The Dukeries Hotel, Edwinstowe
Interesting family photos
These interesting photos of the Dukeries Hotel at Edwinstowe in the 1920s have been sent in to OurNottinghamshire by Elaine Schafer who posted a query about the hotel on our page of Edwinstowe photos.
Elaine schafer collection
Elaine's grandfather was Edgar Handley Hind who was proprietor of the hotel in the 1920s. His business card from the time is included below:-
Elaine Schafer collection
Detail of the main entrance
Elaine Schafer collection
Included below are some of the Comments that OurNottinghamshire users kindly offered in answer to Elaine's original query:-
Further to Elaine's query above, I've found the following bits about the Dukeries Hotel which I though might be interesting: In the book "Edwinstowe Past & Present" compiled by the Edwinstowe Historical Society in 1987 (p.39) it says that The Mansfield Brewery purchased the site of the hotel (just across from the railway station) in 1895 for £543. The licence was granted at the Retford Quarter sessions on 21st October 1896, and the hotel was built in 1897. M.J. Jackson, meanwhile, in his book "Edwinstowe: the Story of a Forest Village" (p32) says "The Dukeries Hotel, vast in comparison with other village hostelries, was built primarily to cater for those coming into the village by train and during the summer months the number of visitors was considerable".
Looking at Trade directories, in 1912 and 1916 the manageress was Miss Charlotte Fox. The next available directory - 1922 - then lists Edgar Handley Hind as proprietor. Hind appears again in the 1925 directory, but by 1928 has been superseded by H. Snaith. After that, the next directory I could find (1932) lists Cameron Rice as proprietor.
By John Farjeon (27/01/2015)
Hello Elaine, the Dukeries Hotel was built in the late 19th century to cater for the tourist traffic that the new railway built by the Lancashire Derbyshire & east Coast Railway Company was expected to create but the numbers of tourists never lived up to expectations. I don't know much about the hotel but I do know that it burned to the ground in 1929 so the one you see today isn't the original one, maybe your grandfather was there at the time.
By Peter Bowler (23/01/2015)
Can anyone help us with details of this fire as mentioned above? If so, please leave a Comment via the link below. Thank you.