Updated by Charlotte November 2024
The Traveller's Friend [sometimes mistakenly referred to as the Traveller's Rest which was actually a different pub in nearby Chapel Street. This was itself sometimes mistakenly called the Traveller's Friend], was a small beer house and low lodging house in Dean Street Marlow, an area dense with other sellers of alcohol, and other low lodging houses. The establishment wasn't the absolute roughest of the Dean Street places but it wasn't far off. Repeatedly the men lodging there were described as tramps or vagrants. They often got in trouble for being drunk and disorderly. It should be understood however that the poorer and shabbier dressed you were the more quickly you would be targeted by police if thought to be tipsy. Drunken rich people generally were advised just to go home and sleep it off, it being considered not fair to embarrass them by making them appear in court to answer charges. The sort of destitute people who used this pub would usually receive no such kindness and were often drinking on a empty stomach which meant a rapid absorption of alcohol.
The pub was fairly close to the corner of Spittal Street and Dean Street, just a few feet from the Cherry Tree, the Jolly Maltsters and later the Chairmaker's Arms too. That was 12 ft from the Cherry Tree and 9ft from The Mint across the road to be precise.
There was only three bedrooms in the property so if you stayed there you weren't getting a bed let alone a room to yourself.
Out back the pub had stabling for three horses though visitors were most likely travellers on foot. Many Dean Street pubs hired out sheds and stables to other residents of the street who had donkeys or ponies for use in their veg hawking, cherry selling or skewer making businesses.
There was a back alley entrance to the Travellers from an alley that also ran behind and could be accessed from the nearby Cherry Tree. This alley was eventually forcibly stopped up as it was seen as a place for bad behaviour such as the exchange of stolen goods or as a means of a quick getaway from the police.
Charles Hoare ran the business from at least 1861 to at least 1864. At other times he ran the Three Horseshoes in Gun Lane and the Bear in Chapel Street both very near the Traveller's. (See this post on his wife Charlotte here). The pub had probably existed as an unlicenced lodging house for some twenty years before Charles took over.
William Price was the landlord for some time. (Possibly from 1864) He said in an 1871 licencing hearing that he had had a licence to sell beer by retail for some 20 years, although it would appear he was not at the Traveller's premises all of that time- he was at the Cherry Tree in 1861 ( See here ). He was also a fruiterer, a very Dean Street occupation - in the late 1840s there had been an orchard out back of the Cherry Tree and there may still have been one later. At one point he and his wife Lydia had trouble with one of their guests whom William suspected of stealing wood from the yard at the Traveller's. William offered to fight him, Lydia politely asked him to leave but he would not. Police had to be called.
William died at the pub in 1874 . Lydia took over the licence. This was a technical detail as she was already described long before that as the landlady but previously only William's name was on the licence. She ran the premises for only a short time before her tragic and horrific death at Bourne End Station later that year, aged 65. On the way to visit her daughter in Goring, she was dragged under the wheels of a departing train after risking a dart back to it, apparently to retrieve something forgotten in the carriage. Her injuries were such that the elderly lady stood no chance of survival. Her son Thomas took over the beer house. Then by 1877 came a William Price followed by a Henry Price landlord until 1894 when a Charles Price took over temporarily. He was considered to have conducted the premises badly, allowing things to get close to riotous inside so that his attempts to take over the pub permanently got short thrift from the magistrates. The revelation by the police that Charles had once been convicted of poaching and had recently been seen walking into town with two notorious poachers and an unexplained three dozen dead rabbits didn't exactly help matters. Henry Price had to take back the licence. There then followed an unsuccessful attempt to transfer the premises from Henry to Richard Wilson, a coffee shop proprietor from London. It seems the magistrates did not want someone inexperienced in charge of a house that was described as a haunt of poachers and the favourite drinking hole of all the "lowest" people in Marlow. When it emerged that Richard had not yet managed to sell the coffee business when he applied to take over the Friend, that was it. The only thing worse than an inexperienced host on the premises, was an inexperienced host who wasn't even going to be able to be on the premises because he had other business to attend to at the same time in a different town. After Richard informed the Bench he hadn't secured a buyer, a hold over was given to George Stroud.
In 1897 it was licensed as a common lodging house for a maximum of 6 lodgers but anecdotal evidence suggests this limit was often exceeded.
The poor state of the building meant significant repairs were needed in 1901 if authorities were to permit it to continue to operate. During the works the then proprietors Annie and George Stroud (from 1894) had to move out. They were forced to stay in a Dean Street house left empty after it too had been condemned as being unfit for human habitation. In the end, the Travellers Friend was practically rebuilt at a cost of £400 in order to satisfy the authorities.
Above, now a cycle shop, the former Travellers Friend, largely rebuilt 1901. There was 2 doors on the front and one at the side after the rebuild.
Maybe the Strouds enjoyed their enforced hiatus from their beer house business as some of the Dean Street customers were a lot of trouble. In 1901 Annie was threatened with being hit with a beer cup by an itinerant woman. This woman along with her husband was allowed to purchase beer on the premises but refused lodgings there as they had caused trouble during a previous stay. The complaining woman when turfed off the premises retaliated by smashing the window of the Traveller's Friend.
The next year the spruced up pub ceased to be used as a lodging house. Officially that is. I found a lodger referenced in 1908! The original dedicated lodging house portion attached to the main part of the premises was removed in the renovations. The works also gave the pub a separate jug and bottle entrance for takeaway alcohol. At this point the pub had three bedrooms and a stable that could take 3 horses.
A James Humphrey, who took over from George Stroud in 1902*, was there until 1904. Humphrey passed the premises onto Frederick Clifton after a brief hold over of the licence was granted to William Henry Noble. Fred Clifton passed it on again the following year to William Henry Blair. In 1906 Frederick Elmy took over briefly. John Henry Westman had it in 1907-1909 and was the final landlord.
The pub was forcibly closed in 1909 under local measures intended to reduce the concentration of beer retailers in any area. As mentioned above, it was described as 9 yards from the Mint and 12 yards from the Cherry Tree, 73 yards from the Cross Keys in Spittal Square plus 33 from The Verney Arms. It was selling 59 barrels a beer a year at this point.
One of the reasons counted against its remaining open was the high turnover of landlords in the proceeding 5 years of its life.
When the Travellers was closed down in 1909 it became Alfred Lee's grocers (later Chapple's general store) with his dairy behind. David Webb the corn merchant occupied the adjacent building to the left, now demolished, (later Hoars cycle shop.)
*George Stroud and his wife moved to Cambridge Road by 1907 when George was fined for using "disgusting" and "indecent" language in front of several witnesses. He said then in his defence that he had run The Traveller's Friend for 8 years without any complaint against him or his conduct.
Related Posts:
Travellers REST here
Pub Related post index here
Posts about life in Dean Street and neighbouring streets here
More beer sellers than bakers -Temperance in Marlow here
Lists of posts about everyday life in old Great Marlow here
Many many Marlow publicans and beer sellers etc had connections as a family or as an individual to several different premises. There was a high turnover in licence holders at many locations! To find all mentions of your ancestors here, see the A-Z person index on the top drop down menu. This lists more than 4000 individuals from Marlow's past and new content is added daily.
Sources:
Censuses from my transcriptions of microfilm images of census pages supplied by the LDS at a Familysearch family history centre.
Bucks Herald 11April, 29th August and 11 July 1874, South Bucks Free Press 22nd September 1865, South Bucks Standard 4th January 1901, 16th February, 13 April and 8th June 1894, 8 October 1897, 4th January 1901, 1st and 22nd August 1902, 27 May and 13th April 1904,26 May 1905 13th March 1908, 05 March 1909 at the British Library via the BNA. Accessed July 2020.
Property deed/sale research and licence hearing reports.
©Marlow Ancestors.
Note: There was also a similarly named Traveller's Rest at Wheeler End, and also at Wooburn.
Previously published pub related posts can be found under the Pub Related option on the top drop down menu. Many many Marlow publicans and beer sellers etc had connections as a family or as an individual to several different premises. There was a high turnover in licence holders at many locations! To find all mentions of your ancestors here, see the A-Z person index on the top drop down menu. This lists more than 4000 individuals from Marlow's past and new content is added daily.
