The Barge Inn Kennet and Avon Canal

From the-barge-inn.com... more

by Terri Waters

Title

The Barge Inn Kennet and Avon Canal

Artist

Terri Waters

Medium

Photograph

Description

From the-barge-inn.com
The Barge Inn has a long and colourful history, built in 1810 to coincide with the opening of the Kennet and Avon Canal, it prospered alongside a waterway then busy with both commercial and passenger traffic.
Known in its heyday as the George, the establishment contained a slaughter house, coach house and stabling for four horses, as well as a brew house, hop store, bake house, smoke house and cart shed. The north section of the ground floor included a grocery and general stores, as between 1871 and 1957 a number of licensees also acted as local grocers.
Sadly, fire broke out on the 14th December, 1858 largely destroying the original building and preceding what the Devizes & Wiltshire Gazette referred to as a disgraceful scene. Soon after the fire was extinguished the cellars were entered . And there was nothing but drunkenness and confusion.
However, due to its importance, the Barge Inn was rebuilt in just six months, an event commemorated by a plaque at the north gable end. The Inn, which now had no fewer than 24 rooms within the main building and 15 fireplaces including those in the bake house and barns, flourished along with other services at Honeystreet such as the sawmills, builders wharf and coal stores.
The canal became more neglected with the arrival of the railways, but this did not prevent the Barge Inn from being sold by auction on Wednesday April 7th, 1897 (at three o'clock punctually), to T&J Usher of Bristol, for the then considerable sum of �2,100. Today, a hundred years later, the wheel of history has turned full circle: with Ushers reacquiring The Barge in 1992.

Uploaded

March 3rd, 2013