Packsaddle pub/hotel Mapledurham

[ShannonF]

Does anyone know anything of/have any old photos of the Packsaddle Hotel? In the early 1910s my Saunders relatives became involved with the pub/hotel and it was in the family for many years (until the 1930s at least). I do not know exactly what they did, whether they owned it, ran it, or other, but they certainly had something to do with it.

I would be grateful for any help.

[nanny jan]

Hi,

BRO might be able to help:


http://www.berkshirerecordoffice.org.uk/



Nanny Jan

[newburychap]

As it's in Oxfordshire you could also try the ORO.

[artifis]

The deadpubs.co.uk site lists a Herbert S Saunders as being there in the 1939 Oxford listing.

The pub also has its own Internet site at thepacksaddle.com and it might be worth an email to them in case they have a history of the pub or know someone who has.

Yopu can also see what it currently looks like on Google Streetview or Bing.com/maps - it's on the A 4074 at the turning for Mapledurham golf course

[adief/CGH]

Here's a press cutting showing the newly opened Pack Saddle bypass, I think from 1957. The road at that time was the B479, later redesignated A4074, known locally as the 13 bends of death on account of the large number of accidents on the stretch from the Pack Saddle to Cane End.
There are 3 pubs alongside the A4074 in the area, Pack Saddle, Pack Horse and the Fox at Cane End, though the latter is now an indian restaurant. People couldn't remember which order they stood in on the road out of Reading, so a local saying was devised- you put the saddle on the horse to chase the fox!
I believe there is now a small garden centre attached to the Pack Saddle.

[adief/CGH]

 I forgot to mention in my last post that the Pack Saddle is just in Oxfordshire about a mile from Caversham Heights, which itself lay in Oxfordshire until the 1974 county boundary changes which saw Caversham absorbed into the borough of Reading.
Adie. 

[newburychap]

Caversham became part of Berkshire/Reading in 1911, since when there have been further minor adjustments in 1977 which included some of Mapledurham being absorbed by Caversham, The 1974 changes were huge, but didn't effect this particular bit of the country boundary.

[ShannonF]

Thank you everyone for your comments and help.

adief/CGH thank you so much for the newspaper article, but I am having trouble viewing it? I cannot make out much of the text without it going blurry. Is it possible to send again at a higher quality?

Shannon