old Kiddlington pub

[Trees]

 
Hic  Cheers
Trees

[Clemo]

Hi Trees,
The Wise Alderman is on the same road as the Three Horeshoes, but around a quarter of a mile further South, at the Northern extremity of Kidlington, adjacent to where the canal & railway line pass under the roadbridge carrying the road towards Banbury.
Give me a shout if you need anymore info on the pub.
Cheers

[Trees]

Many thanks Clemo. This is strange the Three Horseshoes was kept by one line and the Anchor by another must check the dates to see who was where when
I was in Oxford Friday and saw the entry in a book by the Kidlington and District historical Society .
 Do you remember the Dog in School Rd changed its name at one time to the Dog and Anchor? Well the Dog was kept by the son in law of this one who kept the Anchor so my guess is that the anchor that stood outside during his tenancy was inherited by the son in law and put outside the Dog so the name went into common use. Do you think that could be how it happened?
Trees

[Clemo]

Sounds perfectly feasible to me.
The Wise used to be my local watering hole when I first moved to Kidlington in 1991.

[Trees]

From the photographs I saw it looks bigger than either the Dog or The Horse shoes would you say that is so? Was it actually on the canal so would the Anchor be from a canal boat. Don't think I've ever seen such a thing, unless they used something like an anchor to moor to the canal bank.
Trees

[Trees]

I expect you know alderman Wise once worked in the signal box near the pub which at that time was called The railway hotel
Trees

[Clemo]

From the Kidlington book I have, ( although it was not correct with your other pub if you remember) it says the pub was built in the early 1700's before either the canal or the railway, although it aquired the name of the Anchor Beerhouse around the time the canal was built approx 1790.
What was the surname you are interested in  as there is a full history in the book?

[Trees]

Thats interesting wonder if it was always The Anchor. The name there is  WATTS  First John WATTS and Elizabeth nee FAULKNER then their son James and Ann nee DAVIS  then after he died Ann moved to The DOG and after her Mary daughter and son in law Richard YOUNG kept The Dog for 50 add years. James died in1814 Ann died 1847 Richard was buried 5 Mar 1896 and Mary 26 Aug 1895 I think Richard was the publican to the end looks like he never recovered after Mary's death they had been married 61 years . It will be interesting to see if the book is accurate on these two. I never had a reply from the History Society after pointing the mistake out. Have since seen the wording on David and Francis's tomb in the MI book the same Society has prepared so they had no excuse for such a big mistake.
Trees

[Clemo]

The Kidlington book quotes:-
" The earliest record of public houses in Oxford is in a volume called the Victuallers Recognizances Record Book dated 1753. Although no house names are given, the name of Mrs Anstiss Faulkner is given as one of the landlords. Other records show that Anstiss married Henry Faulkner in the 1720's and they had 8 children, 5 of whom died in infancy. Henry died in 1733 and his wife and his wife Anstiss continued to run the Inn until she died in 1759.
In 1758 her youngest daughter, Elizabeth , married John Watts and they had 9 children, 6 boys and 3 girls. When Anstiss died the public house passed to John.
John Watts was landlord for 25 years. When he died in 1784, Elizabeth carried on for a further 9 years. On her death in 1793. one of her sons, James Watts took over the licence and continued until he died in 1814 aged 52 years."

The name changed from the Anchor in 1855 after the Railway station opened, when it became The Railway Hotel, the finally THe Wise Alderman in 1967.