Two moving pubs and a piggery

(first published in Ivybridge iMag in May 2023)

Modern-day South Brent has one pub, The Packhorse Inn, and a cafe bar called The Station House, but it wasn’t long ago that the latter was The Royal Oak and there were two other pubs, namely The London Inn and Anchor Inn. In the 19th century, there was also The Globe and The Wheat Sheaf Inn (at Nos. 9 Fore Street and 4 Church Street respectively).

There’s an interesting local story that both The Royal Oak and London Inn were bought and closed by a temperance (teetotaller) society, but villagers retaliated by reopening them in new buildings on adjacent ground.

Heritage Gateway’s webpage for the Royal Oak in South Brent says:

“The earlier Royal Oak is shown on the Tithe Apportionment and was immediately south of the present one and was sold to Mr John Roope Cranch or his son William Cranch, builders who owned the adjacent property. They pulled it down and built Oak House on the site.

The Royal Oak was built in the early 19th century under a cloud of animosity and revenge. The Clarence Inn and been bought and shut down by a religious factor who wanted to close all the public houses in South Brent. In response, the London Inn was opened close by. The original Royal Oak Inn was located in the cottage next door to the Royal Oak Hotel and this was bought and closed down by the same group. The people who built the London Inn then built the new Royal Oak directly adjacent to the site of the original.”

The original London Inn still exists as Clarence House – the green building on the left as you enter South Brent from Woodpecker Junction. The replacement London Inn, now the first house in London Inn Mews, is further up the hill, just beyond South Devon Auto Repairs.

Early 19th century records reveal nothing about the London Inn or Royal Oak closing, moving or reopening. Heritage Gateway’s source is a 1992 book by Tom Quick, entitled Dartmoor Inns, in which the author clarifies that many of the pub histories were told to him orally.

A search of later Victorian records retrieves an 1891 Totnes Times mention of “the new London Inn” in South Brent. This tallies with the 1887 opening of South Brent’s Methodist Chapel (Methodists were teetotal activists, known to have closed pubs in Victorian Wales).

Carol, the former landlady of the Royal Oak, told South Brent Archive that a regular lunch visitor had been Mrs Cranch, who'd told her:

“the current building that was The Royal Oak, now the Station House, was built in 1885...using proceeds from sale of the old Royal Oak...bet that went down well with the Temperance society. The large room out the back was built on the site of an old piggery...but hubby wouldn't let me call the restaurant that.... spoilsport!” 

This last detail will interest locals who –like me– go to the quiz in the backroom of the Station House. Thankfully, no whiff of pigs remains!

Three of Nelson’s great-granddaughters c. 1903. Most likely Ethel, Ada and Lilian.