Pubs of Old

Looking at the many pubs that once populated the East Wolds of Yorkshire

COMMUNITYHISTORYFEATURED

Al Best

2/14/20242 min read

It still begs the question, if this was Board Inn where were ‘The George & Dragon’ and ‘The Nelson’?

To continue the saga of the Langtoft pubs, Michael Tong wrote in to say, “The Nelson pub is, what is now, The Ship Inn. The George & Dragon is now a private dwelling on Scarborough Road I believe called Wayside”.

I’ve since found a few references to the George and Dragon Inn, the earliest of which is 1874. A later mention in 1933 indicates that Scarborough and Whitby Breweries may have owned it at that time. With what was learnt earlier, could it be that there were three pubs in Langtoft? Not to mention the Old Mill.

I’ve also noticed, during research, that there is a house in Foxholes called the “Ship Inn Cottage”. Was that another pub? If so, when did it close?

In Thwing the Falling Stone pub which closed a few years ago has had a few incarnations. The earliest I’ve found is 1823 when it was called the Bottle and Glass and run by James Jordon. By 1879 it was the Rampant Horse and in 1888 the rector tried to prevent the pub from renewing its license but failed. By 1893 the public house was known as the Raincliffe Arms and in 1905 it had an innkeeper by the name of Augustus Towse who was also a farmer and a carrier. I’ve also found two references (from 1912 and 1922) to a Mr J Allan as owner. In 1932 Scarborough and Whitby Breweries Ltd had the pub advertised as available to let.

Later still, the pub once more became the Rampant Horse until its final incarnation as the Falling Stone. The last name being taken from the meteorite which fell at Wold Cottage in 1795. It was the largest meteorite to be seen falling in Britain. In 1892 the pub was run by a part time victualler who managed a threshing machine business.

(Thank you, Katrina Gray, for that final piece of information

In early 2022, I wrote a short piece for the newsletter about the trades listed in Langtoft, by an early census.

I had speculated about where the two Langtoft pubs, mentioned in this 1800’s census, were located. A Thwing resident said one was on the left of the road just past the roundabout on the way to Driffield. Since then, I've been contacted by Kim Manning who thinks her house may have been that pub.

Now called Board House, it was originally called Board Inn and thought to have been used as a pub/boarding house. Kim has kindly shared the two photographs shown with this article but it’s unclear if the pub was operational at the time the photographs were taken.