From King's Head to Nag's Head – the Oxford Road in Wycombe

 

Oxford Street looking west from the foot of Frogmoor c1905. The King’s Head to the left and the Half Moon to the right. Further down on the right is the Woolpack with what looks like a ladder propped up against it, and the Old Angel two doors further back (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

This map shows the road layout c1875 and all the pubs in this post as far as the Ship on Oxford Road. 

Key to pubs

1 King’s Head  2 Half Moon  3 Old Angel  4 Woolpack  5 Ye Exchange  

6 Hogshead  7 Ship  8 Prince Albert  9 George & Dragon

In 1662 Meredith Jonas sold a property to Edward Bedder and others. Although there’s no mention of this property being a public house, Bedder had an interest in the Naggs [sic] Head, next door to the Maidenhead in the High Street, from 1656. By 1698 the house was the Saracen’s Head alehouse when Edward’s widow, Elizabeth, sold it to John Tomlins. 

The name had changed by 1724 to the Sun when the pub was sold again.

Sometime between a sale of 1737, and another in 1794 to Samuel Veary, the Sun had ceased to trade, and it also appears to have become two cottages. In 1825 these cottages had become a dwelling and a shop, though Brown tells us that brewer John Rotton sold leaseholds to brewers Biddle & Wheeler in 1812 that included the King’s Head (1). 

Both the dwelling and shop were sold to George Lloyd Parker in 1833. The earliest borough poor rate record of 1836 shows one of the properties as the King’s Head and one to the east of the alehouse as a shop.

When William Hawes took on the pub in 1850 he changed its name to the New Wheat Sheaf until he left in 1854. Then Weller’s brewery of Amersham took a 21-year lease with James Moody as licensee, while James Shephard had the shop next door. Parker sold both properties to Shephard in 1866, who then sold them to Thomas Marshall in 1872. Marshall sold the pub to Lucas’ Frogmoor brewery in 1881; we don’t know who had the lease, but it seems likely it was Lucas. 

Architect Arthur Vernon carried out alterations to the building in 1894/5 to make it look less like a private house and more like a pub, as was the fashion at the time.

The King’s Head with a new frontage c1895 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Nearly all of Oxford Street’s pubs by the late 1920s were old and cramped. They needed either rebuilding or moving to another site. In 1937 a plan to move the King’s Head to the old Temperance Hotel on the south-west corner of Frogmoor was, for reasons unknown, abandoned. 

The King’s Head in 1953 with a 1930s frontage to compliment the Rex cinema’s art deco design of 1938 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

Rebuilding, to take in the Haven Restaurant to the east – that was the original shop mentioned in the 1825 sale – started in 1963 and was completed in 1965. The Callaway family had run the pub since 1903 until son Freddie retired when the old pub closed. 

The King’s Head in 1972 in its dreary 1965 version. The new pub took in the Haven Restaurant to the left, and the Rex has gone too (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Owners, Courage, swapped some pubs with Allied Breweries in 1978, including the King’s Head. It was refurbished in 1981 at a cost of £25,000. Renamed Byrd’s in 1983, it became a wine bar by 1985, though it also sold milk. Allied spent a further £20,000 on another refurbishment during a short closure in 1986. 

The pub then disappeared after 1988 having become a series of cafes, bars and restaurants, including Capone’s in 1992, Liberty’s, also in 1992, and Bella Pasta in 1995. Today it is Roosters Piri Piri and Dennis’s restaurants.

Almost opposite the King’s Head was the Half Moon (2), first mentioned in the 1737 will of John Deane who left cottages next to the alehouse to beneficiaries. Nothing much else is known until Wheeler’s were the owners in the mid-1830s, though some sources suggest Wycombe brewers Samuel Welles and Messrs Biddle may have leased the pub in the late 18th century.

By the 1860s, when the Hearn family provided the licensees, it was clear it was already struggling for space as the pub’s stables were in Bowdery’s Lane and regular complaints were being made about wagons owned by the pub being left parked on Oxford Street for hours on end.

Clearing water from the flooded Half Moon in May 1930. One of these women is likely to be Ann Willis, the new licensee and widow of licensee Charles Willis who had died the previous month (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

By the 1920s overcrowding had become a problem. There were just two tiny bars measuring barely 10 feet by 10 feet each. Wheeler’s, relying on one of the findings of the Southborough Commission of 1926 that pubs should be improved, put forward a rebuilding plan in 1928 that would cost £3,000 to include the cottage next door. Meals would be provided, lavatories for both sexes and a bathroom for the landlord. The dining room would become the clubroom in the evenings. The magistrates, probably relying on another Southborough finding that there were too many pubs, declined the application though gave no reason for their decision.

Wheeler’s brewery’s plan of 1928 (courtesy of the Bucks Free Press archive, copyright Newspapers.com)

Plans to rebuild the Half Moon were rejected again in 1930, shortly after Wheeler’s had been taken over by Ashby’s of Staines, who had then been bought by Simonds of Reading. A complaint by Wycombe brewers to the Royal Commission on Licensing in England and Wales about the perceived intransigence of the Wycombe licensing magistrates resulted in discussions – termed ‘conferences’ – between magistrates and brewers starting in August 1930. The magistrates’ message was that there were too many pubs in the town – if a brewer wanted to rebuild a pub or take the licence to a new area they would have to give up other licences too.

The dark interior of the Half Moon as depicted by Francis Colmer in 1929 (courtesy of the Bucks Free Press archive, copyright Newspapers.com)

Simonds got the message and pursued a policy of ‘fewer and better’ pubs – see Wycombe's Suburban Pubs. An application to remove the licence to Dashwood Avenue was made in January 1933. The old Half Moon closed at the end of the year, as did the Pine Apple on West Wycombe Road – the price Simonds had to pay to get the old licence moved to a new area. The old building was sold at auction in early 1934 and demolished for redevelopment. The new building of 1934 is in place today.

The Half Moon in April 1934, closed and awaiting redevelopment (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

A few doors away from the Half Moon was the Old Angel (3) at 41 Oxford Street. The earliest record is from 1758 when Thomas Atkins is the licensee.

Local man Henry Wright owned the pub in 1845, then Byles & Son brewers of Henley in 1847, and from 1858 Brakspear’s Henley brewery.

In 1892 Brakspear’s applied to the magistrates to change the pub’s name to the Henley Ale Stores. The Bucks Free Press reported the magistrates asking if ‘old angels are out of fashion now?’ to much laughter. The response was that it suited the brewery’s business. Brakspear had a handful of pubs in Wycombe and a long journey from the brewery, so a store for beer and a plan to increase off-sales made business sense. The pub was in the hands of a manager by 1905. 

To the right of John Busby’s shop is the Henley Ale Stores, formerly the Old Angel. The handsome Woolpack is to the left of Busby’s in this photograph of c1910 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

Much as a lack of space was to restrict the Half Moon’s business, it was to do the same to the Henley Ale Stores. By 1900 they were sharing storage space with corn merchant Taplin in Bowdery’s Lane when it burnt down causing £100 worth of damage. 

World War One brought dramatic changes to British pubs and brewing. While beerhouses had restricted hours of opening – generally 6am to 10pm and closure during church-going hours on Sundays – alehouses could open much as they pleased, the only restrictions being on Sundays. The war brought about the limited lunchtime and evening opening hours that remained until 1988. The strength of beer typically fell from about 5% alcohol by volume to 3%.

One of the effects on pubs in the town centre was to prevent them trading in the afternoons on market days. Many of the pubs featured in this post then made applications to the magistrates for extensions after lunch, and some were granted; the Stores’ was not.

In 1927 the Stores applied to push back their bar counter by six feet to give customers more room and access to a fire. As this plan meant more drinking area the magistrates refused, and kept on refusing each time the plan was brought back to them. By 1937 Brakspear’s had found a new site at the junction of Desborough Avenue and Deeds Grove for a pub to be called the Wendover Arms. The Stores closed in 1938, the premises being sold at auction.

A door but one away from the Old Angel stood the Woolpack (4). This area of the town was known until well into the 19th century as Wycombe Foreigns, being outside the borough. It was marshy agricultural land with meadows and orchards until building began in the late 17th century. It’s not clear from property deeds exactly when the Woolpack emerged as an alehouse, though there appears to have been a building on the land by 1699. Victualler John Walker occupied a dwelling in 1754 and his name is in licensing records at the Woolpack in 1753, the first year such records were kept. A second Woolpack appears in licensing records from 1774, which became the Bird in Hand – see The pubs of Bird in Hand and Wycombe’s west end.

Owners changed regularly, though none had apparent links to brewing, until brandy merchant and Woolpack licensee Veazey [sic] Raffety bought the pub in 1791. By this time it was described as a ‘tenement’, formerly two, one of which had been occupied by John Walker, and various pieces of land.

Raffety died in 1803, his executors selling the Woolpack to Wycombe brewers Kingston & Crofts. In 1806 the pub and much other property was put in trust for brewer John Rotton. Rotton then sold the pub in 1809 to the sitting tenant James Lowndes, also a brandy merchant. Wethered’s brewery acquired a share of the property in 1829 and by 1833 owned it all.

By the early 20th century the Woolpack comprised public and private bars, a bar parlour, kitchen, four bedrooms, bathroom, clubroom, stables, shed and yard all for an annual rent of £20, with part of the premises available to sub-let for £20. Lavatories had been added in 1905. The cost to an incoming licensee was £200 for stock, fixtures and fittings, according to Horley’s, the Maidenhead pub broker.

A brewer’s dray delivering to the Woolpack in the 1890s (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

From 1900 it was the HQ of the Town Band, led by landlord William Sears. It had a slate club and, because it had places to keep a dead body ‘fresh’, it held inquests. A member of the local air gun shooting league, the Woolpack, like many pubs, turned to darts in the 1930s when it also hosted the London Transport Sports Association’s Wycombe branch.

In the same way that other Oxford Street pubs looked for more space to expand or somewhere new to take their licences so Wethered’s took the Woolpack out of town. Bill Curtis, the Woolpack’s last licensee, told the Bucks Free Press in 1993 that Wethered’s had spent very little on the pub since he became landlord in 1936; it was ‘old fashioned’, the kitchen was separate from the rest of the pub and ‘the living accommodation was disgusting’.

The Woolpack’s new licensee, Bill Curtis, in the doorway of his pub in 1936. It’s already in need of same paint (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Wethered’s were probably biding their time until they had a suitable site and opportunity to take the licence elsewhere. An application was made early in 1956 to ‘remove’ the licence to a site at the foot of Arnison Avenue to be called the Happy Wanderer. The Woolpack closed on 15 May 1959. The Bucks Free Press reported the last night as if there had been a death: a long-distance lorry driver from Nottingham had driven an extra 50 miles ‘to pay his last respects’, while long-term customer Fred Ridgley said ‘This place has been home from home to me. I don’t know what I shall do now. I might even turn teetotal.’

Across the road from the Woolpack was Bowdery’s Lane, once called Temple Place. By 1838 there were two beerhouses in this road within a stone’s throw of Temple Mill. Beerhouses first appeared after the beerhouse act of 1830 was passed. There were many thousands of them. 

One Temple Place beerhouse – neither are named – was kept by Richard Hawes and owned by John Cowden, and had closed by 1844. The second was owned by John and Joseph Lane and kept by John Sammons, and last appears in the 1841 poor rate records. William Steers owned this ‘late beerhouse’ in 1843. By 1855 John Henningham had opened a beerhouse in Steers’ property that was later to be called the Prince Albert (8). Comparison of tithe and 1910 Domesday maps show Steers’ house to have been both the Sammons and Henningham pubs.

Wheeler’s leased the pub from Alfred Steers in 1865 and owned it by 1910. It was a typical beerhouse. In the early 20th century it comprised a taproom, parlour, kitchen, three bedrooms, an adjoining cottage with three bedrooms for lodgers, a kitchen, yard, ‘fowl house’ with poultry, all for an annual rent of £12. The ingoing cost for a new beerhouse keeper was £25.

The brewster session of 1913 contained a surprise for licensee Ellen Smith because the police opposed the granting of a new license on the grounds that it ‘was of disorderly character, or frequented by thieves, prostitutes, or persons of bad character’. While the police witnesses gave evidence of persons of bad character being regularly found at the pub, they agreed, under cross examination, that there had been no offences linked to the pub or Mrs Smith. She had always helped the police and had never been warned about the conduct of her customers. Her solicitor told the bench that Mrs Smith had never been convicted of any offence.

Despite some dissent, the magistrates agreed to renew the licence for another year while warning Mrs Smith about taking more care about who she served at the pub and the lodgers she took in. Wheeler’s surrendered the licence in 1916, probably as a result of a slump in trade during the war rather than any misconduct.

Bowdery’s Lane was cleared in the 1960s and is now covered by the Abbey Way Flyover.

Turning back onto Oxford Street, a couple of doors away from the Woolpack was Ye Exchange (5), formerly the Lamb beerhouse. The poor rate book for 1838 is our earliest record of this pub, then a beerhouse called the Victoria, owned by John White. By 1843 it was known as the Lamb and by 1853 it was owned by the Frogmoor brewery of Richard Lucas, who then sold it two years later to Parsons' Lion brewery of Princes Risborough. 

The Exchange beerhouse with shop before the 1887 rebuild (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

The Lamb struggled to find a licensee in 1872 and emerged in 1873 as the Exchange with Richard Endall in charge. Rebuilt in 1887 at a cost of £1,000, the pub comprised two bars, smoke room, tap room, back room and four beds for travellers, a carriage shed and also new stabling for nine sleeping and up to 40 standing horses, looked after by a stableman. The Exchange was granted the full licence of the Admiral Napier in St Mary Street in 1891, at the same time changing its name to Ye Exchange. 

We can only catch a glimpse of Ye Exchange, on the left side of the street, and its bold signboard in the 1890s (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Promotion to being an alehouse with a full licence to sell all liquor seems to have brought much new trade in the 1890s. By 1901 the annual rent for the pub of £40 was more than covered by letting out the stables. It hosted a Drum and Fife Band, formed a slate club, added a club room, hosted the High Wycombe Volunteer Rifle Club Band – licensee Walter Slater was a member – and poached the Thames Angling Association from the Royal Oak in Bridge Street. 

In 1900 Parsons sold its business to the Welch Ale brewery of south London. Welch then sold most of its Buckinghamshire estate, including Ye Exchange, to the Aylesbury Brewery Company (ABC) in 1920.

Perhaps the most unusual person to have held the pub’s licence was John Grün who took over in 1910. At his licence application hearing, the magistrates were told Grün had been a naturalised British citizen for 20 years and had ‘recently been exhibiting himself as a strongman’. The magistrates commented ‘We hope you will not exhibit your strength except in the cause of law and order’. He did not tell the magistrates that he had suffered a serious injury in 1909.

Grün was a Luxembourger born in 1868. While working in a brewery in St Louis USA he became one of a strongman double act called The Two Marxs. By time he returned to Luxembourg in 1892 he could claim to be the strongest man in the world. As the Luxembourg Hercules he toured the circuses, theatres and music halls of the USA and Europe, even working with Harry Houdini, lifting stones, breaking horse shoes and tearing packs of playing cards in half. 

Unfortunately Grün was less successful in paying his rates, being summoned two years in succession, or in observing statutory closing times at his pub. He was replaced as licensee and returned to Luxembourg in 1912 where he died later that year.

An application was made in 1952 to rebuild the pub to include a shop and a car park at the rear. The Borough Council refused the application and an appeal to the Ministry of Housing also failed. The plan was to reduce the size of the pub but incorporate a shop. It’s not entirely clear from reports in the Bucks Free Press what ABC was trying to achieve. However, new plans resulted in a rebuilt pub without a shop.

The 1953 version of Ye Exchange in 1972 to the right of Beadle & Crome. Like many pubs of the 1950s and 60s it is rather plain (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press) 

Ye Exchange appeared to fall into bad hands in the early 1980s, as did some other pubs in the town. Theodolph Clarke had been the licensee since 1983 and was later convicted of handling stolen goods. A delay bringing him to trial led to him absconding abroad in 1986. It seems the pub closed around this time as it was acquired as part of the route of Archway Road from the Oxford Road roundabout to Temple End.

Not far from Ye Exchange on the south side of what now becomes Oxford Road was Temple Street, in which was the George & Dragon (9) beerhouse, owned and kept by George Pawley from at least early 1867. Richard Lucas’ Frogmoor brewery was the owner by 1872. 

The George & Dragon in 1900 next door to the Free Methodist Schoolroom opened in that year (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

The George & Dragon was one of 12 pubs chosen by local brewers to be closed in the cull of 1903 – there’s more about this here. The de-licensed pub, adjoining cottage and yard were sold at auction to R J Howland for £400. Temple Street was cleared in the 1960s and is now a service road for the Eden Shopping Centre.

The last of the old alehouses on this journey was the Ship (7) at 112 Oxford Road. The first we know of it is in a deed of 1672 that describes property transferred by the Whitton, Bigg and Sale families for the benefit of John Bigg. Included is the Ship that had been built on Cawsey Mead. The name of the location suggests the Oxford Road here was a causeway between water meadows.

John Deane has the Ship in 1737 and bequeaths it in his will to his brother, Solomon. Some meadowland adjoining the alehouse is bequeathed to members of the Grover family, of whom John is the licensee in 1753.

After this, brewer David Squire leased the pub to another brewer, A E Biddle, in 1784. Squire sold it to the Biddle & King partnership in 1810. The Ship was a Wheeler’s house after 1854.

There’s no doubt the original Ship was small, but the document of 1737 mentions an adjoining cottage, which may later have been incorporated into the pub. In the late 19th century the Ship’s landlords were often in the chairmaking industry, suggesting outhouses and workshops had been added and also that income from the pub was perhaps limited.

A wide view of Oxford Road looking west with the Ship on the far right c1908 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Alterations were made in 1893. These are likely to be a new frontage to make the building look more like a modern pub – many pubs in the town including the Kings Head and the Wheatsheaf in the High Street received modern frontages at this time – as well as a new scullery.

A closer view with a traffic jam c1895. The top of the Ship's new frontage can be made out (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

The Drum and Fife Band that had its headquarters at Ye Exchange in 1891 had been at the Ship in 1888. Their twice weekly practice sessions from eight until 10 in the evening led to complaints from the neighbours and, probably, the new venue. After this nuisance had been put down very little happened at the Ship beyond the usual slate club and some pub games such as darts and bar billiards. It’s not a surprise to find Simonds – Wheeler’s successor – being prepared to surrender the licence in 1953 in order to open the Micklefield Inn. The Ship closed in 1955.

After closure the building was used for retail businesses, first Glass & Decor and later Hoar’s bicycle shop before demolition for the new Sainsbury’s.

On the north side of Oxford Road facing down Bridge Street was the Van Inn, opened in 1857 and leased by Parsons' brewery from the owner. An advertisement of 1863 refers to the Van & Horses, but that name doesn’t reappear. The van of the title probably refers to a waggon used for carrying chairs, sometimes called, not inappropriately, a chair van, whose name had been taken by a pub in Newland in 1847.

What the Van Inn was not was an inn. It probably started life as a beerhouse and got its full licence by 1866. It was also industrial in that it had an undertaker and builder in the yard in 1863, and by 1869 it was described as a large premises with yard, [work]shops, stabling and garden. Next to it was Van Place, or Van Row, leading to the cattle market in Bellfield.

By 1871 the first alterations were planned to the frontage. Windsor chair manufacturer, Frederick Weedon, became the first long-serving licensee at this time. In 1877 he nearly lost his pub. The Free Methodist Chapel on Oxford Road was looking to expand. They were trying to raise funds to buy two houses in Remington Terrace. At a fund raising tea the Chairman proposed, to great cheers, buying the Van, building a new chapel on the site and using the existing chapel as a temperance hall. Luckily for Weedon the plan did not come to fruition, though Weedon’s obituary of 1904 says that as well as being a watercress grower he was, surprisingly, a member of the Oxford Road Free Methodist congregation. 

One of the perennial dangers of being surrounded by industry, and particularly the furniture industry, was fire. A fire in Van Place destroyed some chair workshops and threatened cottages in 1883. Cottages and pub were saved by the Volunteer Fire Brigade and the Frogmoor brewery’s fire engine.

Parsons' brewery was preparing to sell its business, including its freehold and leasehold pubs, in 1899. The Van’s lease was listed in auction sale particulars and may have been sold to the Welch Ale brewery in 1900. However, not all of Parsons’ pubs ended up with Welch Ale. In 1901 Weller’s brewery were in charge and were applying for permission to alter the pub. Weller’s bought the Van from Constance Chadwick in 1902.

After Weller’s purchase the pub broker, Horley’s of Maidenhead, described the pub as having three entrances, public and private bars, bar parlour, five-pull beer engine – a cabinet comprising five hand pulls for five different beer barrels – bottle and jug department, large clubroom, kitchen, scullery, cellar, six upstairs rooms, yard and stables. Takings were £20 a week, rent £40 a year, though some part of the premises not used for pub business was being sublet for £50 a year, and the licensee was not tied to Weller’s when buying spirits. 

The Van in the 1920s with, perhaps, William Bender and son. Windows and facias are used to advertise drinks available, while the sign makes it clear that Weller’s much admired Entire is available. Bass and Guinness were served in bottles (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

In 1920 the second long-serving licensee, Samuel Campion, left and a third man whose family was to be at the Van for many years, William Bender, took over. In 1929 the new owners were Benskins of Watford, who had bought Weller’s brewery and pub estate. They applied to make changes to the commercial and club rooms, improve the lavatories, remodel the bar area and create better accommodation for the tenant. The changes were approved in 1932.

The Van in the 1950s showing off its still fresh-looking Benskins’ modernisation of 1932 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

Weekly sales of beer were over nine barrels in 1930, which was a significant amount for a pub out of town. The Bellfield cattle market brought good trade and a regular application to the magistrates to open in the afternoon on market days.

The good sales figures of 1930 may have signalled a peak, despite the economic depression. There were darts and bar billiards teams, but by the 1960s the pub had resorted to hosting regular sales of carpets from an unused room. The last mention of the Van in the press is in January 1973, closure being complete by the end of the year. Newman House was built on part of the site, which was later replaced by Sainsbury’s.

Benskins was absorbed by Ind Coope in 1957 who, in turn, became part of Allied Breweries in 1961. This shot from 1968 shows the Van after a coat of fresh paint with the temporary sign swinging in the wind (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

At a place called Mount Pleasant, before Westbourne Street, stood the Carrington Arms, opened some time between 1829 and 1838. This pub was owned by Thomas Jeffreys, then by his wife Ann from 1855 until the Frogmoor brewery bought it at auction in 1859. 

Like the Van Inn, the Carrington Arms may have started as a beerhouse before getting a full alehouse licence, which it certainly had by 1866. The 1859 auction particulars describe it as two of eight brick and tile cottages with a frontage of 20 feet. The collection of cottages owned by the Jeffreys in Mount Pleasant also included, from 1841 until 1845, an unnamed beerhouse. The licensee of the Carrington Arms in 1838 was Thomas Marshall; in 1841 he had moved to the beerhouse, while Thomas Peppall took over at the Carrington Arms. 

The Frogmoor brewery rebuilt the Carrington Arms in 1887 fronting Oxford Road. The new pub comprised private and public bars, smoke room, clubroom, parlour, kitchen, scullery, four bedrooms, conservatory, yard and stables. Annual rent was £28. 

The rebuilt Carrington Arms c1890 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

After the rebuilding it began to take on the typical activities of public houses from the late 19th century until World War Two: a slate club, a friendly society branch – Hearts of Oak – inquests, a cricket club and an air gun club – replaced by darts in the 1930s. Either side of World War One it hosted the High Wycombe Sweet Pea and Floral Society and from 1922 the Carrington Lodge of Buffaloes, who used a ‘spacious lodge room’ decorated with regalia.

Wheeler’s signage had little time left when this picture of the Carrington Arms was taken in the late 1920s (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

Involvement in pub games and sports reached its height between the world wars. The Carrington Arms took a particular interest in the development of the High Wycombe Sports League (HWSL). As well as a darts league the HWSL looked to create other sporting leagues from the mid-1930s until World War Two saw sporting activity virtually stop: leagues were either formed, or were explored, for tennis, table tennis, snooker, bar billiards, cricket and angling.

It helped, when developing pub activities, to have a dynamic licensee. Robert Green was such a man at the Carrington Arms from 1911. By the 1930s it was clear that other parts of the town needed pubs that would have facilities for developing new activities for a new set of suburban customers. The only way to do this was to give up licences in the town.

In 1938 Bob Green and Simonds brewery applied to remove the Carrington Arms licence to a new site in Booker at the junction of Cressex and New Roads, also to be called the Carrington Arms. The magistrates refused the application and the site later became the Turnpike. Green moved to the Hour Glass.

The Carrington Arms as a Courage pub in 1965 as redevelopment of the Oxford Road continues. The river will disappear from view shortly (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

We hear very little about the pub after 1938 until Mrs June Parford made the news in 1968 as the first woman in Wycombe, apart from widows of deceased licensees, to be granted a pub licence. The Oxford Road at this time was being rapidly developed and Mrs Parford only had a short time at the Carrington Arms before it closed and was demolished in 1971. Aria House now stands on the site.

Opposite the turn into Westbourne Street, where Ash Mill once stood, was Hobbs Lane. There were eight cottages in Hobbs Lane in 1838 all owned by William Dancer. The first mention of an unnamed beerhouse kept by George Mines and owned by Ann Russell is in 1869, though a John Mines had been in Hobbs Lane since 1855. By 1872 it was called the Chairmakers’ Arms.

The only information we have about this Chairmakers’ Arms relates to its closure. Wheeler’s wanted to open a new pub on the corner of Westbourne and Brook Streets in 1875 and applied to the magistrates for a licence, while also offering to surrender the licence of the Hobbs Lane house they had bought for £700 and let to Thomas Cox at a rent of £20 a year. 

The magistrates visited Brook Street and Hobbs Lane remarking that the beerhouse wasn’t doing much trade and that it ‘was not quite of the character required in the present day’. While they agreed to Wheeler's proposal the county licensing committee did not. 

The following year, Wheeler’s applied again. The magistrates this time refused the application saying that as nothing had changed since 1875 the licensing committee would also refuse.

By 1877 Wheeler’s were able to demonstrate that where the new pub would be was more built up than in 1875 and in need of a pub. The magistrates agreed the application as did the licensing committee, and Thomas Cox had a new pub.

The last 19th century pub in this survey was the Nag’s Head beerhouse on the end of a row of nine houses with gardens called Havergal’s Row at the top of a rise known as Cox’s Pitch. The first mention of a beerhouse is in an 1853 trade directory when Edwin or Edmund Fryer is a beerhouse keeper – also a boot and shoe maker – in a house owned by Miss Hedges. He’s also at the house in 1852 but we have no directory for that year. The house appears in the first poor rate record of 1838.

Looking west outside the Nag’s Head with the jettied houses of Havergal’s Row beyond c1895 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Edwin Skull owned the house by 1854 and the Weller brewery of Amersham bought it from him 1857. Weller’s property records show the pub to have a frontage of 40 feet and to have previously been called Madeley’s Folly, though who Madeley was and why it was a folly is not known.

The Nag’s Head with Benskins signage in 1936. Havergal’s Row is by then known as Sunny Bank (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

A comparison of rateable values of some of the pubs in our survey around 1910 serves to show their relative size, importance and business done. Two lowly beerhouses (Nag’s Head and Prince Albert) are valued at £15 each, two small and old fashioned alehouses (Half Moon and Ship) at £18, two thriving mid-Victorian alehouses (Carrington Arms and Ye Exchange) at £28, and the oldest alehouse closest to the centre of town, the King’s Head, at £30.

The Nag’s Head lived the quietest life of any pub on the Oxford Road. In the autumn of 1958 it had withdrawn from a local darts league after being unable to raise a team. It closed in 1959 after the licensee, Archibald Buckmaster, died just six months after his son had been killed in an air crash. The pub became a house and shop.

The former Nag’s Head today (the author)

The last pub to open on Oxford Road was also the last of its pubs to close. Whitbread plc converted the former Hull Loosely & Pearce shop at 120 Oxford Road to one of its chain of Hogshead (6) ale houses in 1997, spending £750,000 on the conversion. The building, belonging to the Loosley Trust, dated back to 1930 when a road widening scheme caused the old shop to be replaced by a new one set back 50 feet from the road.

The new Hull Loosley & Pearce shop (left) in early 1931. The entrance to Temple Street is on the right (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Library)

The Laurel Pub Company – a ‘pubco’ set up to run Whitbread’s pub estate after the brewery was sold in 2000 – took over the lease in 2001. Laurel went into administration in 2008 and, despite a rescue, had collapsed by the end of the year. The Hogshead closed.

The Hogshead (or ‘hog’s head’ in this case) seen from the top of the evolving Eden Centre (courtesy of wellingtonbootblog)

Enter J D Wetherspoon plc to spend another £500,000 on a transformation into the William Robert Loosley, which opened at the end of 2008. Wetherspoons have always been known for their conversions of shops, banks and even swimming baths into pubs, so the shop was an obvious choice for them even if Whitbread had made the initial conversion. 

It might have been the fact that Wetherspoons found themselves with two pubs in the town – one of which, ironically, had been a pub for several centuries – or the poor economic conditions after 2008 but the William Robert Loosley lasted only until 2017, despite Wetherspoons reversing their earlier closure plan of 2016.

The third iteration of the pub was as the Chiltern Taps – this time owned by the Stonegate Pub Company to whom Wetherspoons agreed to sell.

Chiltern Taps (courtesy of wellingtonbootblog)

Stonegate acquired the Ei Group, formerly the largest UK pubco, in 2020, making the now Stonegate Group the largest UK pubco. The Chiltern Taps was sold to the newly formed RedCat pubco in 2021 becoming one of their RedCat Leased Pubs.

Bad luck struck again in early 2024 when the leased pubs arm of RedCat went into administration, the Chiltern Taps being chosen as one of five pubs to close. It is boarded up at the time of writing, though advertised to buy or let.

As the saying goes, ‘use it or lose it’, but in recent years, despite anecdotal evidence that the pub was being used, it was not used enough to make a profit.

Sources 

Buckinghamshire Archives for licensing records, property deeds, poor rate records, the 1910 Domesday Survey, original tithe records and the late Harvey Coltman’s analysis of the tithe records. 

SWOP (Sharing Wycombe’s Old Photographs).

The Bucks Free Press archive.

Trade directories held at High Wycombe Library and accessed through University of Leicester special collections.

Census records accessed through The Genealogist.

Wellington Boot website wellingtonbootblog.wordpress.com

company-histories.com

Companies House on GOV.UK

BROWN, Mike 2007, ABC: A Brewers’ Compendium: A Directory Of Buckinghamshire Brewers, Brewery History Society: Longfield.

Updates

Blog posts are updated as new information comes to light. Here are details of the updates made to previously published posts each month.

May 2026

A pub walk through Flackwell Heath was updated on 1 May to note the Cherry Tree changed its name to Rogues Retreat from 1980 until 1983. Thanks to an unknown correspondent for the new information.

Wycombe Marsh part 2 was updated on 8 and 22 May 2026 to include a map to show the locations of pubs in the centre of the Marsh. Analysis of research carried out by the late Harvey Coltman on the area’s tithe records helped determine the correct position of the Dolphin in Beech Road. Marian Miller’s research into the Wheatsheaf in Wycombe’s High Street has shown the Swan to have been established by at least 1754.

March 2026

Loudwater’s lost pubs, and hopes for a revival was updated on 3 March 2026 to include new information about the ownership of the Halfway House. There is also new information about the site of the Star beerhouse.

The pubs of Bird in Hand and Wycombe’s west end was updated on 10 March 2026 to include a map of Bird in Hand, a correction to information about beerhouses, some information about a short-lived beerhouse, the modernisation of the Bird in Hand and White Horse, and additional sources used.

November 2025

Pubs of Newland part one – the beginning to 1872 was updated on 18 November to include new information about the Sun and the Live & Let Live.

Wycombe Marsh part 2 had a new photograph of the Disraeli Arms added on 19 November, courtesy of Carmel Grace.

August 2025

Wycombe Marsh – Part 1 The London Road was updated on 7 August to include the year (1937) the King George V was rebuilt.

A pub walk through Flackwell Heath was also updated on 7 and 22 August to include more information (taken from the Bucks Free Press Archive) about the Cherry Tree’s sale, renaming and subsequent ownership, and also about the Magpie. 

July 2025

Loudwater’s lost pubs, and hopes for a revival was updated on 25 July. The release of the Bucks Free Press archive in May 2025 has provided some useful information about the Happy Union’s licensing arrangements and ownership.

Wycombe Marsh part 2 was also updated on 25 July using new information from the Bucks Free Press archive about an 1867 version of the Swan and the precise location of the Dolphin. 

April 2025

A pub walk through Flackwell Heath was updated on 2 April to include a paragraph about the Rose & Crown at Sheepridge after more information about its location came to light.

February 2025

West Wycombe’s historic pubs was updated on 18 February – after a document was found in the Dashwood archive – to clarify the leasing of pubs in the early 19th century and the fate of the Lord Le Despencer's Arms. 

Downley's pubs part two – Lords and Donkeys was also updated on 18 February to provide the history of the De Spencers before 1835.

November 2024 

After analysis of the Chepping Wycombe parish poor rate assessment books, information about long-lost beerhouses at Bird in Hand has been added. These include the Blue Flag, Duke of Wellington and another Le Despencer’s Arms.

A new photograph of the original White Horse has also been published, with thanks to Mark Page.

September 2024 

Downley pubs – education, golf and compensation was updated on 25 September 2024 after new information about the Golf Links and Mountjoy’s Retreat came to light. 

West Wycombe’s historic pubs was updated on 27 September 2024 after new information about the Lord Le Despencer's Arms, the Plough, Nag's Head and Friend at Hand was discovered.

Wycombe's Suburban Pubs

 

The Bottle & Jug (off sales) at the Castle in 1953 with players and officials of Castlefield FC. Many new or rebuilt pubs in the 1930s had these off sales ‘departments’ where the public could buy beer to take away without going into the main bars (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Fewer and better

The Royal Commission on Licensing in England and Wales ran from 1929 to 1931 and reported on the state of public houses in 1932. It said ‘the ideal…is to make the public house…a place where the public can obtain general refreshment…in decent, comfortable and pleasant surroundings.’

The concept of ‘fewer and better’ public houses wasn’t new in the early 1930s, but it was enthusiastically taken up by Simonds brewery of Reading who had acquired Wheeler’s Wycombe Breweries in 1930. Simonds recognised that many of the Wheeler pubs were old, uncomfortable and unsanitary. Their proposed programme of alterations and rebuilding would cost about £80,000.

While Wycombe town centre pubs such as the Bull could be rebuilt on their original footprint, others, such as the Royal Oak in Paul's Row, were too small and hemmed in by other buildings to make improvement feasible. In these cases, giving up the licence and proposing new houses in developing areas of the town would be Simonds’ strategy.

Simonds also recognised that encouraging the licensing magistrates to agree to their proposals would mean promising to use Wycombe companies and Wycombe builders to construct public houses to meet modern licensing standards.

The Hour Glass in the 1920s

Wheeler’s Wycombe Breweries opened what might qualify as the town’s first suburban pub. They had bought land in the growing settlement of Sands before they applied to the magistrates in February 1923 to build the Hour Glass – a play on the sands of time. It opened in January 1924.

The Hour Glass not long after completion (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by High Wycombe Society)

The Bucks Free Press reported that ‘every modern convenience had been taken into account’ and great credit was due to Mr Hedges, the architect, and to builders White Brothers. It had a large ‘draw up’ – the front car park today – a roomy bar and spacious club room that could take 50 people, a parlour with smoke room and a bottle and jug department – off-sales – all having separate entrances. The licensee could see every part of the house from the bar – this was of great importance in getting a licence because it reassured the police and magistrates that the pub could be properly supervised. The licensee, Mr Rolfe, was provided with four bedrooms and a bathroom as well as hot and cold running water and modern lavatories. 

Wheeler’s had to pay £550 for the Hour Glass’ ‘monopoly value’ – this was a sum assessed on the increase in a building’s value by virtue of it having a publican’s licence. Pubs in modern times now tend to be worth less if they have a licence.

When compared with the suburban pubs that appeared 10 or so years later there is something still Victorian about the Hour Glass in the 1920s. It had a slate club (a combined Christmas and sickness savings scheme), an air gun club (shooting at an indoor target common until replaced by darts in the next decade) and a cork club (an eccentric social club where members dressed a bottle cork as a character and went off by coach for an annual dinner).

New building in the 1930s

Wheeler’s application to rebuild the Half Moon in Oxford Street had been refused in 1930. By 1933 the magistrates were presented with a new plan: Simonds would surrender the licences of the Half Moon and the Pine Apple on West Wycombe Road and build a new house at the junction of Dashwood Avenue and Desborough Park Road.

The new Half Moon would have a central servery, recreation room, snack bar, saloon, private and public bars, coffee room, kitchen and scullery, and a downstairs living room. Upstairs would be four bedrooms and a sitting room. The architects were Thurlow & Lucas.

A petition supporting the new pub had been signed by more than 1,100 people and witnesses from the local area gave evidence at the licensing hearing in support of the proposals. The opposition view was modest and did not persuade the magistrates to reject the application. The new pub opened in 1934.

The Half Moon in 1997 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Simonds next made an application early in 1935 to remove the licence of the Railway Tavern in Crendon Street to a new house – the Castle – to be built in Rutland Avenue, Castlefield. The application was approved. On the one hand, the Railway Tavern was in the way of the final stage of widening and modernising Crendon Street and would have been compulsorily purchased before being demolished, while on the other hand, the new Castlefield estate was in need of a pub. The Castle opened the following year, with Benjamin Betts of the Iron Duke as its first licensee.

A Thames Valley bus passes the Castle c1960 (courtesy of Gerald Croxford and Facebook group High Wycombe now and then)

The last new build in 1930s suburbia came in 1938 when the licence of the Henley Ale Stores – originally the Old Angel – in Oxford Street was removed to Desborough Avenue at the junction of Deeds Grove. 

The Wendover Arms in 1973 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

The application from Brakspear’s brewery of Henley to remove the licence suggested the original name be used, while the magistrates asked for a new name as they ‘did not want more than one Angel in High Wycombe’. The old pub did a good trade but it was incapable of extension or modernisation owing to its hemmed in position and party walls. The new pub, costing £8,000, would have a large car park – a necessity by 1938 – separate off licence, an extensive bar where meals and snacks would be served, central servery, large cellar, a lounge, five bedrooms and downstairs living room for the licensee.

The Wendover Arms was the new name chosen, the arms in question belonging to Viscount Wendover, the son of Lord Carrington, who had died of his wounds in World War One. 

The ornate pub sign for the Wendover Arms in 1973 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Pub life from the 1930s to 1950s

All the new pubs we have discussed so far led similar lives during the 1930s.

Games featured strongly and every pub had a games or club room, or a games area. Bar billiards, dominoes and shovehalfpenny were popular. Darts took over from air gun shooting as the 30s wore on. Perhaps the most unlikely sport was greyhound and whippet racing behind the Hour Glass, held on ‘England’s Highest Natural Track’ in 1932.

Despite their newness, alterations were needed at the Hour Glass in 1934 and the Castle in 1937. All changes, including the most minor, to the licensed area of a pub had to have approval of the magistrates. There was a constant worry about how the pub could be supervised by the licensee and the police, and a suspicion of any proposed changes leading to an increase in the drinking area. The modest changes at the Hour Glass involved many plans and meetings until they were agreed.

Though pub life was quiet, at the Hour Glass in 1937 there was a murder by shooting that Mike Dewey has covered in depth in the Bucks Free Press.

Games naturally took a back seat during World War Two. Although beer wasn’t rationed – it was considered a vital foodstuff – it often ran out. Robert Green at the Hour Glass ran up a union jack to show he had beer and he advertised this in the local paper. 

Sports were supported at the Hour Glass – Sands Rovers FC – and at the Castle – Castlefield United FC and later Castlefield Cricket Club.

Pubs that never were

After 1930, the three main brewers having pubs in Wycombe – Simonds, Wethered’s and Benskins – were looking to buy land in the town’s suburbs for new pubs. Some of these projects were successful, while others were not.

Benskins went to great lengths to remove the Golden Fleece from Desborough Road and we’ll cover those efforts later. Simonds also proposed the removal of several old licences until they finally succeeded, as we shall see.

Wethered’s were probably the more ambitious of the three, and also the least successful.

Their first attempt was to apply in 1937 for a licence to build a pub to be called the Five Alls on the corner of Desborough Avenue and Marlow Road in Cressex. They had bought the land for £850, which they had intended to use to improve the Royal Oak on Bridge Street before the magistrates refused their application. Until 1936, Wethered’s had a pub of the same name in Studley Green.

Despite the brewery solicitor putting up a good argument for the licence – a developing area, a well-planned modern pub, many new houses and factories – the magistrates threw it out. Undeterred, Wethered’s bought another site in Cressex for £650.

In 1946, they again thought about Cressex, swapping sites with another developer and talking to Wycombe Borough Council about the possibility of a pub on Bookerhill estate until the licensing magistrates put an embargo on any more applications for pubs in Cressex while they considered the distribution of licences in Wycombe.

Eventually, Wethered’s decided to dispose of their Cressex land, and by 1957 it had all gone. 

The Micklefield Inn

Although brewers owning pubs in Wycombe did not appear to compete with one another they were keen to preserve what they had and take advantage of new areas where they could.

Wethered’s bought some land in Micklefield in 1933, which, by 1949, was in the Kingscote estate, later the Micklefield estate. By this time ownership had passed to Whitbread who then were refused a licence for being ‘too premature’. They were refused again in 1951 and yet again in 1952 after spirited opposition from local churches, though what seems to have concerned the magistrates most was that 75% of signatures on a petition supporting the building of a pub were those of women.

Whitbread sold the land to Simonds who were then successful in their 1953 application. Crucially, Simonds proposed to give up two town licences – the ‘little’ Red Lion on St Mary Street and the Ship on Oxford Road – as part of a continuation of their pre-war ’fewer and better’ scheme. 

The plan for the pub was a curious one: it was to be built in three phases owing to building regulations. The first phase would see a lock-up licensed shop containing a lounge bar, games ‘recess’ and a servery. Phase two would ‘put the top’ on phase one; in other words, the licensee’s accommodation. The final phase would provide ‘general enlargements’ and a function room.

The name Simonds originally proposed for the pub was the Pig & Whistle. The other suggestion was the Coronation. 

The 1953 Coronation pub design and sign shown at the Ideal Home Exhibition (courtesy of Raymond Simonds, picture enhanced by Godfrey Clements)

Simonds had been heavily involved with the design of a pub called the Coronation that was being shown at the Ideal Home Exhibition in March 1953. They acquired the pub sign specifically to use on their new Wycombe pub.

The magistrates didn’t like either name and suggested Micklefield Arms, which Simonds thought might be corrupted to Mickey Arms. The Micklefield Inn opened in July 1955, a name thereafter regularly shortened to Mickey Inn.

The Micklefield Inn just after completion in 1955 (courtesy of Raymond Simonds)

From Happy Wanderer to Bell & Mast – Wycombe’s suburban pubs to the 1970s

It’s unlikely that Wethered’s ever lost money on land deals. All the plots they bought eventually had a pub on it making money, or was sold for further development.

They had bought a plot at the top of the new Bowerdean estate from Frank Adams in 1936, though it wasn’t until 1956 that Wethered’s decided to apply for the removal of the Woolpack in Oxford Street to the bottom of the new Arnison Avenue. Work began in April 1957 and was expected to cost £16,000. 

The new pub opened in May 1959. Appropriately, as it had been bought from an ex-Wycombe Wanderer, it was to be called the Happy Wanderer, and, just as appropriately, the first licensee was to be another ex-Wanderer, Norman West. The Happy Wanderer tune had had some Wycombe Wanderers-specific words written for it back in 1955.

The former Happy Wanderer in 2026 (the author)

Then in late 1959, Ind Coope, who had taken over Benskins of Watford in 1957, opened the new Golden Fleece at the junction of Hatters Lane and Hicks Farm Rise bringing to an end over 25 years of trying to find a new home for the old Desborough Road pub. The story of that struggle can be read here and here.

The Golden Fleece’s sign in 1973, in need of a coat of paint (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

And the pub itself in the same year (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

Simonds had bought a site at Booker in the 1930s on which they made several unsuccessful applications to build a pub. The first was the proposed removal of the Masons’ Arms from Newland in 1936 and the second, in 1938, was for the Carrington Arms in Oxford Road. In 1960, a successful application was made to open the Jolly Sandboy near the junction of Cressex Road and New Road having agreed to surrender the licence of the Three Horse Shoes in Horns Lane, Booker.

It’s not clear why the Jolly Sandboy name was chosen. The locals didn’t like it, so Courage – the owners by this time after merger with Simonds – allowed them to choose an alternative. The Turnpike opened in November 1962. The area had been known by this name since the early 1930s. It acknowledged the turnpike road that came up from the West Wycombe road, through Sands and divided into a branch to Cressex and another to the Marlow to Stokenchurch road.

The Turnpike in 1993 (courtesy of SWOP, copyright managed by Bucks Free Press)

The second suburban pub of the 1960s was the Jolly Bodger opened in 1969 at the top of Chairborough Road in the Castlefield estate. This was Wethered’s replacement for the Royal Oak on Bridge Street. The full story of this change can be found here.

Like the Turnpike a few years before, the Jolly Bodger name was selected from about 100 entries in a competition, which was won by Miss Janice Eldridge. Her prize was a cheque for £25. The pub was designed by Diamond Redfern and Partners. Licensees – who were managers rather than tenants – Len and Margaret Rowlinson would be pleased to enlighten you if you didn’t know what a bodger was. They would probably have pointed out the eighth-scale model of a bodger’s pole-lathe and tools made by L J Mayes, the town librarian.

The former Jolly Bodger in 2026. Surrounded by vehicles and fences, it is difficult to believe this was once a pub (the author)

The final Wethered suburban pub in Wycombe was the Bell & Mast in Bellfield estate. Although it opened in 1975, the brewery had chosen the site and paid a deposit for it in 1961, paying the remaining £7,000 in 1963. 

The Bell & Mast replaced the Globe in White Hart Street. The first licensee, Leslie Shotter, came from the Whitbread-owned White Hart, while the new Bellfield pub carried the Whitbread branding having become Wethered’s parent company in 1968.

The Bell & Mast around the time of closure (Movement80 courtesy of the Lost Pubs Project)

Changes to existing pubs in the 1960s and 70s were few. The Hour Glass had an extension and alterations approved in 1962, the Happy Wanderer extended their saloon bar in 1966.

By 1967 the public bar at the Hour Glass had doubled in size catering for two bar billiards teams, and three male and one female darts teams. Bar billiards was gradually replaced in most of our pubs in this period by pool. Pub football teams began to emerge in the 1970s.

Wethered’s were already employing managers rather than letting to tenants by 1960 and Courage and Brakspear did likewise in the 1970s. The Hour Glass became an Allied Breweries house in 1978 when Courage and Allied swapped some pubs. The Wendover Arms had a major refit in 1972 when it became a Tabard Inn – a subsidiary of Brakspear. Its Edwardian restaurant opened in 1977, but it was suffering from declining trade and changes of management by 1979

The Castle reintroduced music in 1960, though music licences weren’t common at this time. They also offered B&B from 1968 and were advertising their Portcullis Bar in 1973. 

Pub life from the 1980s to today

The Half Moon opened up its original multi-room layout, introducing meals and live music in 1980. The Wendover Arms opened a wine bar and bistro in the same year. Live music appeared and in 1985 it opened a Country Carving Room, by which time it had had another refurbishment (the last being 13 years earlier) to become a Clifton Inn – a joint venture with Brakspear. 

At the Golden Fleece, Allied Breweries spent £55,000 on a refurbishment in 1987 to include a games room for pool, bar billiards, a quiz team and darts, while the pub’s emphasis was firmly on families and food. Courage followed the fashion for refurbishment at the Turnpike in 1988. This may have been the result of reputational damage after a riot at a gig in 1987 forced manager of four months, Phil Wicks, to leave. Live music stopped for a while too. Not to be left out, Wethered spent £190,000 on a 1990 refit to revive the Happy Wanderer.

The final pub in this survey is the Cressex in Crest Road, Cressex. A Whitbread Roast Inn, the Cressex opened in late 1989 after having an initial application refused. Essentially a carvery, it lasted little more than three years before changing into another Whitbread brand, Flat Foot Sam’s, a ‘Canadian-style bowling bar’, in early 1993. This brand was replaced by another, a TGI Friday restaurant, three years later. It remains a TGI Friday, a brand no longer owned by Whitbread.

The former Cressex, now a TGI Friday in 2026 (the author)

The 1990s saw ownership changes following the Beer Orders of 1989, which restricted the pub estates of Britain’s six national brewers to 2,000, and required them to stock a guest beer in their pubs. Brewers responded by spinning off pubs into pub companies – pubcos – or selling them entirely. 

The Wendover Arms in 1995 was owned by Scottish & Newcastle brewery who carried out the pub’s third major refit since it was built – while the pool tables disappeared, it offered ‘Whole Hog monster portions’. The pool tables returned in 2000. In 2005, Escape Pubs was the owner before ‘a large property and restaurant group’ based in Buckinghamshire carried out yet another refurbishment in 2008 and now offered Thai food.

The history of the Castle during the 1990s makes for shocking reading. 

The pub’s owner, Inntrepreneur – a joint venture between Courage and Grand Metropolitan – put the freehold up for sale in March 1992 for £275,000. On landlord Joseph McGuinness' last day at the Castle in May the pub was the victim of an arson attack causing £100,000 worth of damage. 

Repairs were complete within a year, though the pub remained empty for nearly another year. The owners had been unable to find a tenant who could persuade the licensing magistrates to grant them a licence. Once they had found their man the pub was torched again in January 1994, this time causing damage estimated at £25,000. In April there was a further attack, and yet another in August.

Pressure was building in 1994 for a community centre in Castlefield and the Castle became a candidate for the site. Despite planning permission being granted, a separate community centre had been planned by the end of the year.

January 1995 saw the Castle reopen, with a function room added in April. The new community centre opened in July 1997. In August, after several changes of licensee, the pub was firebombed. The licensee at the time, Mohammed Ramzan, asked the police for protection after receiving death threats. The then owners, Spring Inns – a joint venture between Grand Metropolitan and Fosters – reported they had had interest in the pub from Wycombe Mosque. The Castle was attacked again in September. 

An arrest was made in 1998 for the most recent arson attacks, though charges were later dropped. Andrew Czerwiwiec took over the licence from Mr Ramzan in May 1998, but when the pub is attacked three times on one August day it is the end. The pub is closed by October and sold to Wycombe Mosque for £170,000.

The former Castle in 2026 (the author)

Both the Turnpike and Golden Fleece were rebranded in the 1990s. The Turnpike was a Scottish & Newcastle pub – a successor to Courage – by 1993 and was then sold to the Magic Pub Co who rebranded it as a Hungry Horse despite the emphasis being on live music. In 1996 it was sold to Greene King. 

The Golden Fleece had been an Ind Coope pub until 1994 when it became a Big Steak Pub – a brand within Allied Domecq – until it was sold to Punch Pubs in 1999.

The Happy Wanderer escaped 1990s branding by being owned by Whitbread – as successor to the closed Wethered brewery – and advertising itself in 1995 as ‘an exciting family pub’ with a play area and pets’ corner. Whitbread sold it to Allied Domecq in 1999, who then sold it to Spirit Group – a subsidiary of Punch – who sold it back to Punch in 2003.

The new century’s vanishing pubs

In early 1996, a Council report highlighted the level of deprivation in Mickelfield, Castlefield and Hicks Farm. Councillor Ted Collins – one of the authors – said “the poor feel frustrated and let down by society. If you are very poor and cannot get a job, some people will say that ‘I do not want the community.’ We have to make everyone feel that they are part of the community.”

While some people did not want the Castle as part of Castlefield’s community, the Micklefield Inn was fighting to remain part of the community in an estate that was becoming mired in increasing violence and prostitution by 2000.

The Micklefield Inn was owned by Punch subsidiary Heritage Pub Company Trading Ltd. In 2005, they were seeking planning permission to close and redevelop the pub. That application must have failed as Admiral Taverns were the owners later that year. They quickly sold the pub to a property company and by 2007 it had gone, to be replaced by Wrights Place.

It seems that by the turn of the 21st century, the community pub in Wycombe’s suburbs was under serious threat. The next to close was the Turnpike. Despite a refurbishment in 2001 it closed in 2008 to become a Tesco Express two years later. Pubs were now worth more closed than open.

The former Turnpike as a Tesco Express in 2026 (the author)

We saw that the Wendover Arms was refurbished again in the year the Turnpike closed. Always looking for a new clientele, its owners – Wendover Hotel Ltd –  put in plans to change the pub’s use to a 39 bed hotel in August 2008. Although the change of use was agreed in 2009, there was a revised plan the following year for 46 beds and an extension to the rear car park, while keeping the remainder of the pub. 

Not satisfied with the 2010 plans, Buckingham Hotels Group – the owners in 2011 – planned to demolish the pub and redevelop it as a new hotel. Not all of those plans have come to fruition, though its owners have not lost the appetite for planning applications since 2011. And it is also clear that the Wendover Arms is no longer a public house.

The Wendover Arms in 2026, now the Wendover Hotel with extensions on both wings and bedrooms being added above (the author)

The Admiral Taverns-owned Jolly Bodger slipped away in 2010, though it’s not entirely clear when exactly it stopped trading. The local council – through Red Kite – are still the freeholders and the lease runs to 2067. In 2010, the lease was sold to private individuals. As recently as 2025 a planning application was made to turn the building into flats with a retail unit below.

The Punch-owned Golden Fleece was operated by the Cavalier Pub Co in 2001; they also ran the Antelope and Flint Cottage in the town. The pub was owned by Punch Pubs who closed and sold it to Tesco in 2013. Apparently, no planning permission was needed for a change of use to a shop.

The Golden Fleece as a Tesco Express in 2026. Despite the boardings up and trollies the original design of the pub is still apparent (the author)

In the Bellfield estate, the Bell & Mast had changed its name to the Masters by 1987. The original name appeared to be based on a bell on a ship’s mast, though behind the pub is a TV mast. The new pub sign showed a group of school masters wearing mortar boards – the connection remains unclear. The pub reverted to its former name in 2012. The owner, Admiral Taverns, sold the pub in 2013. It has since been demolished and housing has been built on the site.

In Bowerdean, the Happy Wanderer was in the Punch stable by 2005 and planning permission was sought for a change of use to a convenience store in 2014. However, Wycombe Islamic Society bought the building in 2015 when the pub closed. It became the Hive in 2017 – a multifaith community centre.

The Half Moon was refurbished by its owners, Enterprise Inns, in 2006, fully opening up the interior of the pub. It was for sale in 2016 and sold for development into flats by the following year.

The Half Moon as flats in 2026. The building still sports its pub signs. Are the exposed pipes a modernist touch or simply cheap? (the author)

Full circle

We started this post by discussing the opening and early years of the Hour Glass, and we end by discussing the history of the Hour Glass – Wycombe’s sole suburban pub since 2017 – from 1990 to the time of writing.

A games bar was added in 1990. In 1999, Punch Pubs bought the freehold from Allied Domecq and immediately transferred it to their subsidiary, Spirit Group. Spirit demerged from Punch in 2002 but were reacquired in 2006, demerging again in 2011, by which time the Hour Glass was owned by Scottish & Newcastle, who had been taken over by Heineken before Heineken renamed its pub division Star Pubs & Bars. 

By 2022, Alex Spittles and Luke Gregory had taken the lease, and made it clear how much they wanted Wanderer’s fans to use Wycombe’s last suburban community pub on match days.

Last one standing. The Hour Glass in 2026 (the author)

Sources 

The Bucks Free Press Archive.

SWOP (Sharing Wycombe’s Old Photographs).

Buckinghamshire Archive for licensing records and Wethered brewery minutes.

Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) website camra.org.uk

ROE, David (editor) 1995, Real Ale In Bucks, CAMRA books: St Albans.

Companies House website GOV.UK

Simonds Family website simondsfamily.me.uk

Wellington Boot website wellingtonbootblog.wordpress.com

The Lost Pubs Project website closed pubs.co.uk