The Eagle

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 05/03/2012

491/0/10023 23-NOV-05

SKERNE AND WANSFORD MAIN STREET Skerne The Eagle

(Formerly listed under Wansford Road)

II

Public House. Early 19th century. Rendered brick with pan tile roof.

PLAN Corridor from central door in front façade through the building, flanked by public rooms to the front with a private room to rear right and servery to rear left, housed in under stairs pantry with no counter or hatch. Single storey outbuildings to right and rear.

EXTERIOR Two storey with symmetrical front façade with end stacks. First floor with 2-over-2-light horned sashes flanking the central pub sign. Early 20th century bay windows to ground floor with linked roof sheltering central door. To rear: second span roof to right and catslide roof to left.C20 casement windows.

INTERIOR Corridor with plain red tiled floor and match boarded ceiling. Door to servery (which is three quarter height) and those to the private room and stairs are all plank doors. Door to right public room is railed, that to the left is panelled. Public rooms have fitted bench seating around the walls and in the bay windows. The right public room has match boarding to dado height and ceiling, the left room has exposed ceiling joists. Beer cellar formed from under stairs area, in which the beer engines are located.

HISTORY The Eagle has been a licensed public house since at least 1822.

SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE Public houses were originally private houses with one or more rooms made available for public drinking. Bar counters were introduced from about the 1820s onwards, the idea being adopted from gin shops which from the mid-C18th century also tended to sell beer. The Eagle is a very rare surviving example of an unimproved public house, where beer is served directly from the beer storage area, and is one of only 11 public houses nationally not to incorporate a bar counter or hatch. It is of special interest for its early plan form, for the plainess and simplicity of its little-altered interior, and for the modesty of its exterior, which together make it a remarkable survival in a national context.