The New Inn, Gloucester

The story

The New Inn stands on Northgate Street in the center of Gloucester, in western England. Despite its name it is one of the oldest buildings in the city: a timber-framed inn arranged around an open courtyard, with wooden galleries running along the upper floors. It is considered the most complete surviving medieval galleried courtyard inn in Britain, and it is listed at Grade I, the highest level of protection for historic buildings in England.

It was built around 1450 to 1460 by John Twyning, a monk of the Benedictine Abbey of St Peter, as a hostel run for the abbey. An older inn had stood on the same plot before it. A story often repeated is that the New Inn was built to house pilgrims coming to see the tomb of King Edward II. Wikipedia notes that this explanation was first written down in the 18th century, centuries after the inn went up, and may well be wrong.

When Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries, St Peter's Abbey was closed and the inn became the property of the Dean and Chapter of the new Gloucester Cathedral. They rented it out to a succession of innkeepers until it was finally sold in 1858.

The inn's most famous moment came in 1553. After the death of the young King Edward VI, Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed queen, and in Gloucester she was proclaimed from the inn's first-floor gallery (Wikipedia attributes the reading to an "Abbot of Gloucester," although the abbey had already been dissolved).

Galleried inn yards like this one often doubled as theaters in Tudor England, and Shakespeare's company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, is known to have performed in Gloucester. That has led to the suggestion that Shakespeare himself may have acted here, but there is no proof.

In the early hours of 7 May 2018 a fire broke out at the back of the building. Flames reached the bar, the roof and several upper-floor bedrooms, and twelve fire engines from across Gloucestershire were sent to fight it; no injuries were reported. In 2021 the hotel was put on the market, with 36 rooms, for £1.65 million.

The legend

Despite its long history, the New Inn's ghost stories are surprisingly recent in print. The earliest dated report found is a BBC Gloucestershire article by David Bailey from 27 May 2010, published just before members of the Gloucester Active Paranormal Society (GAPS) spent a night in the building.

The incident that made the news happened during a pub quiz in 2010. According to the report, a full pint of beer lifted off a table and dropped to the floor, and the glass did not break. Four people said they saw it. Staff described a list of other oddities: footsteps in the cellar when an employee was down there alone, the restaurant's exit door rattling, a cold spot, a television that turned itself off and was found with its plug half pulled from the socket, the managers' dog's bowl knocked over, and keys going missing.

GAPS investigator Lyn Cinderey said she believed a young girl was present in the building, and the managers' daughter at the time was said to have talked with her. A similar account resurfaced in 2021, when press coverage of the sale described an employee living at the hotel who said a child spirit had communicated with her own daughter. The same 2021 coverage mentioned an online broadcast by the group Gloucester Paranormal Investigation Services, streamed live, during which some viewers said they saw a man in a cap watching from behind a window; this comes from a single source.

Local lore also attaches Lady Jane Grey to the inn, because of the 1553 proclamation, and one of the rooms shown on ghost tours bears her name. She probably never set foot here, and the sources linking her ghost to the inn are weak.

A note of caution: Wikipedia states that the 2010 event was caught on CCTV. The BBC text, as reproduced by the paranormal site Mysterious Britain, mentions four eyewitnesses but no camera footage, so the CCTV claim remains unconfirmed.

On television, the inn featured in the second episode of the first season of Great British Ghosts, shown on the UKTV channel Yesterday on 25 August 2011.

What remains today

The courtyard with its timber galleries survives and is the reason architectural historians value the building so highly: it gives a rare idea of what a late-medieval inn looked like. The inn has served as a pub, restaurant and hotel. Its condition and exact use after the 2018 fire and the 2021 sale could not be confirmed from our sources.

Visiting

The New Inn is a commercial building on a central shopping street, not a ruin, and when it is trading as a pub and hotel anyone can walk into the courtyard as a customer or guest. Because its status since the 2021 sale is unclear, check current opening before you travel.

Ghost tours of the building have been offered through booking websites, visiting rooms such as the Oak Suite and its attic, the Regency Suite, Tree Tops, the cellar and the Lady Jane Grey Room; check current prices. The organizer could not be confirmed, so book only through a listing that is clearly current.

Gloucester Cathedral, whose clergy owned the inn for some three centuries, can easily be combined with a visit to the city.

Sources

1. Historic England list entry (List entry 1245714) — Historic England · Open Government Licence
2. Historic Building Recording: Outbuilding at the New Inn, 2 Bradwell Road, New Bradwell, Milton Keynes MK13 0EN — Archaeology Data Service via Europeana · http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
3. The Coach House, The New Inn, 16 Bevois Valley Road, Southampton — Archaeology Data Service via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/
4. The devil is an ass ; The staple of news ; The new inn 5 — European Library of Information and Culture via Europeana, 1816 · http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
5. The New inn; or, The light heart — Internet Archive · Jonson, Ben, 1573?-1637, Tennant, George Bremner, 1908-01-01 · Public domain (pre-1929)
6. The New inn; or, The light heart — Internet Archive · Jonson, Ben, 1573?-1637, Tennant, George Bremner, 1908-01-01 · Public domain (pre-1929)
7. Wikimedia Commons category : The New Inn, Gloucester — Wikimedia Commons
8. Ecclesall Road and junction of Hanover Street, No 108, Ecclesall Road, The New Inn — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
9. General View of Vine Road looking towards Darnall Cemetery & Turin Street showing the New Inn — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
10. Gloucester's Haunted New Inn Hotel is Now For Sale — Journal News Online (Jocelyne LeBlanc, July 2021) — Journal News Online (Jocelyne LeBlanc, July 2021
11. Great British Ghosts 1x02: New Inn Hotel in Gloucestershire — TVmaze — TVmaze
12. Horseriding outside The New Inn — Kirklees Image Archive OAI Feed via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
13. Main Street with pub, the New Inn — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
14. Official website
15. Pub, the New Inn, Repeat of 86 — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
16. Thatch fire at the New Inn. Horse drawn fire engine with crowd of onlookers — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
17. The New Inn. — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
18. The New Inn, Gloucester — Mysterious Britain & Ireland (2013, upd. 2018; reproduces BBC Gloucestershire, David Bailey, 27 May 2010) (not read directly)
19. The New Inn Hotel, Manchester Road, Marsden, Huddersfield. — Kirklees Image Archive OAI Feed via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
20. The New Inn Hotel, Manchester Road, Marsden, Huddersfield. — Kirklees Image Archive OAI Feed via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
21. The New Inn Hotel, Manchester Road, Marsden, Huddersfield. — Kirklees Image Archive OAI Feed via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
22. The New Inn, No 108, Ecclesall Road, at junction of Hanover Street, demolished mid 1980s — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
23. The New Inn, No 108, Ecclesall Road, at junction of Hanover Street, demolished mid 1980s — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
24. The New Inn, No 108, Ecclesall Road, demolished mid 1980s — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
25. The New Inn, No 183, Duke Street, Park, at junction of Bernard Street. — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
26. The New Inn, No 282, Hollinsend Road, Gleadless — Sheffield Images via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
27. The New Inn Pub — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
28. The New Inn (Thomas King Prop) — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
29. The New inn with boy on footbridge — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
30. The village, showing 'The New Inn' pub. — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
31. View up Main Street with The New Inn and Donkey. — Beaford Arts via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
32. Widnes: The New Inn Hale Road Ditton formally Known as Cains hotel — Halton Library Service Image website via Europeana · http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
33. Wikipedia article — Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Text written by AI from the sources above and checked by a separate AI fact-check (how we work). Images: credits and licenses under each picture.