» Main Index
» Search This Site
» Submit Update
» Contact Us
|
Home > Cambridgeshire >
Caxton > George Inn
George Inn
|
|
|
|
The George Inn was situated on Ermine
Street and is now in residential use. It was built in the late 16th century,
refronted in the early 18th century and altered in the 19th and 20th
centuries. The building is constructed from red brick with steeply pitched
slate and plain tile roofs and is of two storey with attic and cellars. The
inn had a Georgian front and the rear is an example of completely preserved
Elizabethan brick. |
|
From: An Inventory of the Historical
Monuments in the County of Cambridgeshire, 1968 |
Caxton Manor, for a time The George
Inn, consists of a house and buildings.
The house is two-storeyed with attics and dates from c1600. The walls are
predominantly of red brick and there are slated roofs. The plan is a
gable-ended main range with a single-carriage entry facing E across the
street to the former market place, and a wing at an obtuse angle to the SW.
The house was converted to an inn in the 18th century when it was refronted
and had the interior largely remodelled, although it later reverted to
private use. There are a number of 19th century and modern modifications:
the floor of the carriage entry has been raised and its ends closed by
glazed screens and a centrally placed clock turret, dated 1887, now
dominates the street elevation.
The Georgian E front is symmetrically designed in seven bays with the three
middle bays forming a slightly recessed centrepiece. The front door is set
in a modern glazed screen under an 18th century elliptical-headed arch at
the street end of the old entry. The hung-sash windows are original except
for the second from the S on the ground-floor which has recently replaced a
door. The wall face rises to a parapet, behind which are two small hipped
dormers. It is broken in the centre by the projecting and gabled clock
turret.
The W side is almost entirely in original dark red brick of c1600, rather
irregular in size and bond. The principal features are two narrow tower-like
gabled projections, between them is the W arch of the carriage entry with a
depressed triangular head. Above this arch is a wide original window divided
into twelve equal lights by brick mullions and transoms with a somewhat
defaced entablature over the head. A number of other original windows,
mostly blocked or mutilated, survive of smaller but similar character.
The adjoining N.W. side of the S.W. wing is similar in character, but the
gabled upper part of its S.W. end is of plastered studwork. The S.E. side is
also similar but has been partially cased in modern brick or plastered over.
These subsidiary elevations have a number of original mullioned windows of
stucco covered cut brick, more or less imperfectly preserved.
The house retains few original features inside. Some ceiling beams are stop
chamfered and one in a cellar immediately N. of the entry is moulded. The
principle rooms on both floors of the main range are now organised
inn-fashion along N-S. passageways running the length of the W. side. The
18th century staircase housed in the N. projection ascends to the first
floor in two flights. There are two simple stone fireplace surrounds and
several doors of six fielded panels, also of the 18th century.
The buildings include a brick-built barn in prolongation of the SW wing and
approximately coeval with it. The S.E. wall of this barn is almost entirely
masked by the N.W. wall of later out-buildings in an adjoining property.
Four buttresses, disposed at irregular intervals, are partly visible
however. They appear to be early additions designed to arrest settlement.
The entire S.E. wall both to the house and the outbuilding, has subsided
continuously, perhaps as a result of having been built over a filled-in
boundary ditch. A free standing stable block, somewhat altered, is parallel
to and behind the main range. Also of the 17th century. |
|
|
Do you have any anecdotes, historical information, updates or photos of this pub? Become a contributor by submitting them here. Like this site? Follow us on
Make email contact with other ex-customers and landlords of this pub by adding your details to this page. |
|
|