One of Britain’s oldest pubs is closing after almost 500 years due to rising costs and changing consumer habits.
The Hole in the Wall first served drinks to customers in around 1540 – that was the year Henry VIII married and divorced his fourth wife and explorer Francis Drake was born.
Richard Rossendale-Cook, landlord of the pub in Torquay, Devon, said he is being forced to shut the venue next month.
“I’m 81-years-old”, Richard said.
“It’s just part of your life.
“I mean, I’m very, very sad, of course I’d like to carry on.
“But unless somebody comes up – a Russian oligarch or someone will give me £360,000 to go and pay off the bill, you know, you’re gonna shut and that’s the end of it.”
The Hole in the Wall is Torquay’s oldest pub (Image: PlymouthLive)
The Hole in the Wall is being shut by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs(HMRC) as Richard can no longer afford to pay the rent for the pub which is owned by the brewery whose beer he sells.
It was originally due to close in February but liquidators managed to get him an extension until next month.
When the pub is closed by HMRC on April 16 Richard says the brewery will come in with the liquidator and put a price on all the fixtures and fittings, and then buy the site back.
A number of jobs will also be lost.
Asked why he thinks the pub is serving its last drinks after almost half a millennium, Richard says he thinks habits are shifting.
“It might be, it might be that the world is just totally changing”, he said.
“People say ‘oh I love your pub, I’ve never been anywhere like it’ – but they don’t come back.
“They’ve been in here, they’ve got the T-shirt and that’s it.
“It might just be the costs and everything, unless the government steps in and helps publicans out or breweries out or whatever, it could really be the end.
“Even people like Wetherspoons – I don’t even know if they buy the buildings or not or they just get a very good rental on them.
“I mean, their beer is so cheap, that’s been around for donkey’s years.
“Wetherspoons, cheap beer and stuff, maybe that’s the way it’ll all go.”
Richard estimates that he has paid the brewery £1.2m in rent and beer over the last seven years, which he dubs “not bad money”.
But he says declining numbers of people eating the “superb” food in the pub restaurant – which he owns – has contributed to his financial difficulties.
The Hole in the Wall has no television but plays live music seven nights a week, with bands performing songs from the 60s, 70s, and 80s in nights that Richard labels “electric”.
But these nights will soon come to an end, with a little more than two weeks until it closed.
The Hole in the Wall has survived major events throughout history in Torquay from the English Civil War in the pub’s second century to the Second World War in its fourth.
