Some Curious Pub Names

Inn signs and inn names have often enshrined important aspects of the history of a parish. Unfortunately, some large breweries today call their house by the same name, in whatsoever town or village they are, in the meantime destroying the traditional names. The 'Bricklayers' Arms' in Studley, on the Alcester Road, has recently suffered this indignity.

Our area has enjoyed a multiplicity of inn names, some of which were probably quite rare but all of great interest. We print here some of the most unusual ones.

Studley parish had two of them, 'THE BUG AND BLANKET' and 'THE HOG IN THE HOLE'. The former was near Castle Farm, tradition stating that it was the half-timbered cottage there: probably no more than a beerhouse and in use before the 19th century (for it is not found in directories of that century) The name's origin may only be guessed at. The 'The Hog' was in Crook's Lane, again a beerhouse but it had a bowling alley and a needle workshop in the garden, where six men worked. They had not far to go to buy a drink. 'The Hog' is thought to have changed its name to 'The Grove' by 1908 but it ceased trading by 1917 and is now demolished. It had a strange name, with no apparent meaning coming immediately to mind.

In Alcester parish, one hostelry, whose site we do not yet know, carried a name redolent of history - 'THE CAT AND BAGPIPES'. The Caterans were the Scots who raided over the Border and the Bag-pipes are obvious. In the 17th century Civil Wars, Scottish mercenaries spread fear and alarm in these parts. It is likely that here was a pub which originated in the mid 17th century but about which we know little now.

Another pub which once was in Alcester parish but is now over the border on the Ridgeway is 'THE WHY NOT?'. This place still operates and the picture of a horse on its sign is a reminder of the winner of the Grand National towards the end of the 19th century. history of a sort.

Until a few years ago, 'THE TURKS HEAD' flourished in Alcester High Street: in its time it had run a flourishing bowling alley and struck its own alley tokens. The name may refer to Alcester's rope trade, for a 'Turk's Head' was a type of rope knot; or it may be an allusion to the Middle Ages, when many hostelries were called 'Turk's Head' or 'Saracen's Head', in reference to the Crusades. from property deeds we know that an earlier name had been 'BUCK AND BREECHES', when the landlord was a breeches maker. The building is now a shop but the inn sign outside is a modern representation of a Turk, replacing the original one.

'THE GREEN DRAGON' in Sambourne is thought to date back to the 17th century. It may have been palin 'Dragon' its origin is obscure: was it on one of the drover:' roads from. Wales and was its name a welcoming sign for the Welsh drovers? The pub, happily, is still with us

Bidford-on-Avon has 'THE PLEASURE BOAT', the name probably given by the Hendleys, a family of wharfingers in the mid 19th century. The name reminds us that Bidford was considered once as the place to go to for an afternoon out on the river and as a centre for river traffic. Another pub not far away is 'THE ANGLO-SAXON', a name this hostelry obtained in the 1960s, being an allusion to the excavations behind the building in the 1920s, when a Saxon cemetery was found. Previously, it had been 'The Masons' Arms', a reference to the building trade centred on Bidford. One historic name for another.'

Unusual names do not come more unusual than Great Alne's 'MOTHER HUFF CAP'. As Richard Churchley observes in 'Local Past' (Autumn 1981), in days when most pubs brewed their own beer, perhaps this one was renowned for the huff cap, or froth, on the top. The 'mother' is likely to be the dame who brewed the beer and managed the public house. In 1746 the pub is thought to have been 'The Huff Cap' and to have acquired 'mother' later. This hostelry was once on the main coach road from Stratford to Bridgnorth.

'THE PAUL PRY' stood in the hamlet of Walcot, part of Haselor parish. It was demolished c.1914 but the cottage next door still bears the name. This beerhouse, like several in the Midlands, took its name from a character in a comedy Written in 1825. The Walcot pub had the name before 1834.

Spring 1991 Index