Red Lion, Ampney St. Peter

UPDATE 2023  After being closed since 2014, the pub reopened im May 2023, initially with limited opening hours. Happily, there have been no changes to the pub's historic core.One of the great unspoilt rural classics. The pub occupies two rooms in a 300-year-old stone-built cottage. It was bought by Tetbury Brewery Co. in 1851, which was taken over by Stroud Brewery in 1911. The oval inn sign is a thick metal Stroud Brewery one. In the 1950s Stroud Brewery and Cheltenham and Hereford Brewery amalgamated to form West Country Breweries – note the ‘West Country Ales 1760 Best in the West’ ceramic wall sign by the entrance door. The little changed interior is due to the remarkable fact that the last licensee John Barnard was only the fourth since 1851.

The porch leads to a central corridor. Service is in the small public bar on the right with a ‘2’ on the door but arrangements are not what you would normally expect. This is one of only eight traditional pubs left in the whole of the UK without a bar counter including the other Heritage Pubs the Cock, Broom, Bedfordshire; Milbank Arms, Barningham, Co. Durham; North Star, Steventon, Oxfordshire; Tuckers Grave, Faulkland, Somerset; Rose & Crown, Huish Episcopi, Somerset; Kings Head, Laxfield, Suffolk; and Manor Arms, Rushall, West Midlands.

You will find a long bench which creates a narrow area for the licensee to operate in with just a couple of handpumps mounted by the back wall and a stool where he sits.

The last change to the interior of this pub is probably the adding of a red Formica top to one of the shelves in the old cupboards to the left of the narrow area. Note the glass model of the interior of the pub situated on one of the shelves. This quarry tile-floored room has a wooden dado panelling, wall bench seating and a window seat. In the corner is a Minster concrete fireplace, one of 50 added to pubs by Stroud Brewery in c.1950. (There was one in the left hand room but it deteriorated and had to be replaced.) Note the old ring on a piece of string on the wall which operates a bell - this is now only used by customers if John is cleaning glasses in the kitchen.

Across the corridor is another room behind a timber screen forming the left hand wall to the passage. There are simple benches against the wall, a baffle by the door and a brick and wood surround fireplace. In the corridor with its parquet floor there is a small sliding hatch through to the ‘servery’ which was the original off sales. It is still in use today by customers of the second room when it is too busy in the bar to get served. They slide the hatch and order the beer through it. No new-fangled inside loos here – both the ladies’ and the gents’ are outside on the left.

The pubs opening hours were Mon 6pm to 9pm; Closed Tue to Thu; Fri 6pm to 9pm; Sat 6pm to 9pm; Sun 12pm to 2pm only; but in the evenings the pub may close early if no customers.