The New Inn, 16 Northgate Street, Gloucester

Gloucester

Gloucester is a city, district and county town of Gloucestershire in the South West region of England. Gloucester lies close to the Welsh border, and on the River Severn, approximately north-east of Bristol, and south-southwest of Birmingham....

, GL1 1SF, is a public house

Public house

A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...

, hotel and restaurant that is Grade I listed by English Heritage

English Heritage

English Heritage . is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...

 and is the most complete surviving example of a medieval courtyard inn with galleries in Britain. The announcement of Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey , also known as The Nine Days' Queen, was an English noblewoman who was de facto monarch of England from 10 July until 19 July 1553 and was subsequently executed...

's succession to the British throne was made from the Inn gallery in 1553.

History

The Inn was built not long before 1455 by John Twyning, a monk, as a hostelry for the former Benedictine Abbey of St Peter. It is on the site of an earlier inn. After the dissolution of St Peter's the inn passed to the Dean and Chapter of Gloucester Cathedral and was leased to various inn holders until it was sold in 1858. Stories that the inn was built to provide lodgings for pilgrims to the tomb of King Edward II were first recorded in the eighteenth century and may be incorrect.

In 1553, King Edward VI died and Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey , also known as The Nine Days' Queen, was an English noblewoman who was de facto monarch of England from 10 July until 19 July 1553 and was subsequently executed...

 was staying at The New Inn when the proclamation of her succession to the British throne was made from the Inn gallery.

Claims that William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

 may have performed at the Inn with his company The Lord Chamberlain's Men, remain unproven, though it is known that the company did visit and perform in the city.

Architecture

The Inn is entered through a carriage way from Northgate Street, and is the most complete surviving example of a medieval courtyard inn with galleries in Britain.

Close to the entrance to the Inn in Northgate Street lies New Inn Lane, which runs parallel to Eastgate Street and The Oxbode. Reportedly, it was originally called Pilgrims Lane.

Today

Today the Inn is a successful restaurant, pub and hotel, as well as being licenced to perform civil weddings. It was taken over by Mark and Samantha Cooke in 2010 and serves as a meeting place for CAMRA and a local branch of the Rotary Club.

The Inn is supposedly haunted with one unexplained event captured on CCTV in 2010.

Further reading

• "Medieval Inns" by E.M. Jope in Studies in Building History, 1961, pp. 166-191.