Home > Nottinghamshire > Nottingham > NG1 > Guildhall Tavern Guildhall Tavern
	Picture source: Eddie Dexter
The Guildhall Tavern was situated on Burton Street. This pub closed in 1969.
Source: Lesley
The Guildhall Tavern used to stand on Burton Street in Nottingham, it was on the opposite side of the street from the Guildhall itself and a little further down the hill. The last proprietor of the Tavern was Marjorie, she also had the Hole in the Wall, a pub in a village near Nottingham and she drove a green, British Racing Green, MG sports car. In September 1969 I was a student at Nottingham University and about to start my second year. Before the beginning of term I went to Nottingham to find myself somewhere to live. An advert in the Nottingham Evening Post caught my eye, 'Free accommodation in exchange for 12 hours work a week behind bar. Would suit student.' I immediately went to the Guildhall Tavern. I found Marjorie working in the kitchen with two other women, they were busy making Cornish pasties. Marjorie told me that she would be able to see me after closing time at 2pm; I went back into the bar. The place was filling up with lunchtime diners, the menu was written in chalk on a board on the wall. The public area of the Guildhall Tavern was one large room. The door opened in directly off the pavement. Inside, to the right of the door was the bar and to the right of the bar was a fireplace and a cosy corner. To the left of the bar was the kitchen and in the kitchen was the cellar door. There was a second fireplace in the wall opposite the bar and a flight of stairs led up to the accommodation. Whenever the Tavern was open fires burned in the two fireplaces. Marjorie told me that Alan Sillitoe sat at a table near this second fireplace writing his first novel, 'Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'. The Tavern emptied rapidly as 2 o' clock approached and then Marjorie came to talk to me. She told me that the nearby Nottingham Polytech College (now Nottingham Trent University) did not have a bar and that the students came to the Guildhall Tavern to drink and socialise. She said that, apart from Mondays and Tuesdays, the evenings were really busy and the job would involve working for ten hours each week on a rota basis on some of the busy nights. I explained to her that I had worked for two summer seasons in busy bars at Butlin's Holiday Camps and was used to bar work. She said that the additional two hours would be worked every Sunday lunchtime. Sunday lunchtimes were always very quiet and if I took the job I would be working on my own during this time, she asked me if I would be comfortable doing this. When I replied that I would she offered me the place. Upstairs I had a small bedroom and the use of the kitchen and living room. I particularly remember my first and last nights at the Guildhall Tavern and Sunday lunch times. On my first night I was due to start work at 7.30pm. It was the first day of the autumn term. I arrived back at the Tavern at 6.45pm but I couldn't open the door. It took a few good pushes before I could squeeze in. When I finally got inside I was absolutely astonished. The place was crammed full, literally crammed full of students. The noise of hundreds of conversations was deafening and the air was blue with cigarette smoke. I had to push my way between people to get to the stairs. Half way up I turned round to look at the scene below me. There were so many people in the room that they were taking up every bit of space and blocking the door. The crowd of people waiting to be served at the bar looked to be about four deep and Marjorie and Joan were serving drinks as fast as they could. I dropped my coat and bag in my room and went straight back downstairs. I got to the bar and started serving. Marjorie said to me ' You're not supposed to start until half past seven', I replied ' You're busy' and she gave me a grateful look. At some stage during the evening Tiddy came to the bar to buy a round of drinks. After I'd given him three pints of bitter he asked me if I would like to cook Sunday lunch for him and his two friends. I had a mental tussle between my feminist instincts to say no to cooking for three men and my thought that it would be nice to have some new friends. I agreed, and so I got to know Tiddy, Bob and Les. Marjorie, Joan and I served drinks without a break until the bell was rung for time at half past ten. Every single pint and half pint glass in the Tavern had been used. At half past ten I went out with a tray to collect empty glasses and by the time I had collected them all the entire bar was stacked high with dirty glasses, they all had to be washed, dried and put away. Most people drank pints or halves of bitter (beer). In October 1969 the price of a pint of bitter was two shillings (10p). This made mentally adding up the cost of an order and counting out the change an easy matter. Mild (beer) was one shilling and ten pence a pint. After a few weeks the price of beer went up by tuppence a pint but at 2/2d for a pint of bitter it was still easy to do the mental arithmetic when calculating the cost of an order and the amount of change. The till was a large, old fashioned, ker-ching style of cash register with no aids to multiplication, addition or subtraction. We sold very little in the way of spirits but one night someone complained to me of having a cold. I asked him if he'd like me to make him a hot toddy (a shot of whisky, a spoonful of sugar and a slice of lemon all topped up with boiling water, it smells wonderful and works wonders for a cold). After that I was often asked to make hot toddies – and the sales of whisky went up. The bell was rung three times at the end of an evenings drinking, it was rung at 10.20pm for last orders, it was rung again at 10.30pm for 'time', after which no more drinks could be served, and it was rung a third time at 10.40pm to indicate the end of drinking-up time and that customers should leave. To the left of the door into the Guildhall Tavern there was a large trapdoor in the pavement. The brewery lorry would arrive laden with barrels of beer, the trapdoor was opened to reveal a ramp leading down into the cellar, the barrels were manoeuvred off the lorry, down the ramp and into the cellar. The beer was Hardy Hanson's Kimberley Ales; the Guildhall Tavern must have been one of the brewery's best customers. Above the door was a plaque stating that the proprietor was Marjorie Whenever we ran out of beer at the pumps on the bar Marjorie or Joan would go down into the cellar and change the barrel. On Sunday lunchtimes I would unlock the Tavern door at 12 noon, Bob and Les would arrive shortly afterwards with the Sunday papers and the three of us would sit beside the fire next to the bar reading the papers. It was always quiet, sometimes Bob and Les were the only customers. At 2 o'clock we would leave, locking the door behind us, and walk up to Corporation Oaks where Bob and Les shared a flat and cook Sunday dinner together. This was a happy time for me, I was enjoying my courses at the university, I loved living at the Guildhall Tavern, it was fun working behind the bar and I was happy to be going out with Bob. Marjorie didn't tell me that the Guildhall was going to close, I found out by chance one evening towards the end of term when someone asked me what I would do after the Tavern closed. I thought he was pulling my leg but he assured me that the Tavern was due to close in early January and it would be pulled down so that the road could be widened. I was working with Joan that night and she confirmed that what I had been told was true. I was shocked and completely devastated. I could hardly bear the thought of no more enjoyable evenings working behind the bar and no more happy Sunday lunchtimes reading the Sunday papers beside the fire with Bob and Les. And where would I live? The following evening I was working with Marjorie. I asked her about the future of the Taven and she told me that it had been compulsorily purchased, it would close down in early January then it would be demolished and Burton Street would be widened to form part of the inner ring road. She said that 'they' had wanted the Tavern to close sooner but that she had persuaded them to allow her to have it open for Christmas and New Year. I had to find somewhere to live. I would have liked to have had a flat or a bedsit somewhere near the Tech College but I couldn't find one. Then I tried, and failed, to find a flat or a room in a flat near the university. Eventually, at the end of term, I had to take the only accommodation that was available, living in digs near the university. There should have been a party, a Christmas party, in the Guildhall Tavern on my last night there, after all it was the last night of term before the Christmas holidays. But the atmosphere in the Tavern on that last night, the last night that the students would drink in the Tavern, was subdued and somber. There was a good crowd but everyone was sad. The evening passed slowly. Eventually the bell was rung for last orders and 10 minutes later the bell was rung again for time. I picked up a tray and went out to collect the empty glasses. I hadn't gone far when I heard a voice saying 'Let's grab her' and someone grabbed one arm, someone else held the other then I was swung off my feet as my legs were grabbed. Suddenly I was being tossed high in the air to a cry of 'Hip hip hooray!' I was terrified that they would drop me, but thankfully they didn't. Six times they threw me up ever higher shouting 'Hip, hip, hooray' each time. When they finally put me down everyone sang 'For she's a jolly good fellow', then they sang 'For Marjorie's a jolly good fellow' and then 'For Joan's a jolly good fellow'. People began to drift away and soon there were just Marjorie, Joan and me washing and drying the glasses and putting them away. When we'd finished I said goodbye to Joan and goodnight to Marjorie. The next morning I left the Guildhall Tavern. Before I went I looked around for Marjorie to say goodbye to her, but I couldn't find her. I never went back to Burton Street. I never saw Marjorie again.
Jane Shillito (March 2019)
As a student at the Nottingham Regional College of Technology I was a regular at the ‘Guild’ between 1963 and 1968. I was a member of the college rugby team which used the Guild as its clubhouse in those days. I do remember Marjorie who was the landlady and somehow managed to control a bunch of loud students with little bother night after night. I went back to Nottingham for the final night of the Guild – I guess early in 1969 – and was pleasantly surprised when Marjorie bought me a drink, the only one in 6 years! I am still in touch with some ex tech college students and rugby team members but sadly have lost touch with Bamo, Tomo, and Nick Plummer, who were the team stalwarts and Nottingham men. It really is a shame that the ‘Guild’ had to go.
John Briggs (May 2020)
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Name	Dates	Comments
Steve Shepherd	1968-1970	Customer
Amanda Talbot (nee Vines)	1969	I lived here with my parents Gerry and Sylvia Vines for several months whilst they looked for a property to buy in Nottinghamshire. Marjorie was the proprietor. I believe my parents kept in contact for several years afterwards. There was another lady living there at the time (can’t remember her name - I was only 9 years of age, but I remember her teaching me to crochet.
John Briggs	1963-19699	As a student at the Nottingham Regional College of Technology I was a regular at the ‘Guild’ between 1963 and 1968. I was a member of the college rugby team which used the Guild as its clubhouse in those days. I am still in touch with some ex tech college students and rugby team members but sadly have lost touch with Bamo, Tomo, and Nick Plummer, who were the team stalwarts and Nottingham men.