Introduction
The inns, alehouses and beerhouses of historic Wisborough Green developed along the routes used to cross a large Western Weald parish. James Dallaway, a clergyman, antiquary and early nineteenth-century historian of western Sussex, recorded a parish of about 8,592 acres. Pallingham and the River Arun formed its southern edge, while Loxwood and the Surrey boundary lay in the north.
The licensed houses sold drink and meals, provided rooms for meetings and auctions, accommodated travellers, and supported fairs, sport and local business. Cattle routes, turnpikes, canals and motor roads brought different forms of trade to their doors.
An inn generally offered meals, beds and facilities for horses. An alehouse or beerhouse could serve a smaller local trade. The Beerhouse Act of 1830 encouraged new premises licensed mainly to sell beer. The records use these terms according to date and local practice.
Ale, early hospitality and the road through Loxwood
Ale was brewed and sold in rural communities long before the familiar public-house signs entered written records. Fairs, livestock journeys and seasonal gatherings created regular opportunities for hospitality. A leafy bough displayed outside a house announced that ale was available.
Local tradition identifies the building now known as Alameda as Loxwood’s oldest inn site. It stood at the top of the hill, immediately before the old track descended towards the River Lox. The property is believed to have served as a coaching inn, offering refreshment and a stopping place before travellers continued down the steep approach to the river crossing.
A large stone stood outside the building with a hollow cut into its surface to form a mounting step. A traveller could place one foot in the shaped recess when climbing onto a horse. The stone was later moved and now stands outside Church Cottage.
After its use as an inn, Alameda became a village shop and housed Loxwood’s first post office. The building therefore continued to serve travellers and the wider settlement through the collection of letters, the sale of provisions and the exchange of local news.
The first Loxwood inn recorded by name is the Drovers Arms, also called the Cattle Drovers Arms, in 1796. The building is now known as Hall House. It stood beside the village pond on the established route used by drovers moving cattle across the Weald.
The earlier road approached the pond, passed around the side of the Drovers Arms that later became the rear of the building, and then continued north towards Alfold. The pond supplied water for cattle, while the inn offered meals, ale and beds for drovers. Farmers and livestock dealers also used the premises when arranging sales and onward journeys.
The turnpike changes the village, 1757–1801
The Guildford and Arundel turnpike reached Loxwood in 1757. The improved road crossed the Surrey boundary at Alfold Bars, passed through the village and continued towards Newbridge, Pulborough and Arundel.
At the Drovers Arms, the new turnpike was driven through the former back garden. The revised road placed the village pond in front of the building, where it became more accessible to passing livestock and road traffic. The former rear elevation became the principal public face of the inn.
Farther down the hill, a farmhouse beside the River Lox crossing became the Bridge Alehouse. Its position served travellers approaching the river, traffic using Brewhurst Mill and following the turnpike. Loxwood Bridge was rebuilt in brick in 1791. By 1801 the Bridge Alehouse was known as the Onslow Arms.
Fairs and parish business, 1780s-1816
The Three Crowns at Wisborough Green was already serving public business by the 1780s. River Arun Navigation proprietors met there in June 1786 while the canal from Pallingham to Newbridge was being built. John King of Greathouse near Loxwood, a member of the long-established King landowning family, was among the proprietors named in the 1785 Navigation Act.
The Three Crowns continued to host meetings, auctions, dinners and sales. The Wisborough Prosecution Society used the inn from its foundation in 1792. Subscribers pooled money to pay legal costs and offer rewards for information about theft, assault and damage to property. Ordinary meetings, special meetings and the annual dinner were held in the inn’s rooms.
Loxwood had its own annual fair on the fields around the Onslow Arms. Newspaper fair lists record Loxwood in April 1788 and repeatedly during the 1820s, 1830s, 1840s and early 1850s. Livestock, dealers, farmers, carts and visitors filled the ground around the inn. Food, drink and stable facilities were available beside the turnpike.
The canal and a new centre at the Onslow Arms
The Wey and Arun Junction Canal opened through Loxwood in 1816. The waterway ran behind the Onslow Arms and added bargemen, canal workers, carriers and traders to the road and mill traffic already using the area. The inn was then ideally positioned beside the turnpike, toll house, canal, River Lox crossing and route to Brewhurst Mill.
Meetings were regularly held at the Onslow Arms. Chapel trustees, parish interests, estate representatives and local groups used its rooms for accounts, property matters, repairs and other business. In May 1845 William Napper and John King, trustees responsible for Loxwood Chapel property, met there to consider cottages, timber and building work.
The Drovers Arms closed after the canal opened. The Onslow Arms occupied the busier location and the drovers building became Hall House, divided into three cottages, with one later becoming a dame school.
Newbridge Wharf had become a major transfer point after the Arun Navigation opened from Pallingham in 1787. The Limeburners Arms stood beside the wharf, serving bargemen, carters and wharf labour. Lime arrived by water for agriculture, mortar and building work.
At Pallingham, the Stone family operated the lock and docks. Bread and ale were sold from the lock-keeper’s household to crews working between the tidal Arun, the lock and the barge-repair docks.
Beerhouses and roadside trade, 1830-1870
The Beerhouse Act of 1830 changed rural licensing. At Wisborough Green, the 1842 tithe survey described the Cricketers as a beer shop and garden. The building faced the cricket pitch and village green. The Three Crowns stood around the corner, closer to the church.
The Cricketers was remembered as a bough house during the annual fair. Quoits were played outside, while cricket, football and stoolball used the green.
The Royal Oak served the Wisborough Green to Petworth road near Balchin Farm. A village account published in 1936 remembered it as a noted beerhouse. The road carried agricultural workers, carters and traffic towards Strood Green, Bedham and Petworth.
At Roundstreet Common, the Fox and Hounds stood at the junction with Drungewick Road. Mid-nineteenth-century records connect it with the Hawkins family. An 1867 directory names Enoch Hawkins as publican and builder, while brewing and malting formed part of the trade associated with the premises.
Sport, auctions and Victorian public life, 1870-1900
The Bat and Ball at Newpound occupied a nineteenth-century public-house range attached to an older timber-framed building. Its sign promoted the growth of village cricket teams. After Wisborough Green defeated Strood Green in the final match of the 1886 season, the teams gathered at the Bat and Ball for supper.
The Three Crowns and Cricketers continued to serve events around the green. Auction notices, society meetings, dinners and sporting gatherings appeared regularly in local newspapers. The Bat and Ball served Newpound, while the Onslow Arms remained the principal gathering place around Loxwood Bridge and the canal.
The Sir Roger Tichborne opened under that name at Alfold Bars in 1873. The sign referred to the Tichborne claimant case, a nationally famous dispute concerning identity and inheritance. Denzil Onslow Osborne, a landowner at Drungewick and a Member of Parliament, supported the claimant. The Sussex portion of Alfold entered Wisborough Green civil parish in 1884.
The Loxwood inn at one end of the turnpike commemorated the Onslow family associated with Drungewick for centuries. The Alfold Bars inn at the other end of the turnpike commemorated the Tichborne case, the most famous legal case supported by Denzil Onslow Osborne.
Motor traffic and twentieth-century village life
Motor vehicles altered the approach to the parish inns during the early twentieth century bringing customers from a wider area. A surviving photograph of the Fox and Hounds at the Drungewick Road junction shows cars parked outside during the 1920s.
The public houses continued to host auctions, clubs, suppers, celebrations and village organisations. The first recorded Wisborough Green Cricket Club supper took place at the Three Crowns in 1909. The Onslow Arms remained associated with the annual fair and gatherings on the surrounding fields.
The 1939 Register recorded Horace Standen as licensed victualler at the Three Crowns. The household included a barman and domestic staff. Loxwood became a separate civil parish in 1938.
Roads, waterways and meeting rooms
The route past Loxwood pond can still be understood at Hall House, where the turnpike changed the front and rear of the former Drovers Arms. The Onslow Arms occupies the later transport centre beside the bridge. Newbridge and Pallingham retain the landscape of wharves, locks and canal traffic.
At Wisborough Green, the Cricketers faces the pitch and green, while the Three Crowns stands nearer the church and the roads entering the village. The Bat and Ball marks Newpound, the Fox and Hounds, now a house, marked the Drungewick Road junction, and the Sir Roger Tichborne continues to serve the line of turnpike hospitality at Alfold Bars.
Inside these houses, auction catalogues were opened, committee decisions recorded, prizes presented, meals served and fair business settled. Outside, cattle drank at the pond, barges waited at locks, cricket occupied the green and cars gathered beside the road.
