The Haycock Beerhouse Husborne Crawley

The Haycock Beerhouse: Turnpike Road, Husborne Crawley [formerly The Greyhound]

This beerhouse was previously known as the Greyhound. In 1730 the property was sold by Thomas Simpkins to William Rutley, when it is described as a three bay cottage with additional bays of stables and barn [R6/29/1/3].

In 1755 the property was conveyed by William Rutley's son, also William, to a trustee for his mother [R6/29/1/4]. Rutley is described as a victualler and so it is not unreasonable to assume that by this stage the building was a licensed premises, although not described or named as such. This William Rutley left the building to his son, also William, by his will of 1789 [R6/29/1/5].

This third William, in 1813, conveyed the premises to a trustee in trust for his nephew William O'Dell. It is now described as formerly being a public house called the Greyhound. Thus it was clearly no longer a public house, Rutley, being noted as a farmer. Interestingly William O'Dell is, in a later document, described as training as a carpenter in Woburn but "afterwards went to the Public House at Crawley" suggesting that he reopened the building as a pub (though he, too, is later listed as farmer with a tenant at the pub).

The building was duly conveyed to William O'Dell by the trustee in 1815 [R6/29/1/9], when he came of age, and in 1832 O'Dell sold it to John, 6th Duke of Bedford, in return for an £18 per annum annuity, by which time it was described as a beerhouse called the Haycock, in occupation of Richard Clark, carrier [R6/29/1/15]. No further documents exist.

The countywide licensing registers from 1822 to 1828 [CLP13] do not list either the Haycock or the Greyhound in Husborne Crawley and so it was clearly not open at that time, unless it had changed its name and is the otherwise unknown licensed premises called The Sun which from 1822 to 1827 was run by Thomas Foulkes and from 1827 to 1828 by Thomas Gurney. The fact that it was called the Haycock in the conveyance of 1832 may indicate that it was later reopened but, more likely, the description is a throwback to an earlier deed (which has not survived) and was simply not updated to reflect the fact that the beerhouse had closed - this is not uncommon.

The building was on the eastern side of Turnpike Road and the buildings on this side of the road were gradually bought up by the Duke of Bedford, then demolished to extend Woburn Park to the road and this is obviously the fate of the Haycock, perhaps soon after its sale and certainly at some point during the 19th century. The inclosure map for Husborne Crawley of 1799 [MA75] shows that it stood more or less opposite The Bakehouse.

List of sources at Bedfordshire & Luton Archives & Records Service:

• R6/29/1/1: mortgage: 1730;
• R6/29/1/2-3: conveyance: 1730;
• R6/29/1/4: demise: 1755;
• R6/29/1/5: will of William Rutley: 1789;
• R6/29/1/6-7: settlement: 1813;
• R6/29/1/8-9: conveyance: 1815
• R6/29/1/10: purchase contract: 1832;
• R6/29/1/11: abstract of title: 1832;
• R6/29/1/14-15: conveyance: 1832.

List of Licensees: note that this is not a complete list and that dates are not necessarily beginning or end dates, merely the first/last date which can be confirmed from sources such as directories and deeds:

1730 - some time before 1813: William Rutley (three generations successively);
1832: Richard Clark (also carrier);
Beerhouse closed and demolished some time after 1832