealand) who sports a mullet haircut and called his pub chain J D Wetherspoon after one of his teachers who couldn't control his class and told Mr Martin he would never be a success in business? You couldn't make it up. But Wetherspoons is on the side of the angels, promoting cask beer, low prices, long opening hours and no music. In 2011 they hit the £1 billion sales mark; long may it continue.
COMMENT: I travel fairly frequently into London so J D Wetherspoon pubs are familiar to me. I remember a few years ago, before the financial meltdown, sitting in a JDW near Liverpool Street station watching as young versions of Attila the Stockbroker (they looked about 17) came in and slapped huge wads of banknotes on the bar; the one with the smallest wad had to buy the drinks. Probably all the teenage Attilas are struggling to hang on to their jobs now. Going back to that JDW would tell me more about the progress of the recession than any number of speeches by Mr Osborne.
The Attilas may not have been very lovable (they made Lord Sugar's apprentices look like a set of Albert Schweitzers) but they certainly gave central London JDWs an atmosphere. Atmosphere was a bit lacking the the Six Templars. The food was OK, the selection of beers first class, the service good and prompt- no complaints at all really; but it was a bit like having a pub lunch in a bank. We made our own atmosphere, there being seven of us, and had a good time, but I wouldn't have called it cosy or intimate. A Wetherspoons looks its best crammed to the gunnels with people, loud, cheerful, even raucous, but in Hertford it probably doesn't get like that very often.
These are not criticisms, I think J D Wetherspoon is a Good Thing. They are great supporters of real beer and have done a lot to bring the product into the modern world. Also, for someone like me who loves the oddities and eccentricities of British life J D Wetherspoon has made a big contribution. What could be more eccentric than a pub chain founded by Tim Martin, a 6 foot 6inch Irishman-New Zealander (went to 11 schools in Ulster and New Zealand) who sports a mullet haircut and called his pub chain J D Wetherspoon after one of his teachers who couldn't control his class and told Mr Martin he would never be a success in business? You couldn't make it up. But Wetherspoons is on the side of the angels, promoting cask beer, low prices, long opening hours and no music. In 2011 they hit the £1 billion sales mark; long may it continue.
Wednesday, 2 November 2011
Pub Odyssey 43
Tuesday, 1 November: OLD CROSS, HERTFORD (Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, JohnWestwood)
COMMENT: This super pub provided a really nice, and really cheap, occasion. £9 each for a total of two pints each plus as many sandwiches as anyone could want to eat! Normally the Old Cross doesn't provide food, at Tuesday lunchtime anyway, but through the good offices of John Westwood the landlord provided the sandwiches.
I thought the Old Cross was terrific. It represents one branch of the great real beer movement, beginning in the 1970s when the British public rose in revolt against crap like Double Diamond and Watneys Red Barrel and demanded proper beer, made in the correct way and properly presented. The success of this movement, fronted of course by CAMRA (the Campaign for Real Ale), has been amazing. Nowadays "real beer" is defined pretty much as CAMRA wants (the ultimate marketing triumph, all other not-approved products are by definition non-real or inferior); The total number of breweries is four times what it was when CAMRA was founded in 1971 and more since any time since the 1940s. Although pubs face tremendous challenges in the recession and are faced by predatory government taxation, real beer sales have held up much better than other forms of alcoholic purchases. The strength of the real beer movement is demonstrated in many ways; craft-type pubs like the Old Cross; big commercial operations like J D Wetherspoons (our next week visit); huge festivals, attended by tens of thousands, like the Great British Beer Festival or the Cambridge Beer Festival; but above all by the fact that nearly all pubs seem to have real ale on offer. There is a lot about CAMRA I don't go for, although I have been a member for decades, my reservations being succinctly summed up by the beer writer Pete Brown when he said that stereotypical CAMRA activists were "bearded, beer-bellied, wear chunky sweaters or tight,stained T-shirts, are pedantic, Luddite and have difficulties relating to girls". Having said all that, we owe them a lot.
And the Old Cross was great. As I stood watching them brewing their own beer in a back room before stepping back into the bare but pleasant parlour to drink it at £2.20 a pint I knew I was in the right place.
COMMENT: This super pub provided a really nice, and really cheap, occasion. £9 each for a total of two pints each plus as many sandwiches as anyone could want to eat! Normally the Old Cross doesn't provide food, at Tuesday lunchtime anyway, but through the good offices of John Westwood the landlord provided the sandwiches.
I thought the Old Cross was terrific. It represents one branch of the great real beer movement, beginning in the 1970s when the British public rose in revolt against crap like Double Diamond and Watneys Red Barrel and demanded proper beer, made in the correct way and properly presented. The success of this movement, fronted of course by CAMRA (the Campaign for Real Ale), has been amazing. Nowadays "real beer" is defined pretty much as CAMRA wants (the ultimate marketing triumph, all other not-approved products are by definition non-real or inferior); The total number of breweries is four times what it was when CAMRA was founded in 1971 and more since any time since the 1940s. Although pubs face tremendous challenges in the recession and are faced by predatory government taxation, real beer sales have held up much better than other forms of alcoholic purchases. The strength of the real beer movement is demonstrated in many ways; craft-type pubs like the Old Cross; big commercial operations like J D Wetherspoons (our next week visit); huge festivals, attended by tens of thousands, like the Great British Beer Festival or the Cambridge Beer Festival; but above all by the fact that nearly all pubs seem to have real ale on offer. There is a lot about CAMRA I don't go for, although I have been a member for decades, my reservations being succinctly summed up by the beer writer Pete Brown when he said that stereotypical CAMRA activists were "bearded, beer-bellied, wear chunky sweaters or tight,stained T-shirts, are pedantic, Luddite and have difficulties relating to girls". Having said all that, we owe them a lot.
And the Old Cross was great. As I stood watching them brewing their own beer in a back room before stepping back into the bare but pleasant parlour to drink it at £2.20 a pint I knew I was in the right place.
Pub Odyssey 42
Tuesday 25 October: THE MILLSTREAM, HERTFORD (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Rupert Stanley, John Westwood)
COMMENT: The Millstream was a real find, a nice little pub with an attractive conservatory and a well-kept garden behind it, friendly helpful staff and good food and drink. It's a bit of a surprise because in an obscure blocked-off road in the Hertford suburbs you might think it might struggle for custom, but the landlandy said that in summer the attractions of the conservatory, garden, food and drink meant that it was safer to book if you were coming at lunchtime. That's good news, but it might not square with the fact that when we were there, admittedly in late October, I saw only one other customer, a somewhat somnolent Dormouse-type character (I'm still reading Alice in Wonderland) at the other end of the bar. We had a good time anyway.
The Millsteam, sometimes called the Old Millstream, is another pub about which it's difficult to get any historical information. McMullens seem less good than many other operators in providing this. It's probably a nineteenth-century pub, which seems to have changed both its name and location in Port Vale in the 1880s and 1890s (for a while it may have been called the Old Windmill). The names given to the pub are a clear indication of the rural nature of the area at that time.
COMMENT: The Millstream was a real find, a nice little pub with an attractive conservatory and a well-kept garden behind it, friendly helpful staff and good food and drink. It's a bit of a surprise because in an obscure blocked-off road in the Hertford suburbs you might think it might struggle for custom, but the landlandy said that in summer the attractions of the conservatory, garden, food and drink meant that it was safer to book if you were coming at lunchtime. That's good news, but it might not square with the fact that when we were there, admittedly in late October, I saw only one other customer, a somewhat somnolent Dormouse-type character (I'm still reading Alice in Wonderland) at the other end of the bar. We had a good time anyway.
The Millsteam, sometimes called the Old Millstream, is another pub about which it's difficult to get any historical information. McMullens seem less good than many other operators in providing this. It's probably a nineteenth-century pub, which seems to have changed both its name and location in Port Vale in the 1880s and 1890s (for a while it may have been called the Old Windmill). The names given to the pub are a clear indication of the rural nature of the area at that time.
Pub Odyssey 41
Tuesday 18 October: THE CHEQUERS, BRAGBURY END (Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, and a Ferrari)
COMMENT: The usual suspects were in the USA, Crete, Cyprus, etc, etc, and this meeting was the smallest yet- in fact it couldn't have been any smaller and still been a meeting. However, it was in a way a historic occasion because Andrew gave Elvis a lift there in his Ferrari, more than 25 years after Elvis won the right to a lift at a function at Tewin Cowper School. Does it seem in character for Andrew to forget and Elvis to remember over a quarter of a century?
Elvis said the ride was quite an experience and I know what he means, many years ago I had a ride in the Ferrari myself. I happen at the moment to be reading "Alice in Wonderland" and it struck me that reading the book was a bit like a ride in the Ferrari, an experience combining in about equal quantities surreal humour, wonder and terror. The original working title for "Alice in Wonderland" was "Alice's Adventures Underground" and you felt that the Ferrari, seeming one inch above the ground, and miles below the hedgerows, might have been an ideal travel vehicle for Alice. The only travel experience in Tewin that compares with Andrew's Ferrari is Rupert's balloon where instead of being propelled semi-underground at terrific speeds you are launched into the atmosphere in a luncheon basket. You never thought living in commuterland could be so stimulating
The Chequers at Bragbury End dates back to 1774 when it was a farmhouse on a 40 acre farm which included a slaughterhouse. The farm was taken over by a St Albans brewer in 1820 but the Chequers was only granted a full licence in 1919. It's another grade II listed building.
COMMENT: The usual suspects were in the USA, Crete, Cyprus, etc, etc, and this meeting was the smallest yet- in fact it couldn't have been any smaller and still been a meeting. However, it was in a way a historic occasion because Andrew gave Elvis a lift there in his Ferrari, more than 25 years after Elvis won the right to a lift at a function at Tewin Cowper School. Does it seem in character for Andrew to forget and Elvis to remember over a quarter of a century?
Elvis said the ride was quite an experience and I know what he means, many years ago I had a ride in the Ferrari myself. I happen at the moment to be reading "Alice in Wonderland" and it struck me that reading the book was a bit like a ride in the Ferrari, an experience combining in about equal quantities surreal humour, wonder and terror. The original working title for "Alice in Wonderland" was "Alice's Adventures Underground" and you felt that the Ferrari, seeming one inch above the ground, and miles below the hedgerows, might have been an ideal travel vehicle for Alice. The only travel experience in Tewin that compares with Andrew's Ferrari is Rupert's balloon where instead of being propelled semi-underground at terrific speeds you are launched into the atmosphere in a luncheon basket. You never thought living in commuterland could be so stimulating
The Chequers at Bragbury End dates back to 1774 when it was a farmhouse on a 40 acre farm which included a slaughterhouse. The farm was taken over by a St Albans brewer in 1820 but the Chequers was only granted a full licence in 1919. It's another grade II listed building.
Thursday, 13 October 2011
Pub Odyssey 40
Tuesday 11 October: THE WOODHALL ARMS PAPILLON, STAPLEFORD (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman,Elvis Pile, David Room, Rupert Stanley, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: This was a nice meal in a pub which managed more successfully than many to combine restaurant and pub, and did this by keeping them physically separate. The pub side really felt like a pub. The beer was good too. It is, however, a difficult place to say anything about historically because nothing much is recorded. Stapleford is little more than a hamlet and all I can find out about the Woodhall Arms is the fact, hardly surprising, that it had a recorded nineteenth century existence. However, by complete coincidence I had lunch the next day with a lady who was brought up in Stapleford before and during the Second World War. She said, again unsurprisingly, that Stapleford was even smaller then but she added what was to me a genuinely surprising fact. This was that in those days the Beane River which flows past Stapleford was a famous salmon river with access much sought after. Now, of course, the Beane is barely more than a ditch, the reason being the pumping of water to supply the needs of (she thought) Stevenage and Harlow. Its another story which emphasises how agricultural a county Hertfordshire was even up to the Second World War, and how much the new towns changed all that.
The Woodhall Arms is obviously named after the Woodhall estate,owned by the Abel Smith family for many generations, and still at the same size, 7,000 acres, it has been for many years. The Woodhall estate like everywhere else of substance in England reflects some facets of England's astonishing history. The big house, now Heath Mount School, was built by Indian nabobs (that is English merchants who made it big in the early years of British rule in India), the park landscaping is a classic 18th century effort, the walled garden was built by prisoners of war in the Napoleonic Wars, and the great Victorian architect and gardener, Sir Joseph Paxton, builder of the Crystal Palace, got his start working in the kitchen gardens of the Woodhall Estate.
COMMENT: This was a nice meal in a pub which managed more successfully than many to combine restaurant and pub, and did this by keeping them physically separate. The pub side really felt like a pub. The beer was good too. It is, however, a difficult place to say anything about historically because nothing much is recorded. Stapleford is little more than a hamlet and all I can find out about the Woodhall Arms is the fact, hardly surprising, that it had a recorded nineteenth century existence. However, by complete coincidence I had lunch the next day with a lady who was brought up in Stapleford before and during the Second World War. She said, again unsurprisingly, that Stapleford was even smaller then but she added what was to me a genuinely surprising fact. This was that in those days the Beane River which flows past Stapleford was a famous salmon river with access much sought after. Now, of course, the Beane is barely more than a ditch, the reason being the pumping of water to supply the needs of (she thought) Stevenage and Harlow. Its another story which emphasises how agricultural a county Hertfordshire was even up to the Second World War, and how much the new towns changed all that.
The Woodhall Arms is obviously named after the Woodhall estate,owned by the Abel Smith family for many generations, and still at the same size, 7,000 acres, it has been for many years. The Woodhall estate like everywhere else of substance in England reflects some facets of England's astonishing history. The big house, now Heath Mount School, was built by Indian nabobs (that is English merchants who made it big in the early years of British rule in India), the park landscaping is a classic 18th century effort, the walled garden was built by prisoners of war in the Napoleonic Wars, and the great Victorian architect and gardener, Sir Joseph Paxton, builder of the Crystal Palace, got his start working in the kitchen gardens of the Woodhall Estate.
Thursday, 6 October 2011
Pub Odyssey 39
Thursday 6 October: THE WELLINGTON, WELWYN VILLAGE (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: "The Wellington is not a pub" said Elvis, and as usual the Sage of Tewin was quite right. The food was fine, the beer was fine- though neither of them was cheap- so it met the requirement and obviously the Wellington's formula works; it was quite busy on a midweek lunchtime with a mixed clientele of all ages from pram-propelled to zimmer-propelled. Anything that does the business and provides proper beer decently presented is fine by me, so I have no complaints, but the Wellington does seem to me to have a very bad case of split personality.
The Wellington is keen to emphasise its long pub history. Outside, painted on the wall, is the following
INN
WELLINGTON
VILLAGE PUB DINING
AD 1352
and there is also a plaque informing you that such famous English types as Samuel Peyps (1633-1703, diarist and omni-shagger), Dr Samuel Johnson (1709-1784, lexicographer and Tory) and David Garrick (1717-1779, actor) stayed there. The plaque also gives you the information that until 1816 it was called the White Swan; obviously the name was changed to celebrate the Duke of Wellington's defeat of the snail-chewing French rascal Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
So far so English, but the split personality arises when you go inside.You might get the impression the snail-chewers had actually won at Waterloo because the place much more closely resembles a French wine bar than an English pub; hence Elvis's point. Well, the beer and food were OK.
However, the fact that the pub/wine bar is named after Wellington (and his boot hangs outside as well) gives me a chance to pay tribute to this very great man who not only put the frogs in their place but also played a big role in the promotion of English beer. This happened as follows. Not everyone knows that the hero of Waterloo later served as a generally unpopular Prime Minister (1828-30) but one whose administration nonetheless had important achievements including the creation of the Metropolitan Police, Catholic Emancipation, and the Beer Act. The Beer Act was the product of the ruthless logic which had made the Iron Duke such a formidable opponent on the battlefield. England was suffering from an epidemic of gin-drinking, very destructive of health prosperity and even life. ("Drunk for a penny, dead drunk for twopence"). The Iron Duke reasoned that banning gin wouldn't work; you had to provide people with a healthier alcoholic alternative. So the Beer Act allowed anybody to brew and sell beer on their premises if they got a licence which only cost £2. Ten years after the act had passed, 50,000 new beer houses had opened! And it did do something to reduce the gin problem. So raise your next pint to that unusual phenomenon, a politician who made drinking easier and cheaper. Messrs Cameron and Osborne are, of course, quite the reverse.
COMMENT: "The Wellington is not a pub" said Elvis, and as usual the Sage of Tewin was quite right. The food was fine, the beer was fine- though neither of them was cheap- so it met the requirement and obviously the Wellington's formula works; it was quite busy on a midweek lunchtime with a mixed clientele of all ages from pram-propelled to zimmer-propelled. Anything that does the business and provides proper beer decently presented is fine by me, so I have no complaints, but the Wellington does seem to me to have a very bad case of split personality.
The Wellington is keen to emphasise its long pub history. Outside, painted on the wall, is the following
INN
WELLINGTON
VILLAGE PUB DINING
AD 1352
and there is also a plaque informing you that such famous English types as Samuel Peyps (1633-1703, diarist and omni-shagger), Dr Samuel Johnson (1709-1784, lexicographer and Tory) and David Garrick (1717-1779, actor) stayed there. The plaque also gives you the information that until 1816 it was called the White Swan; obviously the name was changed to celebrate the Duke of Wellington's defeat of the snail-chewing French rascal Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
So far so English, but the split personality arises when you go inside.You might get the impression the snail-chewers had actually won at Waterloo because the place much more closely resembles a French wine bar than an English pub; hence Elvis's point. Well, the beer and food were OK.
However, the fact that the pub/wine bar is named after Wellington (and his boot hangs outside as well) gives me a chance to pay tribute to this very great man who not only put the frogs in their place but also played a big role in the promotion of English beer. This happened as follows. Not everyone knows that the hero of Waterloo later served as a generally unpopular Prime Minister (1828-30) but one whose administration nonetheless had important achievements including the creation of the Metropolitan Police, Catholic Emancipation, and the Beer Act. The Beer Act was the product of the ruthless logic which had made the Iron Duke such a formidable opponent on the battlefield. England was suffering from an epidemic of gin-drinking, very destructive of health prosperity and even life. ("Drunk for a penny, dead drunk for twopence"). The Iron Duke reasoned that banning gin wouldn't work; you had to provide people with a healthier alcoholic alternative. So the Beer Act allowed anybody to brew and sell beer on their premises if they got a licence which only cost £2. Ten years after the act had passed, 50,000 new beer houses had opened! And it did do something to reduce the gin problem. So raise your next pint to that unusual phenomenon, a politician who made drinking easier and cheaper. Messrs Cameron and Osborne are, of course, quite the reverse.
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Pub Odyssey 38
Tuesday 27 September: THE SALISBURY ARMS, HERTFORD (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy)
COMMENT: The Salisbury Arms,built in 1570, was known as "The Bell" till 1800 when its name changed to the Salisbury Arms. This information is given in a sign on the outside wall, causing Joanne Allen, when she saw it, to ask who needed to know? One can see Joanne's point, customers last here before 1800 who might be confused by the change of name must now be in short supply. Inside the pub (where the food and beer were as usual fine) the clientele did strike me as elderly, at 62 I felt quite a youngster, but I really don't think any of the other customers were more than 200 years old.
The change of name in 1800 was obviously a bit of forelock-tugging towards the grandest of local grandees, the Marquesses of Salisbury, who lived at Hatfield House but owned Hertford Castle and a lot else besides. They were of course Tories and it's no surprise that in the1832 election, when the Tories fought a futile rearguard battle against Parliamentary Reform, the Salisbury Arms was their HQ (pubs and inns were often election HQs in pre-modern elections). Needless to say the result of the 1832 election in Hertford was declared null and void because of bribery and corruption.
COMMENT: The Salisbury Arms,built in 1570, was known as "The Bell" till 1800 when its name changed to the Salisbury Arms. This information is given in a sign on the outside wall, causing Joanne Allen, when she saw it, to ask who needed to know? One can see Joanne's point, customers last here before 1800 who might be confused by the change of name must now be in short supply. Inside the pub (where the food and beer were as usual fine) the clientele did strike me as elderly, at 62 I felt quite a youngster, but I really don't think any of the other customers were more than 200 years old.
The change of name in 1800 was obviously a bit of forelock-tugging towards the grandest of local grandees, the Marquesses of Salisbury, who lived at Hatfield House but owned Hertford Castle and a lot else besides. They were of course Tories and it's no surprise that in the1832 election, when the Tories fought a futile rearguard battle against Parliamentary Reform, the Salisbury Arms was their HQ (pubs and inns were often election HQs in pre-modern elections). Needless to say the result of the 1832 election in Hertford was declared null and void because of bribery and corruption.
Pub Odyssey 37
Tuesday 20 September: THE FOX, WOOLMER GREEN (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: I missed this one, cycling with Anne and Andrew in Croatia. A good time was reported to be had by the attendees. I've managed to miss the Fox at Woolmer Green on each of our visits in 2010 and 2011 and am miserably without an idea of what to say about it. However, I can say that while "The Fox" is a pub name that has been in existence since the late fifteenth century its a little unusual to have an unembellished Fox. Embellished foxy pubs includes a Hungry Fox, a Crafty Fox, a Running Fox, a Lazy Fox, a Wily Fox, a Red Fox, a Blue Fox (?), a Fox on the Hill, a Fox and Cubs, a Fox and Rabbit, a Fox and Covert, and, best of all, a Snooty Fox.
PS [added 13 October] We visited this pub too early. If we had gone in October rather than September I could have added new possible variants on the Fox theme: the "Fox and Werritty", the "Hounded Fox", the "Fox Goes to Ground", etc etc. The possibilities are endless. But life is full of missed opportunities.
COMMENT: I missed this one, cycling with Anne and Andrew in Croatia. A good time was reported to be had by the attendees. I've managed to miss the Fox at Woolmer Green on each of our visits in 2010 and 2011 and am miserably without an idea of what to say about it. However, I can say that while "The Fox" is a pub name that has been in existence since the late fifteenth century its a little unusual to have an unembellished Fox. Embellished foxy pubs includes a Hungry Fox, a Crafty Fox, a Running Fox, a Lazy Fox, a Wily Fox, a Red Fox, a Blue Fox (?), a Fox on the Hill, a Fox and Cubs, a Fox and Rabbit, a Fox and Covert, and, best of all, a Snooty Fox.
PS [added 13 October] We visited this pub too early. If we had gone in October rather than September I could have added new possible variants on the Fox theme: the "Fox and Werritty", the "Hounded Fox", the "Fox Goes to Ground", etc etc. The possibilities are endless. But life is full of missed opportunities.
Wednesday, 28 September 2011
Pub Odyssey 36
Tuesday 13 September: THE ROEBUCK, STEVENAGE followed by TOBY CARVERY, STEVENAGE (Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, John Westwood)
COMMENT: A double header! This was due to inefficiency by the leader, initials MH, who omitted to check that lunch was actually served at the Roebuck. It wasn't- only evening meals there. For the first time on the Odyssey I had a definite impression, I hope mistaken, of a pub on its last legs. A lot of the surrounding buildings have been turned into a nursing home and what we saw of a historic inn was a hotel reception which we walked through to get to the bar and a smallish semi-connected pub area. The receptionist saw us come in and dashed across to get us a drink. It's all rather sad for an inn founded in 1691, with sixteenth century buildings, patronised in its day by celebrity highwaymen like Dick Turpin, and described in 1874 as "an old fashioned roadside public house, containing bar, tap, parlour, kitchen, six chambers and attic, with stabling buildings, cow house, skittle alley and wood barn". Not much of all that left now.
We needed lunch so asked the receptionist/barmaid what to do and she recommended the Toby Carvery which is 50 yards away across the road. We all arrived soaking as a cloud helpfully burst at just the wrong moment but once we got into the Toby Carvery things looked up. Although I suspect CAMRA regard such places as instruments of the devil, it was in fact excellent fun. We solemnly queued up for our carvery, which was excellent and cheap, and the beer was good too (mine was London Pride). The place was quite full and everyone was having a good time, kids included. The clientele included a lady who knew me from other activities and who told me when I saw her a few days later that she had seen me in the Carvery with a collection of noisy geriatric delinquents (well, we were talking and laughing quite loudly). I said I only went out with them to rehabilitate them.
COMMENT: A double header! This was due to inefficiency by the leader, initials MH, who omitted to check that lunch was actually served at the Roebuck. It wasn't- only evening meals there. For the first time on the Odyssey I had a definite impression, I hope mistaken, of a pub on its last legs. A lot of the surrounding buildings have been turned into a nursing home and what we saw of a historic inn was a hotel reception which we walked through to get to the bar and a smallish semi-connected pub area. The receptionist saw us come in and dashed across to get us a drink. It's all rather sad for an inn founded in 1691, with sixteenth century buildings, patronised in its day by celebrity highwaymen like Dick Turpin, and described in 1874 as "an old fashioned roadside public house, containing bar, tap, parlour, kitchen, six chambers and attic, with stabling buildings, cow house, skittle alley and wood barn". Not much of all that left now.
We needed lunch so asked the receptionist/barmaid what to do and she recommended the Toby Carvery which is 50 yards away across the road. We all arrived soaking as a cloud helpfully burst at just the wrong moment but once we got into the Toby Carvery things looked up. Although I suspect CAMRA regard such places as instruments of the devil, it was in fact excellent fun. We solemnly queued up for our carvery, which was excellent and cheap, and the beer was good too (mine was London Pride). The place was quite full and everyone was having a good time, kids included. The clientele included a lady who knew me from other activities and who told me when I saw her a few days later that she had seen me in the Carvery with a collection of noisy geriatric delinquents (well, we were talking and laughing quite loudly). I said I only went out with them to rehabilitate them.
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
Pub Odyssey 35
Tuesday 6 September: THE CROOKED CHIMNEY, near Lemsford (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: This is a big rambling pub with low ceilings (Andrew had to watch out) and endless nooks and crannies. We found a nook or cranny (what's the difference between a nook and a cranny?) with very comfortable armchairs in a corner of the pub; the staff were on the ball, someone found us very quickly, hidden though we were, and the food, once again good and very cheap, came along without delay. It was a very wet day and we had all driven there so I was limited to half a pint which was a pity because the beer seemed to me excellent.
The building was originally a farmhouse called Hornbeam Hall. Use as an inn dates back to 1756 when it was called the Chequers. It remained the Chequers till as recently as 1968 when it was renamed the Crooked Chimney after its distinctive L-shaped brick chimney (though apparently the pub had been known informally by that name for many years). Renaming pubs is not just a modern "Slug and Lettuce" type craze; its been done at all eras for all sorts of reasons. There are more pubs named after Lord Nelson than any other person, but they were mostly not "new builds" but old pubs renamed after his great victory at Trafalger in 1805..
COMMENT: This is a big rambling pub with low ceilings (Andrew had to watch out) and endless nooks and crannies. We found a nook or cranny (what's the difference between a nook and a cranny?) with very comfortable armchairs in a corner of the pub; the staff were on the ball, someone found us very quickly, hidden though we were, and the food, once again good and very cheap, came along without delay. It was a very wet day and we had all driven there so I was limited to half a pint which was a pity because the beer seemed to me excellent.
The building was originally a farmhouse called Hornbeam Hall. Use as an inn dates back to 1756 when it was called the Chequers. It remained the Chequers till as recently as 1968 when it was renamed the Crooked Chimney after its distinctive L-shaped brick chimney (though apparently the pub had been known informally by that name for many years). Renaming pubs is not just a modern "Slug and Lettuce" type craze; its been done at all eras for all sorts of reasons. There are more pubs named after Lord Nelson than any other person, but they were mostly not "new builds" but old pubs renamed after his great victory at Trafalger in 1805..
Pub Odyssey 34
Wednesday 31 August: EIGHT BELLS, OLD HATFIELD: (Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: This pub is a picturesque place in Old Hatfield. (Old Hatfield retains charm and architectural interest. The more modern part part of Hatfield is a grim example of the horrors of twentieth-century urban planning. If you wanted an example proving that a post-1945 town planner is best defined as a man who can spoil a field, look at Hatfield.) We enjoyed the pub. The food was fine and very cheap, the beer fine, the barmaid nice and interactive. So the visit was a success, which was a relief because the Eight Bells is in literary and historical terms one of the most interesting in Hertfordshire. I wanted the pub to be good!
The "Victorian Web" website says it was built in 1226, which if true makes it the oldest building thus far. The pub is from about 1630, another coaching inn right on the Great North Road which ran along Fore Street, beside the pub, till 1850 when the GNR was re-routed with the arrival of the railway. The pub was associated with the notorious highwayman, Dick Turpin, in the 18th century. It seems to have suffered from "name inflation"; a map of 1760 describes it as the "One Bell"; later it was the "Five Bells"; later still the "Eight Bells" when the gloomy but impressive local church, St Etheldreda, got a peal of eight bells.
But the pub's main claim to fame relates to a man who never existed except in a novel, but is a bandit even more famous than Dick Turpin; the burglar Bill Sikes. Sikes, as everyone knows, is a key character in one of the most famous novels in the English language, "Oliver Twist", by our old friend and drinking companion, Charles Dickens (see Pub Odyssey 14 ). Dickens stayed at the Eight Bells on 27 January 1838 and used it in the novel. After murdering Nancy in London, Sikes, fleeing the authorities, walks the 20 miles to what was then the small village of Hatfield and has an encounter in the pub with a crazy local character who sees bloodstains in Sikes' hat, after which Sikes flees back to London and eventual death. Dickens was good at using local material in his novels. Earlier, in 1835, when he was only 23 and making a living as a reporter, he had visited Hatfield to report on a big fire at Hatfield House in which the Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury, aged 85, burned to death. The Hatfield House fire also features in "Oliver Twist".
COMMENT: This pub is a picturesque place in Old Hatfield. (Old Hatfield retains charm and architectural interest. The more modern part part of Hatfield is a grim example of the horrors of twentieth-century urban planning. If you wanted an example proving that a post-1945 town planner is best defined as a man who can spoil a field, look at Hatfield.) We enjoyed the pub. The food was fine and very cheap, the beer fine, the barmaid nice and interactive. So the visit was a success, which was a relief because the Eight Bells is in literary and historical terms one of the most interesting in Hertfordshire. I wanted the pub to be good!
The "Victorian Web" website says it was built in 1226, which if true makes it the oldest building thus far. The pub is from about 1630, another coaching inn right on the Great North Road which ran along Fore Street, beside the pub, till 1850 when the GNR was re-routed with the arrival of the railway. The pub was associated with the notorious highwayman, Dick Turpin, in the 18th century. It seems to have suffered from "name inflation"; a map of 1760 describes it as the "One Bell"; later it was the "Five Bells"; later still the "Eight Bells" when the gloomy but impressive local church, St Etheldreda, got a peal of eight bells.
But the pub's main claim to fame relates to a man who never existed except in a novel, but is a bandit even more famous than Dick Turpin; the burglar Bill Sikes. Sikes, as everyone knows, is a key character in one of the most famous novels in the English language, "Oliver Twist", by our old friend and drinking companion, Charles Dickens (see Pub Odyssey 14 ). Dickens stayed at the Eight Bells on 27 January 1838 and used it in the novel. After murdering Nancy in London, Sikes, fleeing the authorities, walks the 20 miles to what was then the small village of Hatfield and has an encounter in the pub with a crazy local character who sees bloodstains in Sikes' hat, after which Sikes flees back to London and eventual death. Dickens was good at using local material in his novels. Earlier, in 1835, when he was only 23 and making a living as a reporter, he had visited Hatfield to report on a big fire at Hatfield House in which the Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury, aged 85, burned to death. The Hatfield House fire also features in "Oliver Twist".
Friday, 26 August 2011
Pub Odyssey 33
Wednesday 24 August: THE WHITE HART, WELWYN VILLAGE (Chris Haden, Gerry Murphy, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: I missed this one, cycling in the Yorkshire Dales with Anne (very nice pubs there too). The White Hart was the emblem of King Richard II (1377-99), therefore yet another royal emblem like the Rose and Crown, the Plume of Feathers, the Sun, etc etc. The White Hart is a very common pub name, therefore suggesting that King Richard II was more successful as provider of pub nomenclature than he was as a ruler. He lost out in a medieval power struggle, was deposed and starved to death in Pontefract Castle by his successor, King Henry IV. You didn't want to be the loser in medieval cabinet reshuffles. Apart from Richard II, King William II (1087-1100) may well have been assassinated at the instigation of his brother and successor Henry I; King Edward II (1307-27) was murdered by his wife and her lover (red hot poker up anus); King Henry VI (1415-71) was rubbed out by his cousins Edward IV and Richard Duke of Gloucester; and the boy king Edward V (1485) and his brother were assassinated (smothered with pillows) by the order of their uncle, the same Duke of Gloucester, later Richard III.
Not having been at the White Hart, I've nothing to say about it, so this seems a good moment for a short essay on beer consumption. Beer plays an important role in all our lives, but its nothing compared with the role it played in the lives of our ancestors. Water was unhealthy and dangerous in all periods until quite close to the end of the nineteenth century, being the carrier of many diseases, whereas beer was nutritious and also healthier inasmuch as the boiling would have destroyed the waterborne bacteria. Strength and quantities varied widely but a typical daily intake for most people would have been a gallon; two pints for breakfast, a pint mid-morning, two pints with the midday meal, another pint at at 4pm and the remaining two pints after work. All medieval castles and palaces, and all substantial houses in later periods, would have had their own brewhouses. In fact, the word "toddler" is thought to derive from a "tod", a drinking vessel with handles from which a child would have drunk "small beer" as soon as it left its mother's breast.
Can we reach the standards of our ancestors? We do our bit but I fear these standards are beyond us..
COMMENT: I missed this one, cycling in the Yorkshire Dales with Anne (very nice pubs there too). The White Hart was the emblem of King Richard II (1377-99), therefore yet another royal emblem like the Rose and Crown, the Plume of Feathers, the Sun, etc etc. The White Hart is a very common pub name, therefore suggesting that King Richard II was more successful as provider of pub nomenclature than he was as a ruler. He lost out in a medieval power struggle, was deposed and starved to death in Pontefract Castle by his successor, King Henry IV. You didn't want to be the loser in medieval cabinet reshuffles. Apart from Richard II, King William II (1087-1100) may well have been assassinated at the instigation of his brother and successor Henry I; King Edward II (1307-27) was murdered by his wife and her lover (red hot poker up anus); King Henry VI (1415-71) was rubbed out by his cousins Edward IV and Richard Duke of Gloucester; and the boy king Edward V (1485) and his brother were assassinated (smothered with pillows) by the order of their uncle, the same Duke of Gloucester, later Richard III.
Not having been at the White Hart, I've nothing to say about it, so this seems a good moment for a short essay on beer consumption. Beer plays an important role in all our lives, but its nothing compared with the role it played in the lives of our ancestors. Water was unhealthy and dangerous in all periods until quite close to the end of the nineteenth century, being the carrier of many diseases, whereas beer was nutritious and also healthier inasmuch as the boiling would have destroyed the waterborne bacteria. Strength and quantities varied widely but a typical daily intake for most people would have been a gallon; two pints for breakfast, a pint mid-morning, two pints with the midday meal, another pint at at 4pm and the remaining two pints after work. All medieval castles and palaces, and all substantial houses in later periods, would have had their own brewhouses. In fact, the word "toddler" is thought to derive from a "tod", a drinking vessel with handles from which a child would have drunk "small beer" as soon as it left its mother's breast.
Can we reach the standards of our ancestors? We do our bit but I fear these standards are beyond us..
Pub Odyssey 32
Tuesday 16 August: THE FIVE HORSESHOES, LITTLE BERKHAMPSTED (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile)
COMMENT: A barebones turnout with Malcolm in America, Steve in Ireland, Andrew in Austria, Roger and David away at foreign venues unknown to me; the baby boomers booming you might say. The low turnout was a pity because the Five Horseshoes was a good location; a lovely old rambling building (grade II listed, late 16th or early 17th century, extended and remodelled in the 19th century) with good cheap food, good beer and friendly helpful rapid service. Probably CAMRA would have turned its nose up at the Five Horseshoes because it is a chain pub belonging to the Chef and Brewer organisation. This, in my view, is just beer snobbery; if the beer is OK, the surroundings attractive and the food good and reasonably priced, who cares? But in a way I do see what CAMRA means. By complete coincidence a few days later Anne and I, walking the Thames Path, happened on a very nice pub called the Kings Arms at Sandford Lock near to Oxford. We stopped and ate there and had nice competitively priced food, I had good beer, the pub was in (you guessed it) a lovely rambling old building. Chef and Brewer again! The same menu exactly, the same offers exactly, even the same literary quotes on the menus. The only thing that was different was the staff, just as friendly and attentive, but mercifully not the same people. Otherwise you might have got the impression that when my back was turned they had hastily dismantled the Five Horseshoes and rapidly put it up again on the Thames waiting for me to arrive. So pubcos do imply a certain lack of diversity. But if its good quality, why worry?
So I enjoyed the Five Horseshoes. The only downer was those buggers Haden and Pile tooting me from behind as they cruised in their car up Robins Nest Hill to Little Berkhamsted while I laboured up on my bike. Experiences like that set the mark of suffering on a man.
COMMENT: A barebones turnout with Malcolm in America, Steve in Ireland, Andrew in Austria, Roger and David away at foreign venues unknown to me; the baby boomers booming you might say. The low turnout was a pity because the Five Horseshoes was a good location; a lovely old rambling building (grade II listed, late 16th or early 17th century, extended and remodelled in the 19th century) with good cheap food, good beer and friendly helpful rapid service. Probably CAMRA would have turned its nose up at the Five Horseshoes because it is a chain pub belonging to the Chef and Brewer organisation. This, in my view, is just beer snobbery; if the beer is OK, the surroundings attractive and the food good and reasonably priced, who cares? But in a way I do see what CAMRA means. By complete coincidence a few days later Anne and I, walking the Thames Path, happened on a very nice pub called the Kings Arms at Sandford Lock near to Oxford. We stopped and ate there and had nice competitively priced food, I had good beer, the pub was in (you guessed it) a lovely rambling old building. Chef and Brewer again! The same menu exactly, the same offers exactly, even the same literary quotes on the menus. The only thing that was different was the staff, just as friendly and attentive, but mercifully not the same people. Otherwise you might have got the impression that when my back was turned they had hastily dismantled the Five Horseshoes and rapidly put it up again on the Thames waiting for me to arrive. So pubcos do imply a certain lack of diversity. But if its good quality, why worry?
So I enjoyed the Five Horseshoes. The only downer was those buggers Haden and Pile tooting me from behind as they cruised in their car up Robins Nest Hill to Little Berkhamsted while I laboured up on my bike. Experiences like that set the mark of suffering on a man.
Thursday, 11 August 2011
Pub Odyssey 31
Thursday 11 August: THE GRANDISON, BRAMFIELD (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Geoff Searle (plus Sally), Steve Stott, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: I was very pleased when the Grandison Arms reopened after a seven-year closure (even if for some reason they dropped the "Arms") because this pleasant country pub was, amongst its other advantages, a nice mile-long walk across the fields from my house, just the thing to work up a thirst. And I have had numerous good (though not cheap) meals there, with invariably excellent and often unusual beers. However, on the day of our visit they were not on top of their game as was illustrated by the fact that the pot of tea that Andrew and I asked for only appeared after fifteen minutes and three requests. The food, mine anyway, was pretty good but not in my view sufficiently superior to justify the considerable price differential as against some other hostelries we have been to. On the plus side I thought the beer, enticingly named "Dragons Blood", was indeed excellent and the tea, when it came, was in a pot. This immediately put the Grandison on the side of the angels so far as I am concerned.
When you ask for a pot of tea in most coffee bars and in many upmarket pubs you get a cup with a teabag hanging over the side. Less pretentious pubs (McMullens is excellent in this regard) give you a teapot so you can string your consumption out and feel generally more comfortable. But the Grandison soared to even greater heights. I got a big piece of fudge with my pot of tea. I was so staggered that I threw aside all restraint and had another pot of tea, and more fudge, not a pretty sight from the point of view of my dietician.
The Grandison's name neatly embodies the craziness of the British class system. It is named after the Earls of Grandison who held the manor of Bramfield from 1732 till the death of the second and last Earl Grandison in 1800. However, John Villiers, First Earl Grandison, was Earl Grandison of Limerick. Before Elvis asks me what a Paddy was doing as a Hertfordshire landowner, there was nothing Irish about Lord Grandison, his family were perfectly English and got to the top of the tree because one of his ancestors, Barbara Villiers, had been one of the many who screwed King Charles II (1660-1685). An Irish peerage was perhaps the least you could expect for services to the monarchy such as this. Just to make it even more of a farce if you were an Irish peer you couldn't sit in the House of Lords at Westminster, but you could sit in the House of Commons. Lord Palmerston, the billiard table maestro mentioned in Pub Odyssey 29 (Brocket Arms), was an Irish peer who never sat in the House of Lords but was a member of the House of Commons for more than half a century..
So the Grandison was an eighteenth century pub, probably only a beerhouse, run in John Carrington's time by the "Widow Deards" who in 1803 was robbed of £13 (a lot of money then, probably worth at least £700 now) by a woman who lodged with her- she got £10 back. Rural crime was quite a factor in Napoleonic England, with pubs often involved in some way. The Grandison Arms was also just the place to hold an inquest, as happened in 1806 after a two year old boy drowned in the local pond. I understand that in the current hard times pubs need to diversify so maybe the time is coming to bring back pub-based rural entertainments like bear-baiting, cock fighting, bare-knuckle contests, and of course inquests. It would certainly change the somewhat genteel atmosphere in the modern Grandison quite a bit.
COMMENT: I was very pleased when the Grandison Arms reopened after a seven-year closure (even if for some reason they dropped the "Arms") because this pleasant country pub was, amongst its other advantages, a nice mile-long walk across the fields from my house, just the thing to work up a thirst. And I have had numerous good (though not cheap) meals there, with invariably excellent and often unusual beers. However, on the day of our visit they were not on top of their game as was illustrated by the fact that the pot of tea that Andrew and I asked for only appeared after fifteen minutes and three requests. The food, mine anyway, was pretty good but not in my view sufficiently superior to justify the considerable price differential as against some other hostelries we have been to. On the plus side I thought the beer, enticingly named "Dragons Blood", was indeed excellent and the tea, when it came, was in a pot. This immediately put the Grandison on the side of the angels so far as I am concerned.
When you ask for a pot of tea in most coffee bars and in many upmarket pubs you get a cup with a teabag hanging over the side. Less pretentious pubs (McMullens is excellent in this regard) give you a teapot so you can string your consumption out and feel generally more comfortable. But the Grandison soared to even greater heights. I got a big piece of fudge with my pot of tea. I was so staggered that I threw aside all restraint and had another pot of tea, and more fudge, not a pretty sight from the point of view of my dietician.
The Grandison's name neatly embodies the craziness of the British class system. It is named after the Earls of Grandison who held the manor of Bramfield from 1732 till the death of the second and last Earl Grandison in 1800. However, John Villiers, First Earl Grandison, was Earl Grandison of Limerick. Before Elvis asks me what a Paddy was doing as a Hertfordshire landowner, there was nothing Irish about Lord Grandison, his family were perfectly English and got to the top of the tree because one of his ancestors, Barbara Villiers, had been one of the many who screwed King Charles II (1660-1685). An Irish peerage was perhaps the least you could expect for services to the monarchy such as this. Just to make it even more of a farce if you were an Irish peer you couldn't sit in the House of Lords at Westminster, but you could sit in the House of Commons. Lord Palmerston, the billiard table maestro mentioned in Pub Odyssey 29 (Brocket Arms), was an Irish peer who never sat in the House of Lords but was a member of the House of Commons for more than half a century..
So the Grandison was an eighteenth century pub, probably only a beerhouse, run in John Carrington's time by the "Widow Deards" who in 1803 was robbed of £13 (a lot of money then, probably worth at least £700 now) by a woman who lodged with her- she got £10 back. Rural crime was quite a factor in Napoleonic England, with pubs often involved in some way. The Grandison Arms was also just the place to hold an inquest, as happened in 1806 after a two year old boy drowned in the local pond. I understand that in the current hard times pubs need to diversify so maybe the time is coming to bring back pub-based rural entertainments like bear-baiting, cock fighting, bare-knuckle contests, and of course inquests. It would certainly change the somewhat genteel atmosphere in the modern Grandison quite a bit.
Wednesday, 3 August 2011
Pub Odyssey 30
Wednesday 3 August: THE JOHN BUNYAN, COLEMAN GREEN (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, David Room, John Westwood)
The John Bunyan is a nice spick-and-span little pub a long way from anywhere, a McMullen's pub with decent food and beer, and one of the few pubs where nearly all the clientele seemed to be older than us! It was a sweat getting there on the bike,following a narrow road which was once the Roman road from St Albans to Welwyn. The John Bunyan is a hard pub to get much information about. In the first half of the twentieth century it was called the "Prince of Wales". At some point its name was changed to the "John Bunyan" to commemorate the great religious writer, John Bunyan (1628-1688), author of the "Pilgrims Progress", who apparently stayed and preached in a neighbouring cottage of which only the chimney now remains. Bunyan was based in Bedfordshire (and spent a lot of time in jails there as a member of a persecuted Nonconformist minority) but was often in Hertfordshire and preached in many of its villages, He is, however, a bizarre choice of figurehead for a pub because like most Puritans he had little time for popular entertainments. He thought he was descending towards hell because he could not break his liking for profanity, dancing and bell-ringing. He doesn't specifically discuss pub-crawling, so far as I know, but I fear it too would in his view be regarded as a step on the road to hellfire. So it isn't altogether logical to have a pub named after him. But who cares about logic? In the pub garden Elvis was telling us that the Great British Beer Festival would be bad for him, too much drink; he was going out with Richard Thelwell instead.
The John Bunyan is a nice spick-and-span little pub a long way from anywhere, a McMullen's pub with decent food and beer, and one of the few pubs where nearly all the clientele seemed to be older than us! It was a sweat getting there on the bike,following a narrow road which was once the Roman road from St Albans to Welwyn. The John Bunyan is a hard pub to get much information about. In the first half of the twentieth century it was called the "Prince of Wales". At some point its name was changed to the "John Bunyan" to commemorate the great religious writer, John Bunyan (1628-1688), author of the "Pilgrims Progress", who apparently stayed and preached in a neighbouring cottage of which only the chimney now remains. Bunyan was based in Bedfordshire (and spent a lot of time in jails there as a member of a persecuted Nonconformist minority) but was often in Hertfordshire and preached in many of its villages, He is, however, a bizarre choice of figurehead for a pub because like most Puritans he had little time for popular entertainments. He thought he was descending towards hell because he could not break his liking for profanity, dancing and bell-ringing. He doesn't specifically discuss pub-crawling, so far as I know, but I fear it too would in his view be regarded as a step on the road to hellfire. So it isn't altogether logical to have a pub named after him. But who cares about logic? In the pub garden Elvis was telling us that the Great British Beer Festival would be bad for him, too much drink; he was going out with Richard Thelwell instead.
Pub Odyssey 29
Tuesday 26 July: THE BROCKET ARMS, AYOT ST LAWRENCE (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: I missed this one, being with two other Odyssians, Malcolm Allen and Andrew Swift,crossing the Alps by bike from Austria into Italy; but that's another story. Chris Haden, masterminding Odyssey affairs this week, reported a good lunch and a nice occasion at the Brocket Arms.
The Brocket Arms is a 14th century foundation, making it one of the oldest yet. This means the pub is older than its name because Sir John Brocket, a wealthy spice importer, was a sixteenth century Johnny-come-lately who was Captain of Queen Elizabeth I's personal guard. Brocket built Brocket Hall (his house subsequently demolished and replaced by the present Brocket Hall) and, as often happened, the pub was named or re-named after the local bigwig.
I mentioned in Pub Odyssey 24 (Cowper Arms Letty Green) that the biggest of all local bigwigs, Lord Palmerston, Prime Minister 1855-8 and 1859-65 actually died at Brocket Hall after an exciting career involving forcing opium on the Chinese and allegedly raping one of Queen Victoria's maids of honour. Anne took me to task for failing to mention that Lord P, or "Lord Cupid" as he was widely known, did not merely die at Brocket Hall but did so in style, having it away with a chambermaid on the billiard table. He was not quite 81. Is this what they mean by a long screw at billiards?
COMMENT: I missed this one, being with two other Odyssians, Malcolm Allen and Andrew Swift,crossing the Alps by bike from Austria into Italy; but that's another story. Chris Haden, masterminding Odyssey affairs this week, reported a good lunch and a nice occasion at the Brocket Arms.
The Brocket Arms is a 14th century foundation, making it one of the oldest yet. This means the pub is older than its name because Sir John Brocket, a wealthy spice importer, was a sixteenth century Johnny-come-lately who was Captain of Queen Elizabeth I's personal guard. Brocket built Brocket Hall (his house subsequently demolished and replaced by the present Brocket Hall) and, as often happened, the pub was named or re-named after the local bigwig.
I mentioned in Pub Odyssey 24 (Cowper Arms Letty Green) that the biggest of all local bigwigs, Lord Palmerston, Prime Minister 1855-8 and 1859-65 actually died at Brocket Hall after an exciting career involving forcing opium on the Chinese and allegedly raping one of Queen Victoria's maids of honour. Anne took me to task for failing to mention that Lord P, or "Lord Cupid" as he was widely known, did not merely die at Brocket Hall but did so in style, having it away with a chambermaid on the billiard table. He was not quite 81. Is this what they mean by a long screw at billiards?
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 28
Tuesday 19 July: THE GOAT, CODICOTE (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: David Lloyd George (1863-1945), Prime Minister 1916-22, saviour of Britain in the First World War, was the only Welshman to be a statesman of world-class importance (and the only British Prime Minister for whom English was a second language; as a child he spoke Welsh). He was also known to friend and foe alike as "The Goat" because of his promiscuity and impressive sexual performance. With this background I thought a visit to a pub called "The Goat" held unusual promise. I wasn't altogether disappointed. The Goat was the first pub on the Odyssey to have a dispenser for herbal viagra outside the loos (free condom included) and, better still, at the front door was a signed rugby shirt from the Codicote Sex Panthers. But otherwise this friendly attractive little boozer didn't suggest exciting exotic sexuality. It's a nicely preserved 16th century foundation with a 17th century conference room (locked, unfortunately, so I couldn't have a look) and a clientele which which was more sixty-plus than sex panthers. So much so, the pub offered a lunch deal to over-sixties which, of course, included every single Odyssian present. We did prove somewhat more noisy than the other elderly gents present in the pub; this was pointed out to us by a sombre individual in the window seat opposite us.
Despite this, we enjoyed our lunch. It's a good sign in a way when most of us ordered omelettes and the landlady hared across Codicote High Street to buy more eggs from the local store. At least you know its not pre-packaged and microwaved!
It is disappointing to have to record that pubs called "The Goat" are not celebrating uninhibited sexuality. However, the usually suggested explanation is almost equally odd. In primitive rural areas the idea of the "scapegoat" was very real, the idea that a goat could take on to itself the ills and misfortunes of people or other animals. Goats could be paraded round a house where anyone was ill, to carry away the disease. This made the goat a rural talisman very likely to appear on a pub sign. Or so they say.
COMMENT: David Lloyd George (1863-1945), Prime Minister 1916-22, saviour of Britain in the First World War, was the only Welshman to be a statesman of world-class importance (and the only British Prime Minister for whom English was a second language; as a child he spoke Welsh). He was also known to friend and foe alike as "The Goat" because of his promiscuity and impressive sexual performance. With this background I thought a visit to a pub called "The Goat" held unusual promise. I wasn't altogether disappointed. The Goat was the first pub on the Odyssey to have a dispenser for herbal viagra outside the loos (free condom included) and, better still, at the front door was a signed rugby shirt from the Codicote Sex Panthers. But otherwise this friendly attractive little boozer didn't suggest exciting exotic sexuality. It's a nicely preserved 16th century foundation with a 17th century conference room (locked, unfortunately, so I couldn't have a look) and a clientele which which was more sixty-plus than sex panthers. So much so, the pub offered a lunch deal to over-sixties which, of course, included every single Odyssian present. We did prove somewhat more noisy than the other elderly gents present in the pub; this was pointed out to us by a sombre individual in the window seat opposite us.
Despite this, we enjoyed our lunch. It's a good sign in a way when most of us ordered omelettes and the landlady hared across Codicote High Street to buy more eggs from the local store. At least you know its not pre-packaged and microwaved!
It is disappointing to have to record that pubs called "The Goat" are not celebrating uninhibited sexuality. However, the usually suggested explanation is almost equally odd. In primitive rural areas the idea of the "scapegoat" was very real, the idea that a goat could take on to itself the ills and misfortunes of people or other animals. Goats could be paraded round a house where anyone was ill, to carry away the disease. This made the goat a rural talisman very likely to appear on a pub sign. Or so they say.
Friday, 15 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 27
Tuesday 12 July: THE WOODMAN, CHAPMORE END (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: I said that last week's pub, the Rose and Crown in Tewin, was a true village pub uncontaminated by forces of progress like stagecoach routes or railways; but compared with the Woodman the Rose is the last word in metropolitan sophistication. The Woodman is first recorded in 1851 as a basic little two up/two down timber framed lath and plaster building with stables where the car park now is. Needless to say it was only a beerhouse. Previous to its reincarnation as a pub, it is rumoured to have been a slaughterhouse. I've seen a picture of it in 1908, looking very little different from now.
In such a truly rural venue "the Woodman" is a good name for a pub (though there are plenty of Woodmans in London, twenty-five in 2006). The woodman was an important rural figure, tending the woods and forests as well as cutting down trees. Even now, you really wouldn't have been surprised if a man in a smock with an axe had walked into the Chapmore End pub while we were having lunch. The pub's layout (small cramped rooms) screamed of a bygone era and would you believe it, the beer was served by gravity from the barrel. This is rare indeed today in pubs (though funnily enough the very next day I was in another pub on the Thames near Oxford which also served beer by gravity). Not everyone liked the beer; my Greene King IPA was very good but the "Ale Fresco" went down badly with some customers. That, though, might relate to the beer's basic taste rather than its presentation The food was fine, in the tradition of solid honest pub grub.
COMMENT: I said that last week's pub, the Rose and Crown in Tewin, was a true village pub uncontaminated by forces of progress like stagecoach routes or railways; but compared with the Woodman the Rose is the last word in metropolitan sophistication. The Woodman is first recorded in 1851 as a basic little two up/two down timber framed lath and plaster building with stables where the car park now is. Needless to say it was only a beerhouse. Previous to its reincarnation as a pub, it is rumoured to have been a slaughterhouse. I've seen a picture of it in 1908, looking very little different from now.
In such a truly rural venue "the Woodman" is a good name for a pub (though there are plenty of Woodmans in London, twenty-five in 2006). The woodman was an important rural figure, tending the woods and forests as well as cutting down trees. Even now, you really wouldn't have been surprised if a man in a smock with an axe had walked into the Chapmore End pub while we were having lunch. The pub's layout (small cramped rooms) screamed of a bygone era and would you believe it, the beer was served by gravity from the barrel. This is rare indeed today in pubs (though funnily enough the very next day I was in another pub on the Thames near Oxford which also served beer by gravity). Not everyone liked the beer; my Greene King IPA was very good but the "Ale Fresco" went down badly with some customers. That, though, might relate to the beer's basic taste rather than its presentation The food was fine, in the tradition of solid honest pub grub.
Tuesday, 12 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 26
Monday 4 July: ROSE AND CROWN, TEWIN (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, David Room, Andrew Swift, Jeff Tipper, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: The Rose and Crown, our local, is an old and famous Hertfordshire pub which according to the History of Tewin (published 2009) "is thought to have been built in about 1650 on the front of an older building that stood on the site and which now forms part of the present kitchens". The History makes the point that the Rose is probably, even now, about the same size as it was when built in 1650 and also that it was a true village pub, not on a major coaching route and bypassed by the railways. This rural nature is further illustrated by the fact that the landlords often described themselves as "publican and farmer", running a small farm or smallholding in conjunction with the main business of selling alcohol.
The pub's fame relates.to the period of the Napoleonic Wars, when it features almost daily in the remarkable diaries (1798-1810) of John Carrington of Bacon's Farm, Bramfield. Carrington was a great man for food and drink and his son Jack held the tenancy at the Rose and Crown from 1791 to 1833. The elder Carrington was often in the Rose with or without friends, eating enormous meals and drinking impressive amounts for a man in his seventies. Both Carringtons were important local figures and the Rose seems to have been a big operation. In June 1805 a beer engine was installed there; beer engines were very recent inventions and rarely seen at that date outside London. The younger Carrington, the landlord, dealt in big money; for instance he recorded that by 1812 he had lost £3000 (a vast sum in those days) due to the bad behaviour of his brother-in-law. At that stage the Rose was certainly far more important than the Plume of Feathers, laconically described by the older Carrington in 1799 as an "alehouse". Nowadays the boot is very much on the other foot. I don't think many would argue with the proposition that in the last couple of decades the Plume has been very much the more successful pub.
The Rose had just acquired a new landlord when we arrived there and the pub did fine, producing for us good beer and good honest pub food. Let's hope he is a success.
COMMENT: The Rose and Crown, our local, is an old and famous Hertfordshire pub which according to the History of Tewin (published 2009) "is thought to have been built in about 1650 on the front of an older building that stood on the site and which now forms part of the present kitchens". The History makes the point that the Rose is probably, even now, about the same size as it was when built in 1650 and also that it was a true village pub, not on a major coaching route and bypassed by the railways. This rural nature is further illustrated by the fact that the landlords often described themselves as "publican and farmer", running a small farm or smallholding in conjunction with the main business of selling alcohol.
The pub's fame relates.to the period of the Napoleonic Wars, when it features almost daily in the remarkable diaries (1798-1810) of John Carrington of Bacon's Farm, Bramfield. Carrington was a great man for food and drink and his son Jack held the tenancy at the Rose and Crown from 1791 to 1833. The elder Carrington was often in the Rose with or without friends, eating enormous meals and drinking impressive amounts for a man in his seventies. Both Carringtons were important local figures and the Rose seems to have been a big operation. In June 1805 a beer engine was installed there; beer engines were very recent inventions and rarely seen at that date outside London. The younger Carrington, the landlord, dealt in big money; for instance he recorded that by 1812 he had lost £3000 (a vast sum in those days) due to the bad behaviour of his brother-in-law. At that stage the Rose was certainly far more important than the Plume of Feathers, laconically described by the older Carrington in 1799 as an "alehouse". Nowadays the boot is very much on the other foot. I don't think many would argue with the proposition that in the last couple of decades the Plume has been very much the more successful pub.
The Rose had just acquired a new landlord when we arrived there and the pub did fine, producing for us good beer and good honest pub food. Let's hope he is a success.
Monday, 11 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 25
Tuesday 28 June: DUNCOMBE ARMS, HERTFORD (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: a decent cheap lunch in a town centre pub. The Duncombe Arms is named after a local MP, Thomas Slingsby Duncombe (MP for Hertford 1826-32, afterwards MP for Finsbury 1834-61). Like some more modern MPs, he combined radical politics with snazzy dressing, dubious finances, loose women and a penchant for publicity. Naturally all this endeared him to the electorate. We enjoyed our lunch, with the interviewer in our midst establishing that our very nice and unusually on-the-ball waitress was actually a student waiting to take up her university course. Probably not the first or last time we will meet that on the Odyssey..
COMMENT: a decent cheap lunch in a town centre pub. The Duncombe Arms is named after a local MP, Thomas Slingsby Duncombe (MP for Hertford 1826-32, afterwards MP for Finsbury 1834-61). Like some more modern MPs, he combined radical politics with snazzy dressing, dubious finances, loose women and a penchant for publicity. Naturally all this endeared him to the electorate. We enjoyed our lunch, with the interviewer in our midst establishing that our very nice and unusually on-the-ball waitress was actually a student waiting to take up her university course. Probably not the first or last time we will meet that on the Odyssey..
Wednesday, 6 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 24
Wednesday 22 June: COWPER ARMS, LETTY GREEN (Chris Haden, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, David Room, Geoff Searle (plus dog), Steve Stott, John Westwood)
COMMENT: I missed this one, being in Poland that day, but because or in spite of that an excellent time was had by all.
The Cowper Arms, the second Cowper Arms to have been visited on the Odyssey, is of course named for what was in the 18th and 19th century the most prominent local aristocratic family, the Earls Cowper of Panshanger. Bull-baiting is recorded at the site in 1776 (the rural entertainments in the countryside of Merrie England turn your stomach), but the pub, like the other Cowper Arms at Digswell, was founded around 1850. Both Cowper Arms pubs were closely associated with railway development in the nineteenth century. So much so that the Letty Green pub was for a while called the Railway Arms and the landlord at the time even made bricks to help build the line- a slightly unusual sideline. The pub continued as a railway hotel till the adjacent branch line closed down in the 1960s.
It seems a good moment to say something about the Cowpers of Panshanger Hall. Well, not about them as they were a dull bunch but about their wives, relatives and friends who were anything but dull. The 5th Earl Cowper(died 1837) married a lively lady who was not satisfied with him and took up with Viscount Palmerston (and married Palmerston after Cowper's death). Palmerston was lively enough. He was Prime Minister for most of the time between 1855 and his death just short of 81 in 1865. Earlier in his career, as Foreign Secretary, he had fought wars to force the Chinese to accept British opium. Apart from living in sin with Lady Cowper he was also widely suspected of raping one of Queen Victoria's Maids of Honour. Hard to see him doing well in the modern era of an intrusive press (though when you look at M Strauss-Kahn's alleged behaviour, who knows?). Lady Cowper/Palmerston was also the sister of Lord Melbourne of Brocket Hall, another Prime Minister, who in turn was married to the barking mad Lady Caroline Lamb. Not many dull moments in high society in East Herts in the nineteenth century.
COMMENT: I missed this one, being in Poland that day, but because or in spite of that an excellent time was had by all.
The Cowper Arms, the second Cowper Arms to have been visited on the Odyssey, is of course named for what was in the 18th and 19th century the most prominent local aristocratic family, the Earls Cowper of Panshanger. Bull-baiting is recorded at the site in 1776 (the rural entertainments in the countryside of Merrie England turn your stomach), but the pub, like the other Cowper Arms at Digswell, was founded around 1850. Both Cowper Arms pubs were closely associated with railway development in the nineteenth century. So much so that the Letty Green pub was for a while called the Railway Arms and the landlord at the time even made bricks to help build the line- a slightly unusual sideline. The pub continued as a railway hotel till the adjacent branch line closed down in the 1960s.
It seems a good moment to say something about the Cowpers of Panshanger Hall. Well, not about them as they were a dull bunch but about their wives, relatives and friends who were anything but dull. The 5th Earl Cowper(died 1837) married a lively lady who was not satisfied with him and took up with Viscount Palmerston (and married Palmerston after Cowper's death). Palmerston was lively enough. He was Prime Minister for most of the time between 1855 and his death just short of 81 in 1865. Earlier in his career, as Foreign Secretary, he had fought wars to force the Chinese to accept British opium. Apart from living in sin with Lady Cowper he was also widely suspected of raping one of Queen Victoria's Maids of Honour. Hard to see him doing well in the modern era of an intrusive press (though when you look at M Strauss-Kahn's alleged behaviour, who knows?). Lady Cowper/Palmerston was also the sister of Lord Melbourne of Brocket Hall, another Prime Minister, who in turn was married to the barking mad Lady Caroline Lamb. Not many dull moments in high society in East Herts in the nineteenth century.
Monday, 4 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 23
Wednesday 15 June: LONG ARM AND SHORT ARM, LEMSFORD (Mike Horsman, Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, David Room, Steve Stott)
COMMENT: This was a perfectly good pub with decent food and beer but in no way unusual except for its spectacularly unusual name. Fierce debate rages about where it came from. The most attractive solution (to me) is that it represents a gallows. Inquests used to be held in pubs (see Dickens' novel "Bleak House"), surely they could have hosted hangings as well? All part of the rich tapestry of life in Merrie England. Unfortunately it seems unlikely. More humdrum solutions relate to the configuration of local roads, or to a signal board giving the differing depths of water in the local ford over the River Lea. More amusing is the suggestion that the credit goes to an artist called John Frederick Herring whose early sign showed a coachman extending a long arm to the publican who holds back a glass of ale with a short arm, the message being: "Pay before you drink". But the truth is that no-one really knows where the name came from.
The Long Arm and Short Arm may have had a mysterious name but it was pretty clearly something of a dump in olden times. It was a simple beer shop, the lowest form of pub life, till 1928 when it was one of several pubs in the area which had a licence refused. McMullens had the existing building knocked down and put up the larger building which is still there now.
COMMENT: This was a perfectly good pub with decent food and beer but in no way unusual except for its spectacularly unusual name. Fierce debate rages about where it came from. The most attractive solution (to me) is that it represents a gallows. Inquests used to be held in pubs (see Dickens' novel "Bleak House"), surely they could have hosted hangings as well? All part of the rich tapestry of life in Merrie England. Unfortunately it seems unlikely. More humdrum solutions relate to the configuration of local roads, or to a signal board giving the differing depths of water in the local ford over the River Lea. More amusing is the suggestion that the credit goes to an artist called John Frederick Herring whose early sign showed a coachman extending a long arm to the publican who holds back a glass of ale with a short arm, the message being: "Pay before you drink". But the truth is that no-one really knows where the name came from.
The Long Arm and Short Arm may have had a mysterious name but it was pretty clearly something of a dump in olden times. It was a simple beer shop, the lowest form of pub life, till 1928 when it was one of several pubs in the area which had a licence refused. McMullens had the existing building knocked down and put up the larger building which is still there now.
Friday, 1 July 2011
Pub Odyssey 22
Thursday 2 June: BELMONT, BURNHAM GREEN (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: This was half a visit to what is halfway to being a pub. We had called off this week's original destination, the Cowper Arms at Letty Green, because there wasn't a quorum but Andrew, Malcolm and myself got shot of prior commitments early enough to go to the Belmont for lunch. It's an oddity. In the middle of the Hertfordshire countryside it is essentially a French-style wine bar. It does serve perfectly respectable beer and the food was good, but to me it felt peculiar. I like pubs and this wasn't really a pub. However, any establishment which serves the right kind of beer deserves support and if there is a market for their approach, good luck to them.
Probably it felt odder because most Odyssey participants will remember when it was the Duck, an old fashioned boozer originally built in the 1840s to provide drink for the navvies who built the Digswell Viaduct (a brickfield for the viaduct was set up at Burnham Green). When I knew it, in the 1990s, it was less basic but definitely a community pub in which some Odyssians had many legendary evenings with the then landlord, Mick Bruce. Not for me to tell the stories!
COMMENT: This was half a visit to what is halfway to being a pub. We had called off this week's original destination, the Cowper Arms at Letty Green, because there wasn't a quorum but Andrew, Malcolm and myself got shot of prior commitments early enough to go to the Belmont for lunch. It's an oddity. In the middle of the Hertfordshire countryside it is essentially a French-style wine bar. It does serve perfectly respectable beer and the food was good, but to me it felt peculiar. I like pubs and this wasn't really a pub. However, any establishment which serves the right kind of beer deserves support and if there is a market for their approach, good luck to them.
Probably it felt odder because most Odyssey participants will remember when it was the Duck, an old fashioned boozer originally built in the 1840s to provide drink for the navvies who built the Digswell Viaduct (a brickfield for the viaduct was set up at Burnham Green). When I knew it, in the 1990s, it was less basic but definitely a community pub in which some Odyssians had many legendary evenings with the then landlord, Mick Bruce. Not for me to tell the stories!
Thursday, 2 June 2011
Pub Odyssey 19,20, 21
Thursday 12 May: ROBIN HOOD AND LITTLE JOHN, RABLEY HEATH (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: I've been slow to update the blog because the site has had technical problems, also I have been sunning myself in a beautiful Landmark Trust villa in Northern Italy built in the 1540s by the great architect Andrea Palladio but which lacked internet access. Even Palladio couldn't think of everything. So by the time I'm writing this the Robin Hood and Little John is a bit of a distant memory. However, distance does not fade the memory of Keeley, the fascinating (and very nice) barmaid at the RHLJ who those present were still remembering in the Woolpack a fortnight later. I doubt if Keeley is remembering us! Too old and too boring!
The RHLJ is a name which suggests great antiquity, conjuring up images of medieval men in tights running round Sherwood Forest, or at least of Errol Flynn, but it isn't necessarily so. There are apparently over 100 pubs of this name but many were created in the nineteenth century when sentimental nostalgia for the middle ages was as its height. However, this particular RHLJ is older; it was certainly in existence on 3 August 1801 when John Carrington, amongst other functions the Chief Constable of Hertfordshire, entertained his constables there. Admittedly the Chief Constable was a less grand function then than now, but if such an event happened in 2011 the taxpayer would probably foot the bill; in 1801 it appears Carrington paid for it himself. Progress isn't always a good thing.
The penalties of progress were also shown all too clearly by a framed newspaper cutting on the wall about John Derry, a local resident and RHLJ regular who on 6 September 1948 was the first man to fly faster than sound but who four years later was killed, along with 27 other people, when his plane crashed at the Farnborough Air Show.
Monday, May 16: RED LION, Digswell Hill (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: I missed this one, being in Italy, so not much to say. This Red Lion seems to have got lost in the crowd of all the other Red Lions (there were around forty of them in Hertfordshire in the nineteenth century!) It's obviously an old coaching inn on the Great North Road as are a remarkable number of the surviving pubs in our part of East Herts, but apart from that not much information.
Friday May 27: WOOLPACK, Hertford (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, John Westwood).
COMMENT: Signs of modern life at the Woolpack, an old Hertford pub which is on the site of the second brewery opened by McMullens (in 1832). The pub television screens were showing the test match and the conversation was about solar panels! Food was good standard pub grub and the solar panels must have been fascinating, we stayed there longer than any pub so far.
The Woolpack is a good name for a pub in an agricultural county (in the nineteenth century Hertfordshire ranked as one of the five or six leading agricultural counties in England). A woolpack is a large bale of wool prepared for carriage or sale. It's said to have weighed 240lbs. Hertford in the nineteenth century had an important regular agricultural market and I imagine the Woolpack, like other pubs in Hertford, played an important role for thirsty and hungry buyers and sellers on market day.
COMMENT: I've been slow to update the blog because the site has had technical problems, also I have been sunning myself in a beautiful Landmark Trust villa in Northern Italy built in the 1540s by the great architect Andrea Palladio but which lacked internet access. Even Palladio couldn't think of everything. So by the time I'm writing this the Robin Hood and Little John is a bit of a distant memory. However, distance does not fade the memory of Keeley, the fascinating (and very nice) barmaid at the RHLJ who those present were still remembering in the Woolpack a fortnight later. I doubt if Keeley is remembering us! Too old and too boring!
The RHLJ is a name which suggests great antiquity, conjuring up images of medieval men in tights running round Sherwood Forest, or at least of Errol Flynn, but it isn't necessarily so. There are apparently over 100 pubs of this name but many were created in the nineteenth century when sentimental nostalgia for the middle ages was as its height. However, this particular RHLJ is older; it was certainly in existence on 3 August 1801 when John Carrington, amongst other functions the Chief Constable of Hertfordshire, entertained his constables there. Admittedly the Chief Constable was a less grand function then than now, but if such an event happened in 2011 the taxpayer would probably foot the bill; in 1801 it appears Carrington paid for it himself. Progress isn't always a good thing.
The penalties of progress were also shown all too clearly by a framed newspaper cutting on the wall about John Derry, a local resident and RHLJ regular who on 6 September 1948 was the first man to fly faster than sound but who four years later was killed, along with 27 other people, when his plane crashed at the Farnborough Air Show.
Monday, May 16: RED LION, Digswell Hill (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: I missed this one, being in Italy, so not much to say. This Red Lion seems to have got lost in the crowd of all the other Red Lions (there were around forty of them in Hertfordshire in the nineteenth century!) It's obviously an old coaching inn on the Great North Road as are a remarkable number of the surviving pubs in our part of East Herts, but apart from that not much information.
Friday May 27: WOOLPACK, Hertford (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Andrew Swift, John Westwood).
COMMENT: Signs of modern life at the Woolpack, an old Hertford pub which is on the site of the second brewery opened by McMullens (in 1832). The pub television screens were showing the test match and the conversation was about solar panels! Food was good standard pub grub and the solar panels must have been fascinating, we stayed there longer than any pub so far.
The Woolpack is a good name for a pub in an agricultural county (in the nineteenth century Hertfordshire ranked as one of the five or six leading agricultural counties in England). A woolpack is a large bale of wool prepared for carriage or sale. It's said to have weighed 240lbs. Hertford in the nineteenth century had an important regular agricultural market and I imagine the Woolpack, like other pubs in Hertford, played an important role for thirsty and hungry buyers and sellers on market day.
Monday, 9 May 2011
Pub Odyssey 18
Wednesday 4 May: CHEQUERS, WOOLMER GREEN ( Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, John Westwood)
COMMENT: The Chequers is a really old pub name, probably brought to Britain by the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago. Evidence from Pompeii suggests it was already in use there (before 79AD) perhaps referring to a game such as draughts played on the premises. In Britain it was associated with a money table, hence the word "exchequer". Some inns used the sign to indicate that they were willing to change money or act as bankers in some way.
There isn't much information about the origins of the Chequers at Woolmer Green, but the website says it was a coaching inn (on the Great North Road) which suggests a 17th or 18th century foundation. The Chequers was certainly in existence in 1807 when it was the scene of a tragedy typical of the harsh penal laws of those days. The story is told in the famous diary of John Carrington of Bacons Farm, Bramfield. The diary entry for 4 June 1807 reads (I have kept Carrington's idiosyncratic grammer and spelling):
"To London on Dunn poney to present a Pittition for Mrs Pellom of Woolmergreen at Checkers their, now in Hartford Geoal under Sentance of 14 years Transportation for buiing 2 Silver tea Spoons [knowing them to be stolen]_ _ Judge Heath_ _sent us to Ld Hauksburys, the Secretaris of Stats office the Treasury for the home Department_ _Delivrd my Pittition to one Mr Copper their, Clerke of the office at the Treasury, was Recved very kindly & he promised to Give it to Ld Hauksbury & his Majesty. Then to Mr Horsmans Sallopin Coffhouse _ _ _"
Who this coffee house owner "Mr Horsman" was I do not know, but generally it seems a good effort by the eighty-one year old Carrington to be taking a petition to the Home Secretary (effectively, though under a different title, what Lord Hawkesbury was). Carrington clearly thought fourteen years transportation a vicious punishment. Did the petition help Mrs Pellom? I don't know, but on December 6 she was still in Hertford gaol and Carrington was still trying to get the local gentry to help her. Things went better for Lord Hawkesbury, as they usually do for people at the top. Under his later title of Lord Liverpool he was Prime Minister from 1812 to 1827, longer than anyone since, even Mrs Thatcher.
Anyway, the Chequers is currently a nice pub with a cage of chipmunks in the garden (an unusual touch), and an admirable attitude towards charities. (While we were there the landlady was in negotiation over the phone about a big charity ride for the Air Ambulance to be organised from the Chequers in July. Six of our wives rode in another charity ride for the Isabel Hospice from the Chequers the Sunday after our visit.) Also, the pub's award winning pies were excellent!
COMMENT: The Chequers is a really old pub name, probably brought to Britain by the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago. Evidence from Pompeii suggests it was already in use there (before 79AD) perhaps referring to a game such as draughts played on the premises. In Britain it was associated with a money table, hence the word "exchequer". Some inns used the sign to indicate that they were willing to change money or act as bankers in some way.
There isn't much information about the origins of the Chequers at Woolmer Green, but the website says it was a coaching inn (on the Great North Road) which suggests a 17th or 18th century foundation. The Chequers was certainly in existence in 1807 when it was the scene of a tragedy typical of the harsh penal laws of those days. The story is told in the famous diary of John Carrington of Bacons Farm, Bramfield. The diary entry for 4 June 1807 reads (I have kept Carrington's idiosyncratic grammer and spelling):
"To London on Dunn poney to present a Pittition for Mrs Pellom of Woolmergreen at Checkers their, now in Hartford Geoal under Sentance of 14 years Transportation for buiing 2 Silver tea Spoons [knowing them to be stolen]_ _ Judge Heath_ _sent us to Ld Hauksburys, the Secretaris of Stats office the Treasury for the home Department_ _Delivrd my Pittition to one Mr Copper their, Clerke of the office at the Treasury, was Recved very kindly & he promised to Give it to Ld Hauksbury & his Majesty. Then to Mr Horsmans Sallopin Coffhouse _ _ _"
Who this coffee house owner "Mr Horsman" was I do not know, but generally it seems a good effort by the eighty-one year old Carrington to be taking a petition to the Home Secretary (effectively, though under a different title, what Lord Hawkesbury was). Carrington clearly thought fourteen years transportation a vicious punishment. Did the petition help Mrs Pellom? I don't know, but on December 6 she was still in Hertford gaol and Carrington was still trying to get the local gentry to help her. Things went better for Lord Hawkesbury, as they usually do for people at the top. Under his later title of Lord Liverpool he was Prime Minister from 1812 to 1827, longer than anyone since, even Mrs Thatcher.
Anyway, the Chequers is currently a nice pub with a cage of chipmunks in the garden (an unusual touch), and an admirable attitude towards charities. (While we were there the landlady was in negotiation over the phone about a big charity ride for the Air Ambulance to be organised from the Chequers in July. Six of our wives rode in another charity ride for the Isabel Hospice from the Chequers the Sunday after our visit.) Also, the pub's award winning pies were excellent!
Thursday, 28 April 2011
Pub Odyssey 17
Tuesday 26 April: WHITE HORSE, BURNHAM GREEN (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Bob Polydorou, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: This pub has one of the best views in Hertfordshire from its garden but after a week of high summer-like temperatures it was bloody freezing on arrival and we stayed indoors. Food was OK, I thought the McMullen's Country bitter very nice.
This is a pub with a chequered recent history. When Steve Stott arrived in the village in 1972 it was a small teeming boozer. When I arrived in 1990 Richard had taken it over, it had been extended considerably and made probably the most vibrant and attractive dining pub in the area. When Richard moved on to Coltsfoot and sold the White Horse the pub seemed to be rather amatuerishly managed by the new owners with limited success till 2001 when it burned down in a disastrous fire. Now it is owned by McMullens and I would say is a pretty middle of the road dining pub- perfectly fine, but not standing out from half a dozen similar in Tewin, Datchworth, Bramfield, Bulls Green etc.
Unlike most of our earlier pubs, no-one very interesting seems to have been connected with the White Horse- no Keith Moon or Lady Caroline Lamb or Charles Dickens I regret to say. A rather strange website called "lutonparanormal.com" says that when the pub was opened in 1806 it was named after a local legend concerning a farmer and his white horse both beheaded by roundheads in the Civil War. I personally consider this suggestion horsefeathers (white or otherwise) not least because the White Horse has a history dating back around 300 years which therefore takes it back much further than 1806.
COMMENT: This pub has one of the best views in Hertfordshire from its garden but after a week of high summer-like temperatures it was bloody freezing on arrival and we stayed indoors. Food was OK, I thought the McMullen's Country bitter very nice.
This is a pub with a chequered recent history. When Steve Stott arrived in the village in 1972 it was a small teeming boozer. When I arrived in 1990 Richard had taken it over, it had been extended considerably and made probably the most vibrant and attractive dining pub in the area. When Richard moved on to Coltsfoot and sold the White Horse the pub seemed to be rather amatuerishly managed by the new owners with limited success till 2001 when it burned down in a disastrous fire. Now it is owned by McMullens and I would say is a pretty middle of the road dining pub- perfectly fine, but not standing out from half a dozen similar in Tewin, Datchworth, Bramfield, Bulls Green etc.
Unlike most of our earlier pubs, no-one very interesting seems to have been connected with the White Horse- no Keith Moon or Lady Caroline Lamb or Charles Dickens I regret to say. A rather strange website called "lutonparanormal.com" says that when the pub was opened in 1806 it was named after a local legend concerning a farmer and his white horse both beheaded by roundheads in the Civil War. I personally consider this suggestion horsefeathers (white or otherwise) not least because the White Horse has a history dating back around 300 years which therefore takes it back much further than 1806.
Wednesday, 20 April 2011
Pub Odyssey 16
Tuesday 19 April: RED LION, HATFIELD: Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Jeff Tipper, John Westwood.
COMMENT: In the third week of April we sat ouside in the pub garden in our shirtsleeves (and in the case of the cyclist, in his shorts) enjoyning the brilliant sunshine, more like high summer than Spring. With Jeff Tipper having just four days left at work, we collectively resemble ever more closely a day outing from a retirement home, though some of the details don't fit, eg the lack of Zimmer frames and the willingness/ability to walk/cycle long distances at home and abroad.
The "Red Lion" is the most common pub name in Britain but the Red Lion in Hatfield stands out from all the others because it was outside this pub that the craziest man in rock and roll, Keith Moon, drummer of The Who, killed his friend, driver and bodyguard Neil Boland.
On 4 January 1970, "Moon the Loon", drunk as usual, was trying outside the Red Lion to escape hostile patrons of the pub who had begun to attack his Bentley. Moon attempted to take control of his car which in the melee ran over and killed Boland. There is some doubt whether Moon was actually behind the wheel and the coroner in any event declared the incident an accident, Moon getting an absolute discharge having been charged with driving offences. But it appears the incident haunted Moon for the rest of his short life. He died of gross drug and alcohol abuse in London on 7 September 1978, aged 32. He was undoubtedly one of the greatest of rock drummers but is probably better remembered for the smashed up hotels, dynamited toilets, physically attacked girlfriends, and passings out on stage which punctuated his career.
Why is the "Red Lion" such a common pub name? (There are over 600 of them round the country.) The red lion is actually the red lion of Scotland which James VI of Scotland ordered should be displayed in public places when, in 1603, he also became King James I of England. The public places included a great many pubs. The Hatfield Red Lion provided decent food and drink and was rather attractively refurbished inside but it was the sunshine which provided the high point as we looked from the garden to the ex-car park, now sold off for another building, where Keith Moon and Neil Boland had their tragic encounter..
COMMENT: In the third week of April we sat ouside in the pub garden in our shirtsleeves (and in the case of the cyclist, in his shorts) enjoyning the brilliant sunshine, more like high summer than Spring. With Jeff Tipper having just four days left at work, we collectively resemble ever more closely a day outing from a retirement home, though some of the details don't fit, eg the lack of Zimmer frames and the willingness/ability to walk/cycle long distances at home and abroad.
The "Red Lion" is the most common pub name in Britain but the Red Lion in Hatfield stands out from all the others because it was outside this pub that the craziest man in rock and roll, Keith Moon, drummer of The Who, killed his friend, driver and bodyguard Neil Boland.
On 4 January 1970, "Moon the Loon", drunk as usual, was trying outside the Red Lion to escape hostile patrons of the pub who had begun to attack his Bentley. Moon attempted to take control of his car which in the melee ran over and killed Boland. There is some doubt whether Moon was actually behind the wheel and the coroner in any event declared the incident an accident, Moon getting an absolute discharge having been charged with driving offences. But it appears the incident haunted Moon for the rest of his short life. He died of gross drug and alcohol abuse in London on 7 September 1978, aged 32. He was undoubtedly one of the greatest of rock drummers but is probably better remembered for the smashed up hotels, dynamited toilets, physically attacked girlfriends, and passings out on stage which punctuated his career.
Why is the "Red Lion" such a common pub name? (There are over 600 of them round the country.) The red lion is actually the red lion of Scotland which James VI of Scotland ordered should be displayed in public places when, in 1603, he also became King James I of England. The public places included a great many pubs. The Hatfield Red Lion provided decent food and drink and was rather attractively refurbished inside but it was the sunshine which provided the high point as we looked from the garden to the ex-car park, now sold off for another building, where Keith Moon and Neil Boland had their tragic encounter..
Tuesday, 12 April 2011
Pub Odyssey 15
Tuesday 12 April: WHITE HORSE, HERTFORD (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile- welcome back Elvis- Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, John Westwood).
COMMENT: probably the oldest pub yet visited, as the Fullers website says it goes back to the 14th century. As all properly educated persons know, this was the century in which the Scots stuffed the English (Bannockburn 1314, the most important date in European history), and in which the Black Death reduced the population of the world by one-third (1348-50). But in these dark days there was a bright side, they opened the White Horse.
Going inside the White Horse it does feel really old and not well suited for people over 5ft 10 inches. Not difficult to believe that our ancestors were shorter! Andrew needed to watch his head, and although it's a shame that David Room couldn't make it the White Horse couldn't be described as ideal territory for him either. Otherwise it was good, with nine real beers, decent food and friendly service though I nearly leapt to the low ceiling from a sitting start when the fire alarm went off as our food was being cooked!
Possibly the conversation was a shade vulgar. There was a good deal about the sexual outlook of teenagers, particularly teenagers from Essex (some of us are spending too much time in front of reality TV) plus more information about the Crazy Sexy Club of Frankfurt than was probably good for us. I saw a party of elderly people come into the pub for lunch and felt perhaps we should be toning the conversation down a bit; but when I went past them to get to the loo, I realised that at average age about 64 we were older than they were!
However, my big Pub Odyssey moment this week came when researching stuff about Charles Dickens and pubs (see Pub Odyssey 14). Imagine my delight when I saw in his novel "Martin Chuzzlewit" how Mrs Gamp, the drunken midwife, drank a pint of the "celebrated staggering ale, or Real Old Brighton Tipper, at supper". The Thomas Tipper brewery of Sussex produced ale where if anyone drank three pints "may the powers that are above preserve him". Sadly, the Tipper brewery closed in 1911. Any relation Jeff?
COMMENT: probably the oldest pub yet visited, as the Fullers website says it goes back to the 14th century. As all properly educated persons know, this was the century in which the Scots stuffed the English (Bannockburn 1314, the most important date in European history), and in which the Black Death reduced the population of the world by one-third (1348-50). But in these dark days there was a bright side, they opened the White Horse.
Going inside the White Horse it does feel really old and not well suited for people over 5ft 10 inches. Not difficult to believe that our ancestors were shorter! Andrew needed to watch his head, and although it's a shame that David Room couldn't make it the White Horse couldn't be described as ideal territory for him either. Otherwise it was good, with nine real beers, decent food and friendly service though I nearly leapt to the low ceiling from a sitting start when the fire alarm went off as our food was being cooked!
Possibly the conversation was a shade vulgar. There was a good deal about the sexual outlook of teenagers, particularly teenagers from Essex (some of us are spending too much time in front of reality TV) plus more information about the Crazy Sexy Club of Frankfurt than was probably good for us. I saw a party of elderly people come into the pub for lunch and felt perhaps we should be toning the conversation down a bit; but when I went past them to get to the loo, I realised that at average age about 64 we were older than they were!
However, my big Pub Odyssey moment this week came when researching stuff about Charles Dickens and pubs (see Pub Odyssey 14). Imagine my delight when I saw in his novel "Martin Chuzzlewit" how Mrs Gamp, the drunken midwife, drank a pint of the "celebrated staggering ale, or Real Old Brighton Tipper, at supper". The Thomas Tipper brewery of Sussex produced ale where if anyone drank three pints "may the powers that are above preserve him". Sadly, the Tipper brewery closed in 1911. Any relation Jeff?
Thursday, 7 April 2011
Pub Odyssey 14
Tuesday 5 April: OUR MUTUAL FRIEND, Broadwater Crescent, Stevenage ( Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift)
COMMENT: This is a pub much beloved of the local CAMRA branch, and I thought it encapsulated quite neatly the strengths and weaknesses of the CAMRA approach. On the plus side, the beer was excellent and I quite liked the decor and the Dickens memorabilia scattered about. On the minus side, the food options were very limited and if like Malcolm you are a vegetarian a cheese sandwich is what you get- and all you get. I wasn't too thrilled by the service either. Twice I approached the bar to make an order and the bar staff, engaged on something else (though the pub wasn't that busy) walked away. Good beer is critically important, and I am very grateful for what CAMRA has done and continues to do on that front, but OMF is the sort of place that tends to confirm the suspicion that in assessing pubs CAMRA consider there own obsessions rather than more general attractiveness.
Be that as it may, I did enjoy our visit, the company as always being excellent and the pub an interesting place in unusual ways. From the exterior it lacks all architectural charm, looking what it is, a basic almost prefab construction to service a post-war housing estate. But what it actually represents is the power of a man's name and reputation. The man is Charles Dickens (1812-70), the greatest of all English novelists and the greatest writer of any form of English after Shakespeare. Dickens was a man of London and Kent, but he had a local presence; he was a friend of Lord Lytton of Knebworth, another successful Victorian novelist- in fact Dickens gave readings of his novels at Knebworth House. When Lord Lytton decided to set up a pub in Broadwater (a fine late Victorian building, long since gone but pictured on the walls in the current pub) he had it named after the last completed novel of his friend Charles Dickens. In addition Dickens himself, always a generous and open-handed man, set up at some stage near there a sort of superior almshouse for journalists and writers fallen on hard times. Lord Lytton's pub and the almshouse are long gone, but when a new pub was created on the new housing estate Dickens' name still had the power for the pub to be called "Our Mutual Friend".
Although it seems to have been Dickens' general fame and local activities which led to all this, he did in fact love pubs. Dickens (like Shakespeare too) was fascinated by English inns, taverns and pubs, their drink, food and culture. He wrote endlessly about all these things; it has been calculated that 166 public houses of all types from grand to extremely seedy appear in his writings, some inventions of his imagination but many of them real places- we will meet at least two later on in the Odyssey.
COMMENT: This is a pub much beloved of the local CAMRA branch, and I thought it encapsulated quite neatly the strengths and weaknesses of the CAMRA approach. On the plus side, the beer was excellent and I quite liked the decor and the Dickens memorabilia scattered about. On the minus side, the food options were very limited and if like Malcolm you are a vegetarian a cheese sandwich is what you get- and all you get. I wasn't too thrilled by the service either. Twice I approached the bar to make an order and the bar staff, engaged on something else (though the pub wasn't that busy) walked away. Good beer is critically important, and I am very grateful for what CAMRA has done and continues to do on that front, but OMF is the sort of place that tends to confirm the suspicion that in assessing pubs CAMRA consider there own obsessions rather than more general attractiveness.
Be that as it may, I did enjoy our visit, the company as always being excellent and the pub an interesting place in unusual ways. From the exterior it lacks all architectural charm, looking what it is, a basic almost prefab construction to service a post-war housing estate. But what it actually represents is the power of a man's name and reputation. The man is Charles Dickens (1812-70), the greatest of all English novelists and the greatest writer of any form of English after Shakespeare. Dickens was a man of London and Kent, but he had a local presence; he was a friend of Lord Lytton of Knebworth, another successful Victorian novelist- in fact Dickens gave readings of his novels at Knebworth House. When Lord Lytton decided to set up a pub in Broadwater (a fine late Victorian building, long since gone but pictured on the walls in the current pub) he had it named after the last completed novel of his friend Charles Dickens. In addition Dickens himself, always a generous and open-handed man, set up at some stage near there a sort of superior almshouse for journalists and writers fallen on hard times. Lord Lytton's pub and the almshouse are long gone, but when a new pub was created on the new housing estate Dickens' name still had the power for the pub to be called "Our Mutual Friend".
Although it seems to have been Dickens' general fame and local activities which led to all this, he did in fact love pubs. Dickens (like Shakespeare too) was fascinated by English inns, taverns and pubs, their drink, food and culture. He wrote endlessly about all these things; it has been calculated that 166 public houses of all types from grand to extremely seedy appear in his writings, some inventions of his imagination but many of them real places- we will meet at least two later on in the Odyssey.
Pub Odyssey 13
Tuesday 29 March: THE HORNS, Bulls Green (Chris Haden, Gerry Murphy, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: I missed this one, walking the Thames Path with Anne (lots of nice pubs on that too). The Horns is a really ancient pub, probably the oldest we have yet been to. It's dated to 1543 (roughly the same age as the George and Dragon, Watton) but details of construction of the building suggest it is 100 years older than that. It is relatively upmarket now, but for much of its long life seems to have been the lowest form of pub life, far below inns and taverns, a simple beer house serving the hamlet of Bulls Green. Like many such, it also doubled, or trebled or quadrupled, as an auction room, traders meeting and bargaining post, livery stables, farmhouse. Its basic nature is suggested by the fact that as recently as the 1920s there was a hayloft over the main bar, and until the introduction of piped water to the parish in 1915 most of the water used daily would have come from the nearby moat (the last remnant of which is the small pond opposite). In such grim and often unhealthy suroundings our rural ancestors lived their lives and took their pleasure. The Horns is a pleasant place now where our team enjoyed their food (getting in just ahead of a big crowd of punters, always a pleasure to see); a hundred years ago it might have been a somewhat different story.
COMMENT: I missed this one, walking the Thames Path with Anne (lots of nice pubs on that too). The Horns is a really ancient pub, probably the oldest we have yet been to. It's dated to 1543 (roughly the same age as the George and Dragon, Watton) but details of construction of the building suggest it is 100 years older than that. It is relatively upmarket now, but for much of its long life seems to have been the lowest form of pub life, far below inns and taverns, a simple beer house serving the hamlet of Bulls Green. Like many such, it also doubled, or trebled or quadrupled, as an auction room, traders meeting and bargaining post, livery stables, farmhouse. Its basic nature is suggested by the fact that as recently as the 1920s there was a hayloft over the main bar, and until the introduction of piped water to the parish in 1915 most of the water used daily would have come from the nearby moat (the last remnant of which is the small pond opposite). In such grim and often unhealthy suroundings our rural ancestors lived their lives and took their pleasure. The Horns is a pleasant place now where our team enjoyed their food (getting in just ahead of a big crowd of punters, always a pleasure to see); a hundred years ago it might have been a somewhat different story.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Pub Odyssey 12
Tuesday 29 March: BAKER ARMS, BAYFORD ( Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms, John Westwood).
COMMENT: Six (idle but shrewd) drove to this pub, three (mentally challenged) cycled there. It's uphill all the way, and if it is less than five miles from Tewin, even as the crow flies, I will eat my bicycle. I am not a crow and all I know is that I did eight miles in all and spent the last two behind Andrew's rear wheel climbing pretty steeply from the Lower Hatfield Road to the pub. When I got there the first pint barely touched my sides on the way down. The heat was on for me in other ways too. Call me sensitive, but I got the impression that some of our gallant band were becoming unnecessarily obsessed with the implications of going out to lunch with sweaty men in tights.
The Baker Arms turned out to be a McMullans pub with, yet again, decent pub food and a nice barmaid/waitress who was not fazed by our bizarre behaviour as we paid the bill. Andrew Swift's personalised cashback system may not have puzzled her, but it certainly baffled me at the other end of the table.
The Baker Arms has nothing to do with baking, despite the fancy baker's hat embossed on the polo shirts of the barpersons. It's named for the Baker family who were the local landowners, and built the row of cottages which includes the pub in the mid 19th century. A little surprisingly, the pub is a grade 2 listed building. I looked the Bakers up and they seemed an uninteresting bunch. There most prominent member was Sir William Baker, a wealthy merchant who in the 18th century attended Parliament for a few years and didn't do much there except hang around the Kit-Cat Club. What they did at the Club I don't know, except that it didn't have to do with chocolate. (It also didn't go in for uninhibited all round sexual intercourse and kinky dressing as does the Kit-Cat Club of Berlin today.) This lack of pzazz is very disappointing; surely the Bakers could have produced something better than a mere malingering fop given the cast list of homicidal monarchs, crazy politician's wives, mad bad poets, insane walking champions, and juvenile architects connected with previous pubs on the Odyssey. Still, you can't win them all.
COMMENT: Six (idle but shrewd) drove to this pub, three (mentally challenged) cycled there. It's uphill all the way, and if it is less than five miles from Tewin, even as the crow flies, I will eat my bicycle. I am not a crow and all I know is that I did eight miles in all and spent the last two behind Andrew's rear wheel climbing pretty steeply from the Lower Hatfield Road to the pub. When I got there the first pint barely touched my sides on the way down. The heat was on for me in other ways too. Call me sensitive, but I got the impression that some of our gallant band were becoming unnecessarily obsessed with the implications of going out to lunch with sweaty men in tights.
The Baker Arms turned out to be a McMullans pub with, yet again, decent pub food and a nice barmaid/waitress who was not fazed by our bizarre behaviour as we paid the bill. Andrew Swift's personalised cashback system may not have puzzled her, but it certainly baffled me at the other end of the table.
The Baker Arms has nothing to do with baking, despite the fancy baker's hat embossed on the polo shirts of the barpersons. It's named for the Baker family who were the local landowners, and built the row of cottages which includes the pub in the mid 19th century. A little surprisingly, the pub is a grade 2 listed building. I looked the Bakers up and they seemed an uninteresting bunch. There most prominent member was Sir William Baker, a wealthy merchant who in the 18th century attended Parliament for a few years and didn't do much there except hang around the Kit-Cat Club. What they did at the Club I don't know, except that it didn't have to do with chocolate. (It also didn't go in for uninhibited all round sexual intercourse and kinky dressing as does the Kit-Cat Club of Berlin today.) This lack of pzazz is very disappointing; surely the Bakers could have produced something better than a mere malingering fop given the cast list of homicidal monarchs, crazy politician's wives, mad bad poets, insane walking champions, and juvenile architects connected with previous pubs on the Odyssey. Still, you can't win them all.
Thursday, 17 March 2011
Pub Odyssey 11
Tuesday 15 March: LYTTON ARMS, Old Knebworth (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: A good turnout for this attractive free house, famous for its range of real ales. It's also the first pub on the Odyssey allegedly designed by a famous architect. This was Sir Edwin Lutyens (1869-1944) who created New Delhi, many English country houses, the Cenotaph in Whitehall, the rather creepy Monument to the Fallen at Thiepval in Flanders, etc etc. I say "allegedly" because although its superficially quite plausible that Lutyens did the work (he married a member of the Lytton family of Knebworth House and designed other buildings in Knebworth including one of the churches) the dates don't seem right. The Lytton Arms website states the pub was built around 1877 (replacing another that is now a private house next door). However, in 1877 Lutyens was only eight years old and talented though he was I think designing a pub while still in junior school is a bit precocious. Probably Lutyens did a later makeover for the pub. However, whoever was responsible, they did a good job.
The Lytton Arms is in the "lucky dip" section of the Good Pub Guide as is the Waggoners at Ayot Green. Of the eleven pubs so far visited on the Odyssey, only the Old Barge (Hertford) gets into CAMRA's Good Beer Guide. Its interesting that eight of the eleven don't get into either of my two bibles for pub going yet I would say that everywhere we have had good honest pub food and good beer. And although we are an ill-disciplined crew given to turning up in the wrong numbers and never on time, everywhere we have met only friendliness, good humour, courteous efficient and quick service. Makes you proud to be British!
COMMENT: A good turnout for this attractive free house, famous for its range of real ales. It's also the first pub on the Odyssey allegedly designed by a famous architect. This was Sir Edwin Lutyens (1869-1944) who created New Delhi, many English country houses, the Cenotaph in Whitehall, the rather creepy Monument to the Fallen at Thiepval in Flanders, etc etc. I say "allegedly" because although its superficially quite plausible that Lutyens did the work (he married a member of the Lytton family of Knebworth House and designed other buildings in Knebworth including one of the churches) the dates don't seem right. The Lytton Arms website states the pub was built around 1877 (replacing another that is now a private house next door). However, in 1877 Lutyens was only eight years old and talented though he was I think designing a pub while still in junior school is a bit precocious. Probably Lutyens did a later makeover for the pub. However, whoever was responsible, they did a good job.
The Lytton Arms is in the "lucky dip" section of the Good Pub Guide as is the Waggoners at Ayot Green. Of the eleven pubs so far visited on the Odyssey, only the Old Barge (Hertford) gets into CAMRA's Good Beer Guide. Its interesting that eight of the eleven don't get into either of my two bibles for pub going yet I would say that everywhere we have had good honest pub food and good beer. And although we are an ill-disciplined crew given to turning up in the wrong numbers and never on time, everywhere we have met only friendliness, good humour, courteous efficient and quick service. Makes you proud to be British!
Pub Odyssey 10
Wednesday 9 March: BRIDGE HOUSE, HERTFORD (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: An attenuated turnout this time with a lot of us away; three (Malcolm, David, Jeff) on a bike maintenance course; myself in Malta; and Steve in Bangladesh (where England collapsed before the cricketing power that is Ireland: later England bowed down before the invincible machine that is Bangladesh). The bike maintenance crew have, I regret to say, suffered a lot of ragging from uncouth non-cyclists who do not realise, as I do, that cyclists represent all that is best and finest in Britain today. Forget the mocking riff-raff! They only sound like Jeremy Clarkson, a fate too terrible to contemplate.
Anyway, getting back to the Bridge House, formerly known as the Sele Arms, the reports were of good and not expensive food, and a good time had by the small turnout. But the pub is interesting in other ways. So far on the Odyssey we have seen 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th century pubs and a couple of modern ones (post 1975). The Bridge House is clearly a "between the wars" pub. The invaluable web source, deadpubs.co.uk, states tersely that this pub "may not have been established till the 1930s". To me the Bridge House, seen from the outside, screams "1920-1939". The inter-war years were hard for pubs and breweries with rising taxes and an economic depression (sound familiar?) and the brewers reacted by trying to create new-style pubs which imitated then popular architectural styles, so you get "arts and crafts" pubs, stockbroker tudor pubs, even art deco pubs. The Bridge House is clearly stockbroker tudor; seen from the outside it could be a large inter-war house in Brookmans Park or somewhere similar. These pubs were often called "road houses" because they were situated at strategic points on the new highways to catch the hugely increasing car traffic (few seemed to worry about drink driving in those days). However, in the case of the Bridge House, I suspect it might better be called a "railway house"; it must surely have been set up to catch the punters emerging from Hertford North railway station opposite, opened in 1924.
COMMENT: An attenuated turnout this time with a lot of us away; three (Malcolm, David, Jeff) on a bike maintenance course; myself in Malta; and Steve in Bangladesh (where England collapsed before the cricketing power that is Ireland: later England bowed down before the invincible machine that is Bangladesh). The bike maintenance crew have, I regret to say, suffered a lot of ragging from uncouth non-cyclists who do not realise, as I do, that cyclists represent all that is best and finest in Britain today. Forget the mocking riff-raff! They only sound like Jeremy Clarkson, a fate too terrible to contemplate.
Anyway, getting back to the Bridge House, formerly known as the Sele Arms, the reports were of good and not expensive food, and a good time had by the small turnout. But the pub is interesting in other ways. So far on the Odyssey we have seen 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th century pubs and a couple of modern ones (post 1975). The Bridge House is clearly a "between the wars" pub. The invaluable web source, deadpubs.co.uk, states tersely that this pub "may not have been established till the 1930s". To me the Bridge House, seen from the outside, screams "1920-1939". The inter-war years were hard for pubs and breweries with rising taxes and an economic depression (sound familiar?) and the brewers reacted by trying to create new-style pubs which imitated then popular architectural styles, so you get "arts and crafts" pubs, stockbroker tudor pubs, even art deco pubs. The Bridge House is clearly stockbroker tudor; seen from the outside it could be a large inter-war house in Brookmans Park or somewhere similar. These pubs were often called "road houses" because they were situated at strategic points on the new highways to catch the hugely increasing car traffic (few seemed to worry about drink driving in those days). However, in the case of the Bridge House, I suspect it might better be called a "railway house"; it must surely have been set up to catch the punters emerging from Hertford North railway station opposite, opened in 1924.
Thursday, 3 March 2011
Pub Odyssey 9
Wednesday 2 March: SUN, LEMSFORD (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, David Room, John Westwood)
COMMENT: For me the epitome of a middle-of-the-road pub with decent food (and lots of it) but nothing particularly unusual. The most unusual things we saw were the implausibly, incredibly youthful photos of Gerry, Chris Parkinson and (yes, its true) Elvis brought along by John Westwood.
The Sun is another stagecoach pub. From the 1600s to 1833 the "Old Great North Road" from London to York passed through Lemsford which was a day's coach ride from London. In those days Lemsford had four coaching inns for the stagecoach traffic, two survive today as the Sun and the Long and Short Arm. Right at the end of these glory days, in 1824, the wife of a future Prime Minister, Lady Caroline Lamb ("mad bad and dangerous to know", so different from Cherie Blair or Mrs Cameron) watched from the Brocket estate as the funeral cortege of her lover Lord Byron (also mad, bad and dangerous to know) passed through Lemsford. But in 1833 a bypass was cut through from Stanborough to Ayot Green and Lemsford lost its pivotal place on the Great North Road.
The Sun is a common pub name, popular perhaps because there's nothing easier than sticking up a pub sign with a big yellow blob on it- easy to do, easy to recognise. But it is also the royal emblem of King Edward IV (1461-83), grandfather of Henry VIII, like him in appearance (though no beard) but also like him in an unfortunate attitude towards women and general bloodthirstiness. Henry scored high in the bloodthirstiness stages by chopping off the heads of two of his six wives (Edward had only one wife who managed to survive, despite his partiality for London tradesmen's wives) but Edward had a bloodthirstiness trump card. Even Henry VIII couldn't match Edward's performance when, dissatisfied with his brother's political conduct, he had him drowned in a butt of Malmesey wine. What a way to go! But both Edward and Henry had to acknowlege top-level bloodthirstiness in the performance of their great ancestor, Roger Mortimer first earl of March, who apparently had King Edward II murdered by having a red hot poker stuck up his anus. Never a dull moment with members of that family. Edward IV and Henry VIII got the reward their fame deserved, remembered in countless "Sun" and "Kings Head" pub signs all over England.
COMMENT: For me the epitome of a middle-of-the-road pub with decent food (and lots of it) but nothing particularly unusual. The most unusual things we saw were the implausibly, incredibly youthful photos of Gerry, Chris Parkinson and (yes, its true) Elvis brought along by John Westwood.
The Sun is another stagecoach pub. From the 1600s to 1833 the "Old Great North Road" from London to York passed through Lemsford which was a day's coach ride from London. In those days Lemsford had four coaching inns for the stagecoach traffic, two survive today as the Sun and the Long and Short Arm. Right at the end of these glory days, in 1824, the wife of a future Prime Minister, Lady Caroline Lamb ("mad bad and dangerous to know", so different from Cherie Blair or Mrs Cameron) watched from the Brocket estate as the funeral cortege of her lover Lord Byron (also mad, bad and dangerous to know) passed through Lemsford. But in 1833 a bypass was cut through from Stanborough to Ayot Green and Lemsford lost its pivotal place on the Great North Road.
The Sun is a common pub name, popular perhaps because there's nothing easier than sticking up a pub sign with a big yellow blob on it- easy to do, easy to recognise. But it is also the royal emblem of King Edward IV (1461-83), grandfather of Henry VIII, like him in appearance (though no beard) but also like him in an unfortunate attitude towards women and general bloodthirstiness. Henry scored high in the bloodthirstiness stages by chopping off the heads of two of his six wives (Edward had only one wife who managed to survive, despite his partiality for London tradesmen's wives) but Edward had a bloodthirstiness trump card. Even Henry VIII couldn't match Edward's performance when, dissatisfied with his brother's political conduct, he had him drowned in a butt of Malmesey wine. What a way to go! But both Edward and Henry had to acknowlege top-level bloodthirstiness in the performance of their great ancestor, Roger Mortimer first earl of March, who apparently had King Edward II murdered by having a red hot poker stuck up his anus. Never a dull moment with members of that family. Edward IV and Henry VIII got the reward their fame deserved, remembered in countless "Sun" and "Kings Head" pub signs all over England.
Monday, 21 February 2011
Pub Odyssey 8
Monday 21 February: THE GEORGE AND DRAGON, Watton at Stone: (Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, David Room, Roger Toms, John Westwood.)
COMMENT: A decent but not cheap meal, and good banter, in a small, ancient but rather chilly room! The George and Dragon is by 200 years the oldest pub we have yet been to, and I think the first to be a Grade II listed building. The listing notice says that it is mid to late 16th century, extended and renovated several times since. To put that in context, it's most likely that either Henry VIII or Elizabeth I was on the throne when it was built (between them these two famous monarchs reigned for 80 years of the 16th century) The George and Dragon is the first pub on the Odyssey to have been named after a saint, St George the patron saint of England no less. (Up till now the pub names have reflected royal emblems, local landowners, agricultural and commercial activities). This combination of a 16th century origin and a saint's name makes the pub a bit of a puzzle to me. As everyone knows, Henry VIII initiated and Elizabeth I consolidated the establishment of Protestantism in England. Amongst other things, this included the democratic idea that everyone had their own personal relationship with God and didn't need the intervention and help of saints to achieve salvation. So under the Tudors many saints' days were abolished. So why in this Protestant era call your pub after a saint? Woe betide you if Henry VIII, "that spot of blood and grease on English history", got to hear of it. So much safer, for example, to call the pub instead the Rose and Crown after the Tudor emblem. I have this image, probably a fantasy, of someone in the remote village of Watton hating the religious changes which were being forced on him from above and as a small act of defiance calling his pub after a popular saint. If so I hope he got away with it.
Incidentally, it's always struck me as odd that the patron saint of England should be St George, in reality an aristocrat of the late Roman Empire born in Syria and martyred by the Emperor Diocletian in Nicodemia (Turkey) on 23 April 303AD. George had no British connection, probably didn't even know where Britannia was, but there you go. The stuff about rescuing a maiden from a dragon was just a load of nonsense invented by some overheated monk in the Middle Ages.
COMMENT: A decent but not cheap meal, and good banter, in a small, ancient but rather chilly room! The George and Dragon is by 200 years the oldest pub we have yet been to, and I think the first to be a Grade II listed building. The listing notice says that it is mid to late 16th century, extended and renovated several times since. To put that in context, it's most likely that either Henry VIII or Elizabeth I was on the throne when it was built (between them these two famous monarchs reigned for 80 years of the 16th century) The George and Dragon is the first pub on the Odyssey to have been named after a saint, St George the patron saint of England no less. (Up till now the pub names have reflected royal emblems, local landowners, agricultural and commercial activities). This combination of a 16th century origin and a saint's name makes the pub a bit of a puzzle to me. As everyone knows, Henry VIII initiated and Elizabeth I consolidated the establishment of Protestantism in England. Amongst other things, this included the democratic idea that everyone had their own personal relationship with God and didn't need the intervention and help of saints to achieve salvation. So under the Tudors many saints' days were abolished. So why in this Protestant era call your pub after a saint? Woe betide you if Henry VIII, "that spot of blood and grease on English history", got to hear of it. So much safer, for example, to call the pub instead the Rose and Crown after the Tudor emblem. I have this image, probably a fantasy, of someone in the remote village of Watton hating the religious changes which were being forced on him from above and as a small act of defiance calling his pub after a popular saint. If so I hope he got away with it.
Incidentally, it's always struck me as odd that the patron saint of England should be St George, in reality an aristocrat of the late Roman Empire born in Syria and martyred by the Emperor Diocletian in Nicodemia (Turkey) on 23 April 303AD. George had no British connection, probably didn't even know where Britannia was, but there you go. The stuff about rescuing a maiden from a dragon was just a load of nonsense invented by some overheated monk in the Middle Ages.
Tuesday, 15 February 2011
Pub Odyssey 7
Tuesday 15 February: COWPER ARMS, DIGSWELL (Malcolm Allen, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms, John Westwood)
COMMENT: I missed this one so nothing to say about food, discussion etc (other comments welcome!) But in terms of Hertfordshire history this pub is an interesting place. Once again, it shows the close connection between pubs, transport and trade. Already we have been at pubs closely connected with river trade (Old Barge, Hertford) and stagecoach trade (Waggoners, Ayot Green and White Horse, Welwyn). With the Cowper Arms the connection is of course with the railways. The pub was built in 1850 at the same time as Welwyn North station by the same navvies who built the station and Welwyn Viaduct and with the same bricks. (Welwyn North station was known as Welwyn station until 1926 when Welwyn Garden City station was opened.) The pub therefore was a speculation to make money out of railway traffic just as the others had been for river and road traffic. Perhaps the local landowner, Lord Cowper of Panshanger, had a hand in it since it was named after him. Victorian enterprise, therefore, but the pub also showed the harsh side of unrestrained Victorian capitalism. In the 1850s there was an appalling accident in the railway tunnel and the bodies were brought to lie in the Cowper Arms in preparation for the inquest.
COMMENT: I missed this one so nothing to say about food, discussion etc (other comments welcome!) But in terms of Hertfordshire history this pub is an interesting place. Once again, it shows the close connection between pubs, transport and trade. Already we have been at pubs closely connected with river trade (Old Barge, Hertford) and stagecoach trade (Waggoners, Ayot Green and White Horse, Welwyn). With the Cowper Arms the connection is of course with the railways. The pub was built in 1850 at the same time as Welwyn North station by the same navvies who built the station and Welwyn Viaduct and with the same bricks. (Welwyn North station was known as Welwyn station until 1926 when Welwyn Garden City station was opened.) The pub therefore was a speculation to make money out of railway traffic just as the others had been for river and road traffic. Perhaps the local landowner, Lord Cowper of Panshanger, had a hand in it since it was named after him. Victorian enterprise, therefore, but the pub also showed the harsh side of unrestrained Victorian capitalism. In the 1850s there was an appalling accident in the railway tunnel and the bodies were brought to lie in the Cowper Arms in preparation for the inquest.
Wednesday, 9 February 2011
Pub Odyssey 6
Tuesday 8 February 2011: WHITE HORSE, WELWYN VILLAGE (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Bob Polydorou, Steve Stott, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: This is a nice pub with five different good beers (the Rose and the Plume might take note that it is possible to get beyond two good beer options) and in food terms we got lucky. The food is good but restaurant-type prices; luckily for us they had a "2 for 1" main course deal so everyone was happy.
The White Horse is a 17th century coaching inn in a village famous for pubs; indeed Welwyn village used to be in the Guinness Book of Records as having more pubs proportionate to population than anywhere in England. It isn't now, but it still has a lot of pubs. In fact they have been drinking in Welwyn for 2,000 years. Roman wine jars from the Mediterranean were discovered in Prospect Place, so the pubs, old as they are, represent what might be called the modern movement.
The White Horse is a very common pub name (in fact there are more pubs of this name within 5 miles of Tewin than any other name). The white horse was the emblem of the Saxon Kings of Wessex and is the traditional emblem of Kent. A galloping white horse was also a heraldic sign of the Royal house of Hanover, Kings of Britain and Ireland from 1714. Since pubs go strongly for royalty (both the Rose and Crown and the Plume of Feathers are names connected with royalty) this meant the White Horse was a winner all round in the pub names stakes. Also, with a lot of Guilds favouring the white horse in their coats of arms, it was particularly popular as a pub name in London, where even now there are more than 40 pubs called the White Horse.
COMMENT: This is a nice pub with five different good beers (the Rose and the Plume might take note that it is possible to get beyond two good beer options) and in food terms we got lucky. The food is good but restaurant-type prices; luckily for us they had a "2 for 1" main course deal so everyone was happy.
The White Horse is a 17th century coaching inn in a village famous for pubs; indeed Welwyn village used to be in the Guinness Book of Records as having more pubs proportionate to population than anywhere in England. It isn't now, but it still has a lot of pubs. In fact they have been drinking in Welwyn for 2,000 years. Roman wine jars from the Mediterranean were discovered in Prospect Place, so the pubs, old as they are, represent what might be called the modern movement.
The White Horse is a very common pub name (in fact there are more pubs of this name within 5 miles of Tewin than any other name). The white horse was the emblem of the Saxon Kings of Wessex and is the traditional emblem of Kent. A galloping white horse was also a heraldic sign of the Royal house of Hanover, Kings of Britain and Ireland from 1714. Since pubs go strongly for royalty (both the Rose and Crown and the Plume of Feathers are names connected with royalty) this meant the White Horse was a winner all round in the pub names stakes. Also, with a lot of Guilds favouring the white horse in their coats of arms, it was particularly popular as a pub name in London, where even now there are more than 40 pubs called the White Horse.
Thursday, 3 February 2011
Pub Odyssey 5
Wednesday 2 February THE WAGGONERS, Ayot Green (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Poydorou, Roger Spendley, Steve Stott, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: Nice meal and beer in a pub with French owners (as has been the case at the Waggoners, on and off, for a long time) but not really much of a French look to the bar menu. Mostly we had omelettes- very nice. Might be a more Frenchified look to the restaurant menu (and personnel). I remember years ago going for a meal with Anne and asking the waitress, clearly just off the plane from Paris, for a pint of London Pride. She looked blank; "a pint of London Pride? What is it you have commanded?" But it was a good meal..
The history is that when the stagecoach service on the Great North Road was set up in the 17th century coaching inns sprang up on the road like mushrooms after rain. The Waggoners was one of them, on the stretch of the road between Lemsford and Corey's Mill in Stevenage. We go next week to another 17th century coaching inn, also on the Great North Road, the White Horse in Welwyn village.
Why "The Waggoners"? Obviously before the railways goods were carried everywhere on horse-drawn waggons. Many inns acted as agents, and goods could be left there for onward transmission or for local collection. I regret to say the name has nothing to do with "being on the waggon". This expression for being teetotal is an abbreviation of "being on the water waggon", water being delivered on waggons in the days before Jeff Tipper took the system in hand..
COMMENT: Nice meal and beer in a pub with French owners (as has been the case at the Waggoners, on and off, for a long time) but not really much of a French look to the bar menu. Mostly we had omelettes- very nice. Might be a more Frenchified look to the restaurant menu (and personnel). I remember years ago going for a meal with Anne and asking the waitress, clearly just off the plane from Paris, for a pint of London Pride. She looked blank; "a pint of London Pride? What is it you have commanded?" But it was a good meal..
The history is that when the stagecoach service on the Great North Road was set up in the 17th century coaching inns sprang up on the road like mushrooms after rain. The Waggoners was one of them, on the stretch of the road between Lemsford and Corey's Mill in Stevenage. We go next week to another 17th century coaching inn, also on the Great North Road, the White Horse in Welwyn village.
Why "The Waggoners"? Obviously before the railways goods were carried everywhere on horse-drawn waggons. Many inns acted as agents, and goods could be left there for onward transmission or for local collection. I regret to say the name has nothing to do with "being on the waggon". This expression for being teetotal is an abbreviation of "being on the water waggon", water being delivered on waggons in the days before Jeff Tipper took the system in hand..
Monday, 24 January 2011
Pub Odyssey 4
Monday 24 January: OLD BARGE, Hertford (Malcolm Allen, Chris Haden, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, David Room, Andrew Swift, Jeff Tipper)
COMMENT: Nice riverside pub, excellent selection of beers, good food I thought if a bit expensive. Not as old a pub as I'd expected- cottages were constructed on the site in 1802 and (as someone more erudite than me said at lunch) the site was used for a clay pipe factory in the 1820s. By 1837 one of the cottages was an inn called the "Jolly Bargeman". Incidentally, the folly wasn't an island till Hertford Dock (now the Marina) was constructed in the 1850s.
If the Black Horse's claim to fame is its own rugby club, the Old Barge also has sporting eminence. A former landlord, Harry Curtis Garner, once held all national walking records between 1 and 30 miles. In 1891 in New York he established a new world record for the quarter mile- 1 minute and 23 seconds.
COMMENT: Nice riverside pub, excellent selection of beers, good food I thought if a bit expensive. Not as old a pub as I'd expected- cottages were constructed on the site in 1802 and (as someone more erudite than me said at lunch) the site was used for a clay pipe factory in the 1820s. By 1837 one of the cottages was an inn called the "Jolly Bargeman". Incidentally, the folly wasn't an island till Hertford Dock (now the Marina) was constructed in the 1850s.
If the Black Horse's claim to fame is its own rugby club, the Old Barge also has sporting eminence. A former landlord, Harry Curtis Garner, once held all national walking records between 1 and 30 miles. In 1891 in New York he established a new world record for the quarter mile- 1 minute and 23 seconds.
Saturday, 22 January 2011
Pub Odyssey 3
Week 3: Tuesday 18 January BLACK HORSE, Hertford (Chris Haden, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms)
COMMENT: I missed the Black Horse because sunning myself in Lanzarote and although it's clearly an ancient foundation I can't find any historical details about the pub. It does have one uncommon feature, it has had its own RFU-affiliated rugby team for 30 years! Presumably they have got new players during that time! Why are pubs called the Black Horse? It's not related to Lloyds Bank, it started long before Lloyds was created. The Black Horse was a pub name from at least the fourteenth century. Lloyds got their name because the black horse was the sign for goldsmiths in Lombard Street in London (goldsmiths often went into banking). So the avaracious banking bastards who have so financially damaged the country (and the world) can't even claim they created a pub name.
COMMENT: I missed the Black Horse because sunning myself in Lanzarote and although it's clearly an ancient foundation I can't find any historical details about the pub. It does have one uncommon feature, it has had its own RFU-affiliated rugby team for 30 years! Presumably they have got new players during that time! Why are pubs called the Black Horse? It's not related to Lloyds Bank, it started long before Lloyds was created. The Black Horse was a pub name from at least the fourteenth century. Lloyds got their name because the black horse was the sign for goldsmiths in Lombard Street in London (goldsmiths often went into banking). So the avaracious banking bastards who have so financially damaged the country (and the world) can't even claim they created a pub name.
Monday, 10 January 2011
Pub odyssey 1and 2
Hi folks. This is a basic blog of progress through 52 pubs in 52 weeks, all within 5 miles of Harwood/Godfries Close. One day I may be good enough to add photos and other attractions but not yet!
Week 1: Friday 7 January. FAIRWAY TAVERN, Welwyn Garden City. (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Roger Spendley, Jeff Tipper.)
Week 2: Tuesday 11 January. ATTIMORE HALL, Welwyn Garden City. (Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Roger Spendley, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms.)
COMMENT: Hertfordshire is a historic county with loads of ancient pubs and where did we start but with a pub opened in 1975 (Fairway) and one in 1986 (Attimore). But both illustrate features of modern life. The Fairway was set up by Welwyn and Hartfield Council in 1975 along with the golf course, at a time when councils were creatively interested in providing services for ratepayers. Thatcherisation overtook the Fairway in 2004, when it was sold to a private owner. (I know Thatcher was long gone by 2004, but her spectre sure is a long one.) If the Fairway demonstrates a move from a help-the-citizens culture to a "there is no such thing as society" privatisation approach, then the Attimore demonstrates the creeping urbanisation of Hertfordshire. The Attimore was built as a farm somewhere between 1640 and 1700, originally with 300 acres, but the progressive expansion of Welwyn Garden City ate up the farmland and in 1986 after a survey it was decided to turn it into a pub.
Unless you love Thatcherism and/or are keen to see rural Hertfordshire concreted over these might be regarded as negative developments but at least they gave us two more pubs. And we had a decent pub meal at both. Another positive is that both serve good beer (Courage Best Bitter and Directors at the Fairway, London Pride and Courage at the Attimore). For this we have to thank neither Thatcher, Welwyn Hatfield Council, nor pubcos but the unremitting efforts of consumers, particularly the Campaign For Real Ale. But for them it is a cert we would be drinking shite like Watneys Red Barrel (remember that?) whoever the owners and whatever the history. For avoiding that fate we must raise a glass in celebration.
.
Week 1: Friday 7 January. FAIRWAY TAVERN, Welwyn Garden City. (Malcolm Allen, Mike Horsman, Elvis Pile, David Room, Roger Spendley, Jeff Tipper.)
Week 2: Tuesday 11 January. ATTIMORE HALL, Welwyn Garden City. (Mike Horsman, Gerry Murphy, Elvis Pile, Bob Polydorou, Roger Spendley, Andrew Swift, Roger Toms.)
COMMENT: Hertfordshire is a historic county with loads of ancient pubs and where did we start but with a pub opened in 1975 (Fairway) and one in 1986 (Attimore). But both illustrate features of modern life. The Fairway was set up by Welwyn and Hartfield Council in 1975 along with the golf course, at a time when councils were creatively interested in providing services for ratepayers. Thatcherisation overtook the Fairway in 2004, when it was sold to a private owner. (I know Thatcher was long gone by 2004, but her spectre sure is a long one.) If the Fairway demonstrates a move from a help-the-citizens culture to a "there is no such thing as society" privatisation approach, then the Attimore demonstrates the creeping urbanisation of Hertfordshire. The Attimore was built as a farm somewhere between 1640 and 1700, originally with 300 acres, but the progressive expansion of Welwyn Garden City ate up the farmland and in 1986 after a survey it was decided to turn it into a pub.
Unless you love Thatcherism and/or are keen to see rural Hertfordshire concreted over these might be regarded as negative developments but at least they gave us two more pubs. And we had a decent pub meal at both. Another positive is that both serve good beer (Courage Best Bitter and Directors at the Fairway, London Pride and Courage at the Attimore). For this we have to thank neither Thatcher, Welwyn Hatfield Council, nor pubcos but the unremitting efforts of consumers, particularly the Campaign For Real Ale. But for them it is a cert we would be drinking shite like Watneys Red Barrel (remember that?) whoever the owners and whatever the history. For avoiding that fate we must raise a glass in celebration.
.
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