The Bull & Swan

The Bull and Swan inn is one of the oldest buildings in High Street St Martins, beginning in mediaeval times as a stone-built open-hall house parallel with the street. Evidence of the fourteenth century roof is said to still exist.

In the sixteenth century it became an inn, the Woolpack or Woolpocket, a reminder of Stamford’s importance in the wool-trade. An upper floor was inserted in the hall and a cross-wing with carriage-entrance added. Stables were provided in the rear courtyard above which were bedrooms for visitors, connected by an outside wooden balcony. Belonging to the estate of Lord Burghley, Elizabeth I’s Lord Treasurer, his crest was found on a gable-end during later refurbishment.

In 1728 it was renamed the Bull and Swan, a popular staging-post for travellers on the Great North Road. A famous painting by J W Turner, dated 1828, shows travellers alighting at the doorway of the inn.

Travel by stage-coach reached its peak in the 1830s but died with the advent of the railways. Many coaching-inns closed but the Bull and Swan survived and has been adapted to cater for travellers who come by car, the interior with its wooden beams and uneven floors preserving an atmosphere of age and history.