As taverns were often staging posts for coaches, we soon had ‘The Coach and Four’, ‘The Halfway House’ and ‘Traveller’s Rest’. ‘The Steamer’ can be found at the top of a steep hill where an extra horse was enlisted to help pull the coach to the top. The spare horse was then uncoupled and left steaming in the courtyard.

Of course, there were always taverns a-plenty in ports, where thirsty sailors could avail themselves of good, strong ale, and much else besides! It was here that naval recruiting parties, often called ‘press gangs’, found many ‘recruits’.

Life aboard a naval vessel was so unpleasant that extra measures needed to be taken to keep new recruits flowing. If you accepted the offer of a drink from a stranger, you might just find the ‘King’s Shilling’ in the bottom of your tankard, meaning you had agreed to join the Royal Navy (starting right now!). This led to the introduction of tankards, which were generally made of pewter at this time, with glass bottoms, allowing you to check that you weren’t in danger of inadvertently accepting the ‘King’s Shilling’.

As well as serving as a focal point for the dramas of everyday life in England, the local pub has been the source of plots and uprisings, intrigue of every description, and chicanery without bounds! As a result, the subject matter of historic, antique pub signs range from the religious, through the heroic and the sentimental, to the profane!