Welcome to The Castle

The Castle chronicles!

We first stepped foot into The Castle in April 2006 and purchased it in October of the same year. This Grade II listed building was in a very sorry state & as a pub The Castle's reputation was not the best. After getting approval from Listed Buildings we set about a program of extensive restoration & renovation at the beginning of 2007. During this time we kept a 'warts and all' on-line blog which tells the story from our first viewing to the opening day.

To read our blog go to: www.thecastle-boa.blogspot.com

The fruits of our labour have been recognised by Bradford on Avon's Town Council with award of a Past and Future Award 2007 which recognises a project that is considered to have preserved the past for the benefit of the future.

We feel remarkably proud and privileged to own The Castle however, we have owned this magnificent building for a mere fraction of its life. Below is some of the history of The Castle that we have so far been able to unearth.

Earliest History

Remarkably despite being a prominent building on the entry to Bradford on Avon, The Castle is the one public house that receives little notice in the books on the town. The main building is 18th century but is not mentioned as being licensed before the Kelly's Wiltshire Directory of 1855. It is not listed under any name in the 1848 or earlier directories.

It seems most probable that it was a private house that opened as a public house between 1848 and 1855 to serve the area that developed here after the building of Christchurch in 1841. In the 18th century there had been a coaching inn, The New Inn (now Clifton House) on the Bath Road, but there had been no hostelry in the area since the closure of the New Inn.

The Castle seems to have been established by George Newman who is listed as the licensee in 1855, 1867 & 1875; although in 1859 the licensee is T. Holloway.

In the 1870s George Newman Jnr was licensee & brewer at the Lamb in Bridge Street - a pub that had a fine stone lamb as its sign.
It is not until 1867 that Mount Pleasant is mentioned as a street name; prior to that the address was Dry Hill or Mason's Lane.

 

Later licensees were;
1878 & 1880 - Henry Stokes
1889 - Henry John Blackmore
1895 - Henry John Blackmore Jnr
1899, 1903 & 1907 - William Moody
1911 & 1915 - Mrs Ruth Moody (probably widow of the above)
1920 - A. Price
1923 - G.C. Powell
1927 - Arthur George Cross
1931 - Walter B. Beak
1935 - Jas. Godden
1939 - Thomas Walker Robinson