10 Clarence Place
(King's Head Street and Crane Street)
A free house, fully
licensed, which stood on the corner latterly with Lord Warden Square.
Its origin lay early in the seventeenth century. The owners show on maps
of 1624 as William and Ann Bradshaw.
Only six stage
coaches ran in England in 1672. The terminus for the Dover run being the
"White Hart", in the London borough of Southwark. (That sign associated
with the badge of Richard II but the building itself taken down in
1889).
It can be said that
coaches left this hotel in 1819, at six and eleven a.m. and four thirty
p.m. for the "Golden Cross" at Charing Cross; the "Black Bear" in
Piccadilly; the "Spread Eagle" in Gracechurch Street and "Blossom's
Inn", Lawrence Lane. London.' All made the return journey the same day.
This sold for £3,775
in 1876 and again in 1932 it was on offer but did not reach the reserve
price. By 1934 it belonged to Hays Wharf and following extensive
alterations it was renamed Ferry House, being then the accommodation of
the Continental Express Company who moved here from Northumberland House
in Strond Street.
For better or for
worse, a new god called the juggernaut appeared in the sixties and no
person or building was allowed to stand in its way or hinder the new
religion. Continental Express were obliged to leave the premises in July
1968, the only cafe in the area was unceremoniously shut down and the
demolition of the building commenced in-March 1970. The ground thus
gained was then used for the parking of private cars and the formation
of a private road.
(Smith, 1991)
