DOVER KENT ARCHIVES

Sort file:- Gillingham, June, 2025.

Page Updated:- Monday, 23 June, 2025.

PUB LIST PUBLIC HOUSES Paul Skelton

Earliest 1828-

Plough Inn

Latest 1990s

(Name to)

11 (7) Britton Street

New Brompton

Gillingham

Plough 1960

Above photo, circa 1960, kindly sent by Samantha Bird.

Dorothy and Horace Blesch 1960

Above photo showing Dorothy and Horace Blesch, circa 1960, kindly sent by Samantha Bird.

Dorothy Blesch 1960

Above photo showing Dorothy Blesch, circa 1960, kindly sent by Samantha Bird.

Plough Inn 1980s

Above photo 1980s, from www.Flickr.com by Ben Levick.

Plough Inn sign 1991

Above sign, October 1991.

With thanks from Brian Curtis www.innsignsociety.com.

 

Information below by Ben Levick

The "Plough" used to stand fully in Britton Street, but was bombed during WW2, when it moved to the corner of Britton Street and the High Street. The building it moved into had temporarily housed Gillingham Library before the war, whilst the present Library was being built. It remained there until the 1990s when it changed name and became "Vincents." It closed in the 2000s and the flats were built in its place.

Plough original location

Above photo showing the original location.

 

Local knowledge, further pictures, and licensee information would be appreciated.

I will be adding the historical information when I find or are sent it, but this project is a very big one, and I do not know when or where the information will come from.

I am informed that the pub was bombed in 1941 which killed the licensee.

Samantha Bird tells me her Grandparents Horace Leslie and Dorothy Patricia Blesch were licensees between 1959 and 1961, they also had a ginger cat called Chatham and there was a men’s club behind the pub, but separate from it called the Saracens she thinks.

 

South Eastern Gazette, Tuesday 31 May 1859.

CHATHAM AND GILLINGHAM, KENT.

Mr. J. T. Skinner, HAS received instructions from the Proprietor to SELL by AUCTION, at the "Sun Hotel," Chatham, on Wednesday, the 15th June, 1859, At five o'clock in the evening, The following valuable FREEHOLD ESTATES, in seven lots, vis.

Lot 3.— Two brick and tiled DWELLING-HOUSES, with outbuildings in rear, and valuable piece of BUILDING LAND, at the north side thereof, situate opposite the "Plough" public-house, Upper Britton-street, New Brompton, Gillingham, Kent, and now in the tenures of John Shorter and James Southgate, at weekly rentals amounting to £12 11s. 4d. per annum (less rates and taxes).

 

From the Southeastern Gazette, 26 June 1866.

Public-house Convictions.

At the Chatham Police Court, on Wednesday last, Deborah Cleave, landlady of the “Plough” public-house, Gillingham, was charged with having her house open for the sale of liquors at 12 o’clock at noon on Sunday. The police found twelve persons in the parlour, all with liquors before them, and about twenty persons in the garden. The magistrates fined the defendant 40a, and the costs.

George Smith, landlord of the “Black Boy” public-house, High-street, was also charged with a similar offence, and was fined £5 and costs, a previous conviction having been proved.

 

RAOB card 1958

Above membership card for the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffalos.

 

LICENSEE LIST

TANNER John 1828+ Pigot's Directory 1828-29

CONSTABLE David 1832+ Pigot's Directory 1832-34

PROUT Thomas 1858+

CLEAVE Deborah 1866+

BEALE Alfred James 1871-74+ (also Joiner age 54 in 1871Census)

TURNER Thomas 1881+ (age 63 in 1881Census)

Last pub licensee had JEAL Thomas 1891+ (age 57 in 1891Census)

WELLS Joseph R 1903+ Kelly's 1903

FLETCHER George 1913-30+

PETERS Frederick Alec 1938-41 dec'd

BLESCH Horace Leslie & Doroth Patricia 1956-61

https://pubwiki.co.uk/PloughInn.shtml

 

Pigot's Directory 1828-29From the Pigot's Directory 1828-29

Pigot's Directory 1832-34From the Pigot's Directory 1832-33-34

CensusCensus

Kelly's 1903From the Kelly's Directory 1903

 

If anyone should have any further information, or indeed any pictures or photographs of the above licensed premises, please email:-

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