The Old Queen's Head

The Old Queen's Head

LOCATIONPond Hill, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England

TYPEPub (15th-century timber-framed building)

BUILTc. 1475 (commonly cited); tree-ring dating suggests 1503–1510

STATUSOpen

The Old Queen's Head is a Grade II* listed pub at 40 Pond Hill in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, and the oldest surviving domestic building in the city. The timber-framed structure is widely dated to around 1475, though tree-ring analysis has suggested a slightly later construction window of 1503–1510. It is reputed to be one of the city's most haunted buildings.

History

The earliest known written reference to the building is a 1582 inventory of the estate of George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury, in which it is recorded as "the hawle at the Poandes" — the Hall at the Ponds — among the furnishings listed. Historians generally believe the structure originated as a banqueting or hunting lodge associated with Sheffield Castle, used by the Earl and his guests after hunting wildfowl on the ponds that once bordered the site. The building is thought to have been constructed for the 4th Earl of Shrewsbury, who developed nearby Sheffield Manor Lodge into a substantial Tudor estate from 1516.

Its status declined after being let to tenants sometime between 1582 and 1637, and later records describe it being used for laundry associated with Sheffield Castle and Manor Lodge. By the early 1800s it was in use as an ordinary house; a three-storey building was added to its rear in 1840, which became a public house initially known as the Queen Hotel — a name generally linked to Mary, Queen of Scots, who was held in Sheffield under the custody of the Earl of Shrewsbury from 1570 to 1584. The pub was recorded under the name Queen's Head Hotel from 1864. The building underwent restoration in 1993, during which nails, keys, and locks from its earlier construction phases were recovered.

There is no firm documentary evidence that Mary, Queen of Scots ever visited the building itself, despite the popular association carried by its name. Persistent local claims of a tunnel connecting the pub to Manor Lodge, and possibly Sheffield Cathedral, are similarly unconfirmed.

Reported hauntings

The pub is reputed to be haunted by several figures, most consistently a Civil War-era soldier reported standing near the fireplace, and a medieval child nicknamed Pierre, said to tug at the hair of women — particularly blonde-haired patrons — to get their attention. Other reported figures include a hunting hound, a woman in white, and a pub regular from the 1970s. Staff accounts describe unexplained cold spots and the sound of the building's structure moving.

The pub periodically hosts organised ghost hunts for the public.

VAULT LOCATION ASSESSMENT

ASSESSMENT

The Old Queen's Head's haunting claims are typical of long-established British pubs — multiple named apparitions accumulated over generations of oral tradition, with no single claim traceable to a specific documented incident the way Wentworth Woodhouse's Strafford haunting is. Its historical and architectural documentation (construction dating, ownership records, 1582 inventory) is considerably stronger than its paranormal documentation, which rests mainly on staff and patron testimony reported in local press rather than any formal investigation.

See also

• Sheffield
• Sheffield Castle
• Sheffield Manor Lodge
• Mary, Queen of Scots
• Wentworth Woodhouse

External links

• CAMRA Sheffield & District — Old Queens Head
• Atlas Obscura — The Old Queens Head