When I was planning a few days’ stay in Gloucester, England, I was looking for a reasonable price in a place close to the town center. It was only after booking that I learned my choice was not only dead center, but 600 years old.
The New Inn was built around 1430, possibly as a hostel for pilgrims to the nearby abbey that later became Gloucester Cathedral. It’s just down the street from The Cross, where the two main streets of a Roman camp eventually became Gloucester’s Gate streets: Northgate, Southgate, Eastgate and Westgate.
Today, it’s a 42-room hotel with a pub and restaurant on the ground floor, still in the form of England’s most completely-surviving galleried medieval inn. At points, it was host to several bars and restaurants, and some of the ground-floor space facing the street is given over to retail.
But its quiet quaintness belies a sometimes turbulent past—it’s lived through the Civil War of the 1640s and the Siege of Gloucester; a century earlier, Lady Jane Grey’s nine-day reign as Queen was proclaimed from its balconies by the Abbot of Gloucester.
Although there’s no record Jane Grey visited Gloucester—and she certainly wasn’t there during those nine days—local custom says that she is among the spirits of what calls itself “the most haunted pub in Gloucester,” along with The Old Lady in Black and the The Old Man Who Drops His Pint in the Bar.
But while Jane Grey never made her way into the New Inn, it was not too many years later that another famous name did: The New Inn was one of the Gloucester courtyard venues where William Shakespeare and The Lord Chamberlain’s Men performed, and the only one still standing.
Prices have changed, but it’s still a reasonably-priced lodging. Rooms are small and simple, and there are plenty of stairs and twisting corridors—and they’re all reached by an outside stairway, rain or shine.
Inside the pub, which is also the front desk, it’s a comfortable and cozy place for tasty pub meals or a pint or both.
And, if you’re there at the right moment, history—or at least a hint of it—may show up. I had just finished my last dinner when the room was invaded by a raiding party led by “the High Sheriff of Gloucester” and his cohorts, proclaiming that they were there to test the ale and make sure it had not been contaminated by dangerous substances such as water.
A pint was poured on a stool, and an assistant in leather pants was made to sit on it for a few minutes, during which the ‘Sheriff’ collected funds for local charities. After five minutes, the assistant rose, with the stool sticking to his pants, proving that only ale and no water was being served.
