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Bridge Hotel, Buttermere
Bridge Hotel
locality:-   Buttermere
civil parish:-   Buttermere (formerly Cumberland)
county:-   Cumbria
locality type:-   inn
coordinates:-   NY17481696
1Km square:-   NY1716
10Km square:-   NY11

photograph
BPA01.jpg (taken 16.4.2008)  
photograph
BPA03.jpg  A guest book with the signature of A Wainwright.
(taken 16.4.2008)  courtesy of the Bridge Hotel.
evidence:-   old map:- OS County Series (Cmd 69) 
placename:-  Queen Victoria Inn
source data:-   Maps, County Series maps of Great Britain, scales 6 and 25 inches to 1 mile, published by the Ordnance Survey, Southampton, Hampshire, from about 1863 to 1948.
"Queen Victoria Inn"
evidence:-   probably old text:- Green 1814
source data:-   Set of prints, soft ground etchings, Sixty Small Prints, with text, A Description of a Series of Sixty Small Prints, by William Green, Ambleside, Westmorland, 1814.
image GN09p21, button  goto source
page 21:-  "The horse-road to the Inn at Buttermere is eight miles and a half from Keswick, through the vale of Newlands; but the carriage-road is part of the way on the Cockermouth road, over Whinlatter, and through a part of the vale of Lorton, by Crummock Water to the Inn at Buttermere, which is somewhat more than fourteen miles. The Inn at Scale Hill (which is about half a mile from the outlet of Crummock Water and eleven miles from Keswick), and the Inn at Buttermere, are both of them excellent stationary places from which to see Buttermere, Crummock Water, Lows Water, and Ennerdale Water. The Inn at Buttermere lies at about an equal distance from the two lakes of Buttermere and Crummock; and the lofty mountains round the valley rise in sublime grandeur. ... the Inn is at the bottom of the Keswick road, on the eastern side of the vale; and the intermediate grounds are of sweet pasturage, with woods elegantly distributed over it. ..."
evidence:-   old advertisement:- Jenkinson 1875 B
placename:-  Victoria Hotel, The
source data:-   Advertisements for ... John Nelson, The Victoria Hotel, Buttermere, Cumberland, published by Edward Stanford, 55 Charing Cross, London, 1875 edn 1884?
image  click to enlarge
JK1211.jpg
Adverts p.17 at the back of Jenkinson's Smaller Practical Guide to Carlisle, Gilsland, Roman Wall and Neighbourhood. 
item:-  Armitt Library : A1717.12
Image © see bottom of page
evidence:-   old photograph:- Bell 1880s-1940s
placename:-  Victoria Hotel
source data:-   Photograph, sepia, Victoria Hotel, Buttermere, Cumberland, by Herbert Bell, photographer, Ambleside, Westmorland, 1890s?
image  click to enlarge
HB0983.jpg
Now enlarged, the Bridge Hotel. 
item:-  Armitt Library : 1958.4303
Image © see bottom of page
evidence:-   probably old advertisement:- Philip/Wilson 1890s
placename:-  Buttermere Hotel
source data:-   Advertisement from The Concise Series of Guides No.1, The English Lake District, published about 1895.
image  click to enlarge
PW1A21.jpg
Guide book published by George Philip and Son, 32 Fleet Street, London, Philip, Son and Nephew, Liverpool, Lancashire, and Titus Wilson, Kendal, Westmorland, about 1895. 
item:-  JandMN : 58
Image © see bottom of page

photograph
BPA02.jpg  In an earlier guise as The Victoria.
(taken 16.4.2008)  courtesy of the Bridge Hotel.
hearsay:-  
 Earlier on this site was a storehouse associated with the mill higher up the Mill Beck.
The buildings were sold to the church about 1734. There were several buildings and the curate, Robert Walker, got a beer licence for this part, in his brother's name, and established the Bridge Inn. It later fell into disrepair and was bought by Jonathan Sleap, a solicitor from London, who rebuilt it as the Victoria, about 1837. It was inherited from him by Mrs Haidee Cooper, 1861, who added the bay windows. In 1921 she sold it to Nicholas Size, author of The Secret Valley. When he died it had somewhat declined and new owners restored it and changed the name back to The Bridge.
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