The Temperance Hotel

According to local legend Marske’s Dormouse Pub was closed after carters and pack-horsemen became very drunk and made a bonfire from gates, fencing and anything else that would burn. As a consequence the Hutton’s of Marske Hall closed the pub down. The building was converted to the Temperance Hotel. The Temperance movement was supported by the Methodists, who had a strong foothold in the area. Marske has been very quiet ever since the pub closed!

Read the full story below …..

Marske is a half-way point on the way from Reeth to Richmond.  This was as important for the packhorse men (jaggers) and carters of previous centuries as it is now coast-to-coasters.  Marske is a natural resting place (see Coast to Coast page).  Whilst today’s hikers tend to refuel on Ribena and Muesli bars yesteryear’s travellers had probably wanted something stronger.  In 1841 the Busby family were listed in the census as innkeepers – and the 1854 Ordnance Survey map names their pub as the “Dormouse”.

At around this time the lead mines in Swaledale and Arkengarthdale were producing around 2000 to 3000 tons of lead a year1.  This is the equivalent of 200 packhorse journeys every day (each packhorse could carry a hundredweight, or 1/20th of a ton).  Most of this lead was destined to be shipped from the River Tees, and typically travelled there via Richmond or Hartforth towards Darlington and Stockton1,2.  Laden packhorses would have travelled eastwards across the parish of Marske, either through the village, or by way of the more open moorland surrounding Helwith and Kexwith to the north.  It is quite feasible that at least one third of these journeys came through the village.  For example, a probable route from the mines at Hurst would have been via Orgate and Clints, heading towards Clapgate and Richmond High Moor.  Other routes may have gone via Clapgate and “Jagger Lane” to Hartforth and Melsonby.  Equally the packhorses would have returned more lightly laden, but still would have needed a rest somewhere en-route.

Packhorse illustration (Image: Public domain)

So, it is no wonder Marske was a stopping off point for thirsty travellers.  Village folklore, recorded in two publications in the late twentieth century, recalls that upwards of a dozen horses and carts would stop for refreshment3,4.  However one November 5th, they “became very drunk and made a great bonfire from gates, fencing and anything else that would burn, causing an uproar that the Huttons (the owners of Marske Hall) would not tolerate.  The consequence of this ‘riotous behaviour’ was that the pub lost its licence, the Dormouse became the Temperance Hotel, and the house that was the pub is now the farmhouse of Temperance Farm.  Marske has been very quiet ever since.” 

The temperance movement in the United Kingdom had campaigned against the use and sale of alcohol and promoted teetotalism.  Temperance societies began to be formed in the 1830s to campaign against alcohol – this was supported by the non-conformist churches, including the methodist churches.  Methodists believed that despite the supposed economic benefits of liquor the harm that it caused society outweighed its economic benefits5. 

Methodism was strong in the Marske and Clints area in the mid nineteenth century.  Shortly after the Errington family had sold the Clints Estate in 1842 to the Hutton’s the catholic chapel at Clints was converted to a methodist place of worship.  When this chapel was sold by the Hutton’s, alongside the rest of the estate in the 1960s the trustees who took charge of it included families from across the parish of Marske including Skelton, Marske Hall, Clints, Gingle Pot and Applegarth.  Whilst the impetus and power to close the pub may well have come from the Huttons it is quite plausible that the strong methodism in the area was very supportive of this move.

These stories must have felt fresh in the village’s collective memory when they were re-told – as both books3,4 refer to the pub being closed in the early twentieth century.  However the closure of the pub had in fact happened before 1861 as by that time the Busby family has turned from innkeepers to farmers, and were the inhabitants of the newly named “Temperance Hotel”.

There is little evidence of any of this today, save for two large stones on which the carters rested their carts, and which were parked so that the strain was taken off the horses, can still be seen in the wall adjacent to the road opposite Temperance Farm.  Marske remains a good-resting place for travellers on foot – it remains none the worse off for not having a noisy pub!

One of two stones still in place opposite Temperance Farm where carters would park their carts and let packhorses rest. The cartwheels would slot into the space behind the upright stone.

Return to History pages

  1. Fieldhouse, R and Jennings, B. 1978. A History of Richmond and Swaledale. See Annex 2.[↩][↩]
  2. Wright, G.N..  1985. Roads and Trackways of The Yorkshire Dales.  Moorland Publishing Company.[↩]
  3. North Yorkshire Federation of Women’s Institutes.  1991. The North Yorkshire Village Book.[↩][↩]
  4. Rees, David Morgan. 2000. In the Palm of the Dale.[↩][↩]
  5. Wikipedia, Temperance Movement in the United Kingdom.  Accessed 2023.[↩]