HISTORY

The village of East Garston is situated on the river Lambourn. Its name comes from "Asgar's tun". A tun was Saxon for a village or farmstead, and Asgar means “spear of God”. Asgar was the actual name of a hero who was wounded in the Battle of Hastings, defending the country against the Norman invasion. He was also a “staller” or keeper of horses for the King, and owned land in several counties. He witnessed many of Edward the Confessor's charters, and also the Queen Mother's will. Asgar appears to have held all the cultivated land of the Lambourn Hundred, which encompassed East Garston.

The village was called variously Asgarstun in the twelfth century, Esegareston in thirteenth, Esgarston in fourteenth, and Estgarston in sixteenth century. The introduction of the "t" in the first syllable was an early corruption, and not indicative of "east". The village first appears on a map of 1574 as East Garston. A petition led by the Rev John Tidor in 1904 to reclaim the original name of Esgarston failed to garner support.

In the Domesday Book, the village was assessed at 30 hides, 23 villagers and 12 smallholders, and valued at £20. The manor of Esgarston was not mentioned in the Domesday survey, but it is likely to have been included in the “King’s demesne of Lambourn.” It passed to the Londons of Kidwelly and their descendants, one of whom was fined in 1222 for marrying off his daughter without a licence. In 1226, King Henry III seized the whole Hundred of Lambourn, and East Garston was given to the Chatworth family. Later the Earl of Lancaster granted it through marriage to Richard de Rivers. The manor house itself had its own brewhouse: “le folkes chambre’. In the 16th century, East Garston was described in a book belonging to the Duchy of Lancaster as “in the middest with a propper stream running through the same, verie commodyous to thenhabitaunts”. By 1900 the manor had come into the Burdett family, and remained with them until 1919. At this time the village became famous for its racehorse trainers, including Henry Beardsley, following in the tradition of the village’s namesake.

The Queen’s Arms existed as a farmer’s cottage in 18th century. The 1843 tithe map shows William Ferrebee to be the owner of a “house and garden, of 1 rod and 8 perches”. To the north of the house lay farms owned by Thomas Rogers, and to its west Blake’s Meadows. Ferrebee also owned a barn and other cottages in the village, and paid a tithe to the parish of 8s 6d. His son William junior turned the house into an inn, probably in 1856 during the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, and aptly named it the Queen’s Arms. At the end of August every year, from 1872 until 1878 Ferrebee paid £15 for his licence to sell alcohol on the premises.

The building has grown to suit its purpose over the decades and is much altered from its original plan. It began as a modest brick built house dating from the 18th century. The south east side, now the site of the spacious dining area, was originally the entrance to the inn. This facade was of typical symmetrical design, with four sash windows. The main entrance door was positioned in the centre of the wall with a large sign above it. Over the years various new extensions have been added, faced in white render and roofed with slate.

Ferrebee died on the 28th November 1879 and the licence passed to his widow Ellen. That year, the pub was sold to Charles Nutley of Newbury. On 24th June 1881 Mrs Ferrebee transferred the licence to Eli and Martha Brown. The Browns housed two lodgers: a gardener George Cruse, and a domestic servant Louisa Randall. Ownership of the pub again changed in 1894 when it was purchased by H.J Finn of the Phoenix Brewery in Newbury. The premises were run after this date by Eli Brown’s son George and his wife Emily, who stayed with their children Dorothy and Eva until 1903.

From 1904 until 1914 the Queen’s Arms was managed by Samson and Sarah Ann Burr. It then passed to the Charles Waterman in 1915, and subsequently to Albert Baker who ran it until the outbreak of the Second World War, when Ellen Cox became the publican. The Phoenix Brewery owned 21 public houses in the county by the time it was bought out by Ushers in 1926. Ushers themselves were acquired by Watneys in 1970. Audrey and Harry Knape were the publicans during the 1960s, and they were followed by Alfred Jolly in the 1970s and 80s. The Millers Collection acquired the building in 2008, and have retained its air of rustic and elegant simplicity.