HUGGENS ARMS Pub of Northfleet

DOVER KENT ARCHIVES

Sort file:- Northfleet, July, 2025.

Page Updated:- Wednesday, 23 July, 2025.

PUB LIST

PUBLIC HOUSES

Paul Skelton

Earliest 1860

(Name from)

Huggens Arms

Latest 1975

(Name to)

10 The Creek

Northfleet

Above photo, date unknown.

Above photo, date unknown. Kindly supplied by John Hopperton.

Above photo, 1950. Kindly supplied by John Hopperton. The chimneys of the Bevan's Works are seen in the background.

Above photo, date unknown.

Above photo, date unknown taken in the garden of the pub, showing Susan Mary Grover Todhunter and her friend Susan Street, with Susan's mother between them.

Originally known as the "Blue Anchor" and traced as far back as 1706, however, 100 years later in 1860 it became the "Huggens Arms." However, the directories seem to keep it listed till 1901, alongside this pub as well.

In 1890 the pub was trading as part of the tied estate of Dartford brewers C. N. Kidd & Son, later passing to Courage after a succession of takeovers.

The pub changed name again to the "Riverside Tavern." During the 1980s it became a rare outlet for Young's Bitter and a regular haunt for CAMRA members. Sadly however the pub closed its doors for the last time in 1991 and was for some reason demolished shortly afterwards. The Blue Circle Heritage site now occupies part of this area.

From the Northfleet History Group - January 2014 Meeting.

THE STORY OF HUGGENS COLLEGE.

It was almost standing room only for our first meeting of 2013, when Alex Pavitt gave a talk on the history of Huggens College and the life and times of its founder, John Huggens, a Sittingbourne corn dealer and brickmaker who made his fortune during the Napoleonic wars. He decided to build almshouses for gentlefolk who found themselves in reduced circumstances, and being refused planning permission in his home town of Sittingbourne, chose Northfleet, which was then a pretty village of cherry orchards and arable land, as the location for his ‘little charity’ as he called it.

We learned something about a few of the more colourful characters who lived in the College in its early days, including Madam Rolse, lady-in-waiting to the Duchess of Kent, who was the first person to live in house No.1, and Mrs Murray (No.17), who was private secretary to the opera singer Jenny Lind, famously known as the ‘Swedish nightingale’. All the Collegians lived rent free and in addition, received a pension of £1 a week.

LICENSEE LIST

SCOTT Robert (widow) 1871-81+ (age 35 in 1801)