Kings Head, North Weald Bassett
The King's Head has served as the village alehouse since the sixteenth century; but in this case a record of the first license ever taken out on the property survives. This was in 1592, but the building appears to some forty or fifty years older, and tradition has it that it was built of ships' timbers salvaged from Tilbury docks. This is a story that is often told of half-timbered pubs, usually to make them seem romantic, but in the King's Head's case it could easily be true. Pre-fabrication marks on the beams could well be shipwrights' marks. In the reign of Edward VI and Mary Tudor, the mighty navy built up by their father Henry VIII fell into decay; many ships were laid up and scrapped, and builders near naval dockyards found it cheaper to salvage old ships' timbers than to make new ones.
The King's Head also helps foster the myth that our ancestors were very much smaller than us. Doors on the ground floor are barely 5ft high, and the ceiling clearance is no more than 6ft in places. But of course, the house was not built like that; in fact the ground level appears to be steadily rising, as a comparison with old prints will show. A look into the magnificent Squire's Room, where the ground-floor ceiling was taken out to create a noble two-storey parlour for any quality who might happen to call, shows that door-cases on the upper floors are a more normal size.
If the ground level is not rising, the pub is sinking. The King's Head is a crooked house, with beams leaning and sagging in all directions. It suffered some bomb damage in the war (there is an airfield in the village) and comparison with old photographs, combined with regular surveys, indicates that the crookedness is getting worse, A stream runs near the foundations and the ground is possibly a little spongy. A well-built timber frame is supposed to be resilient enough to give in all directions at once without falling over; one can only hope this is true.
The King's Head stands on the old London-Colchester coach road, and in the eighteenth century it made an effort to attract some of the posting trade. It was at this time that the Squire's Room was made, and the whole front was stuccoed over to persuade passing travellers of the pub's modernity. It does not seem to have been a very successful effort, for no more substantial alterations were made, The stucco came off in 1927, and apart from some reasonable new buildings at the back, the King's Head is much as it ever was.
From The David and Charles Book of Historic English Inns
Ted Bruning and Keith Paulin, 1982
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