This photograph of the Masons Arms in Winchester Street was taken by Charles Wardell in 1968.

To the left is Barlow’s the bakers, one of four shops scattered about the town at that time, although the name was shortly to disappear completely. Both these buildings were demolished in the cause of town development and much of this site would now be in the middle of the road.

From its street frontage, the Masons Arms looks modest enough but to its right (out of sight in this photograph) was a side entrance wide enough to take the vehicles of coaching days through to a large rear courtyard with extensive stabling.

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It was of course on the main road to Winchester and Southampton, so ideally placed.

Dating a building that was demolished 50 years ago is never easy. Even if old deeds survive, they rarely state when a property has been completely demolished and re-built, nor do they reveal much about significant renovations that transform the overall look.

Ostensibly, we are looking at an 18th century building but the inner core and cellaring date can easily date from a much earlier period.

Town leases for the site go back to 1634 when the Corporation of Andover let the one-acre piece of ground called Dagons, on which a three-roomed barn had recently been erected, to butcher Robert Mountain.

The new lessee was a noted local man of his day who made money through buying leasehold property and renting it out to tenants. Thirteen years later, in 1647, after Andover suffered a great fire, Winchester College, to whom Mountain was also a lessee, awarded him the sum of £1 in consequence of losing £800 worth of property. The sum of £5 was also shared between the 82 families who lost their homes.

In view of the great losses, this act of charity by the College does not seem very generous but it was not College properties that were burnt and to put it into a 17th century perspective other charitable donations in the College accounts were measured in shillings.

In 1658, the lease was assigned to collar maker John Piper who had built a house on the land but his death a few years later meant his widow and son, who failed to pay the annual rent, surrendered the lease back to the Corporation who then leased it to yeoman John Cooke and shalloon maker Thomas Whatley.

Then followed Nathaniel Brice, a maltster in 1674; Richard Waite, a cordwainer, in 1690; draper William Cooper in 1730; John Horne, a victualler, in 1745; stonemason Richard Leversuch in 1757 and John Bailey, innholder in 1786.

The name Masons Arms dates from Bailey’s time, possibly after the occupation of the previous lessee Richard Leversuch, but whether the building was an inn before that is unclear.

The eclectic mix of traders who leased it suggests not, but any of them could have sub-let to a tenant innkeeper who may not appear on the leases themselves.

At some point the Corporation sold it outright and it was bought by innkeeper William Stare in 1864 from auctioneer Frederick Ellen.

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His son William Henry Stare inherited it in 1878 and his widow sold it, in 1894, to Henry Hammans whose brewery in George Yard was the subject of an earlier column (Andover Advertiser 27 May 2022).

Hamman’s brewery was bought by Strong and Co of Romsey in 1919 and the Masons Arms continued under them until its demolition in the mid 1970s.

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