Queen’s Head (Duke Street)

This Duke Street pub used to sit alongside one of the many entrances to Devonport Market and certainly, in years leading up to the Second World War and it’s untimely end through enemy bombing, it seemed to enjoy its fair share of notoriety. In 1929 the licensee was fined three times for supplying ‘intoxicating liquor except during permitted hours’ and twice in the mid-thirties he was taken to task for selling ‘adulterated’ spirits – brandy and rum – both presumably having been watered down.

As you might expect from its location at the heart of the old town of Devonport this was one of the area’s older inns and one can only wonder at which Queen was the inspiration for what is, even now, one of the most common pub names in the area.

Licensees

1798 - William Cock
1812 - Hugh Tregoning
1822 - R Hodkinson
1830 - Matthias Watts
1838 - James Tinney
1844 - Edward Lasky
1850 - Richard Taylor
1852 - George Luscombe
1862 - James Toms
1867 - John Cock
1873 - William Towl
1875 - R Clapp
1878 - Mrs M Orchard
1885 - JH Wills
1895 - John Rickard
1921 - Albert Crapper
1923 - Alfred Parnell
1936 - William Leest
1940 - Francis Stentiford