A Quick Half and a Trio of Haunted Pubs

Over the Tamar and into Cornwall, for there is a curious tale to relate about The Tree Inn at Stratton. Long before Bude became a hip surf resort, neighbouring Stratton was an important stop on the coaching route now grandly termed the Atlantic Highway. Its moment making headlines occurred a long time ago, during the English Civil War. For when Charlie’s fun-loving cavaliers planned 1643’s Battle of Stratton, the village inn was their choice of H.Q.

The Tree Inn at Stratton

Sir Bevil Grenville

The royalist troops were led by Sir Bevil Grenville, described as the only man who knew how to handle the Cornishmen. Loving Bevil as only the most loyal soldiers can, they were happy to march into battle against apparently overwhelming odds. That was certainly the case during his attack on Ralph Hopton’s parliamentarians, a skirmish none but himself expected to win.

By his side was Anthony Payne. Standing at 7ft 4in, he was the last of the Cornish giants. After the war, he retired to live at The Tree, dying peacefully in 1691. His coffin was so large, it had to be lowered through a hole made in the roof.

Courtyard at The Tree Inn

I visited this lovely, historic pub six years ago, to drop off beer from the brewery I worked at. Whilst there, I may have been tempted to try a swift half myself…the old memory isn’t as strong as it used to be! However, what I do recall is the interesting tale the then landlady told me about the back bar. It was, she assured me, haunted!

An Ulsterman had the pub at the time, a great, fat fellow; I can’t seem to remember his name. Anyway, it doesn't matter, for it was his wife’s mother who’d seen the ghost, not him. The ghost was an old woman, sat on a chair by the fireplace. In fact, not only did his mother-in-law see the ghost, she even talked to it. Many a conversation she enjoyed with the spectral punter, even though no one else ever heard so much as a whisper from it.

The White Hart Hotel in Okehampton

A similar tale was told at The White Hart in Okehampton. This coaching inn, on the fringes of Dartmoor, must once have offered a very welcome sight to those travelling on inclement evenings, for it provided warmth and shelter of the kind unheard of upon the moor. Yet the tale told was not about the clatter of ghostly hooves, and neither did it involve the spirit of anyone who stayed there long ago. Rather, it was another old lady, one who asked the most prosaic of questions about room rates and the like.

The manager called the young receptionist to his side and dressed her down for not coming to help in the busy bar.

“But I couldn’t leave my post,” she protested. “I was dealing with a customer.”

“What customer?” he scoffed. “There was nobody there.”

“Oh, but there was sir,” she insisted. “An old lady. You must’ve seen her.”

She claimed to have been kept occupied with a veritable barrage of enquiries.

To settle the argument, the manager inspected footage from the CCTV cameras. Nothing was seen save the pretty young receptionist…who chatted merrily away at what appeared to be an empty space!

Chillaton, with the Chichester Arms

Both inns are under new ownership and remain as busy as ever. Sadly, another of the pubs I sold beer to, The Chichester Arms in Chillaton, is no more. It has gone the way of so many atmospheric country pubs, neglected by the village it once served so proudly. Boarded up, it offers just a hint of the great times local people must once have enjoyed there. Occasions so enjoyable that one visitor refused to allow even death to prevent him returning each night.

The Chichester Arms

The name of Charlie, he went by, and every night after closing time he played a trick or two on The Chichester’s last landlady. She told me that he would unlock all the doors whilst she slept, and unplug both the television and Sky box. Each morning, she would wake up to see the wires laid neatly beside each other.

One night, he took his mischief further. The landlady awoke to smell the unmistakeable aroma of cooking fat reach her upstairs rooms. Rushing down to the pub kitchen, she found the commercial fryers switched on.

To my great amusement, she then related to me how she’d chastised the errant spook for his behaviour. Wagging her finger in the air, and adopting the kind of tone one normally uses when addressing an ill-behaved dog, she told Charlie that she didn’t mind him unlocking the front doors, but switching on the fryers was, “stupid and dangerous.”

The dressing down apparently worked, for she told me Charlie never pulled that trick again. Suitably chastened, he reined in his sense of humour and limited his pranks to unlocking doors and loosening cables once more.