White Hart Inn

First recorded as Le Herte in 1428-9, the White Hart was Henley's oldest functioning inn until its closure in 1996.

Urban inns developed during the late 14th and 15th centuries as places where better-off travellers might spend the night, providing food, stabling, and accommodation of various grades. A well known example is the Tabard at Southwark in London, where Chaucer's motley crew of pilgrims in the Canterbury Tales spent the night. But in a trading town like Henley, many of the clientele were probably travelling merchants and other traders, or gentry and landowners (or their servants) in town on business. Such inns were distinct from taverns, which were of no great size, and were often housed in vaulted cellars (view Burford example). Even lower down the social scale were alehouses, which were generally distinguished from ordinary houses only by a sign outside (usually a bush).

Many larger inns were grouped around a courtyard entered from the street, with galleries at first-floor level giving access to the rooms. The White Hart is a good example (read more). Typically, the front range had dining rooms or a communal hall, with the kitchen and service rooms to the rear. Travellers’ horses were stabled in the rear wings, with sleeping accommodation in dormitories or private chambers above. As a centre of the town’s social life, the inn courtyard was also a place where travelling performers could entertain the locals. On such occasions the galleries would have been packed with spectators. The courtyard at the White Hart dates from a major rebuilding in 1530-1, which probably reflects an upturn in Henley's economy connected with the resurgence of its grain trade with London. 

Many of Henley's inns found a new role as coaching developed in the late 17th and 18th centuries. John Hathaway ran a regular London service from the White Hart by 1717, and by the late 18th century the White Hart was one of the town's busiest coaching inns - although unlike major coaching inns like the Bell and Red Lion it was not substantially rebuilt in the new classical style. 

The coming of the railway destroyed Henley's coaching industry, but the White Hart (acquired by Brakspears Brewery) survived as a pub, inn and restaurant into the late 20th century. (See census entries 1861-1901.)  In 1985 it was leased to Beefeater Steak Houses, whose decision not to renew the lease led to its closure in 1996. Part of the building is now a Zizzi's restaurant.

More information about the White Hart and other Henley inns is available in Ann Cottingham, The Hostelries of Henley (privately printed 2000)

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