UPCOMING EVENTS:

Opening Hours:
Limited Opening Hours & Menu from 4th July

Call 01630 638754
to book

Quiz Night
Mondays at 8:30pm

This Weeks Real Ales
Check Inside!

Whitchurch Mobile Library
Alternate Thursdays at 12.30 - 1.00 pm




The Red Lion
Wistanswick
Market Drayton
Shropshire
TF9 2BB
Tel: 01630 638754
The Red Lion dates back to the 1700s. However, according to the Register of Public Houses of 1901, the license had been granted for 68 years. It was then owned by the Market Drayton Brewery Company Limited and the occupier was Charles Henry Gattensbury, who has taken over from William Percival. The rateable value was £30. Accomodation was 4 rooms down, 5 rooms up and could accept 10 lodgers. Stabling was regulated for 2 horses by night and 4 by day. The nature of the trade was agricultural and roadside and the pub was 3 miles from the Constables station with regard to police control.

In 1918 Rachel Stanworth was the licensee and at some later date Mabel Stanworth came from the Old Bell in Newport for a holiday, met and married Samuel M Hopwood. Both of them then held the license. During the 1920s and 1930s the Red Lion ran football te and cricket teams, matches being played on the field called round yard, just across the side lane.

Of the Hopwood's six daughters the youngest Muriel married John Chidler on his release from the Army and they became joint owners in 1946. They had four daughters and a son. When Muriel Chidler died in 1979, Diane held the license jointly with her father from 1979-1986 and then Diane on her own from 1986-1994. Of this large family Myra lives in the village with her husband Steve Hollins, as does her sister, Jill, with her husband Mick Walford at Sweet Appletree.

When Diane Hind left there was a succession of tenants, who with Marstons, the brewers, were unable to run the business profitably. Sadly in 1998 the Red Lion closed. It re-opened in 2004 under new ownership but was then sold to property company Provence who demanded high rent that tenants couldn't meet. The company went into liquidation in 2007 and the pub was sold to its current owners, the Britt/Woolley family.

Thanks to Robert Ward for providing the history.