England. March 28, 2013. Joe flew in today, and I hopped the train from Hereford, three hours west, to meet him at his hotel, about fifteen minutes from Heathrow Airport via courtesy bus. (In the morning, we’d head north by train to explore York.) The late evening was fine. He didn’t appear too tired, so we decided to walk to an attractive village a half-mile from the hotel’s door.
It was peculiar to stroll along Colnbrook’s cobbled ‘High’ (main) street: at least nine centuries fell away. But then, seeming to glow in the moonlight, a soundless silver bullet-jet would emerge from a dark, fluffy cloud and aim for land, just 5 miles away.
Bizarre.
Here’s the thing: to truly understand the United Kingdom one needs to explore and appreciate its often riveting history.
In this pretty village, for example, we happened upon the attractive Ostrich Inn, the third oldest in England. For well over 900 years it’s sat on this spot, close to the road. Settled with age, the whitewashed, half-timbered building’s ancient, paned, mildly distorted glass windows glowed from reflected firelight and discreetly placed lamps.
The posted menu looked promising.
We entered and looked around, fascinated.
Casual inquiries yielded an informational gold mine. This inn began, around 1107, as ‘The Hospice,’ meaning a house of rest for travelers, run by a nearby religious order. Today’s name, ‘Ostrich,’ is probably a corruption of ‘Hospice,’ which would mutate over the centuries to ‘The Crane’ in the Middle Ages, then to ‘The Heron,’ before finally settling on The Ostrich Inn. That flightless fowl now decorates the inn’s outdoor sign.
We sat next to a large, deep fireplace with dying embers. After bringing us wine, the barkeeper staggered up to it with an enormous, slim, wheel-shaped log that he placed upright in the smoldering log cradle. Propped against the hot firewall behind, the large ‘slice’ soon caught, snapping, and crackling.
Huge beams crisscross the generous room’s ceiling; the bare, planked floor sags slightly, and is worn to pale, velvet smoothness from nearly a thousand years of inadvertent polishing by countless shod feet.
Traveling by coach or horse used to be an ordeal. There were no decent roads, only quagmires, muddy cow trails, and approximations of where sheltering inns might be. Nearby, a half-buried rectangular stone still has a readable ‘17’ carved into it, meaning that London town- much smaller in the wee years of the last millennium- was 17 miles away. Few could read, so lettered signs were infrequent in the deep countryside.
Queen Elizabeth I tried to travel through this village, but the road was so full of coach-eating potholes that a royal wheel snapped off. Her Majesty spent the night here, at the Ostrich.
Often, when summoned by Royalty to Windsor Castle, three miles west of Colnbrook (alternatively spelled Coolbrooke, Colebrok, Culbrok, and Coldbroc over the ages), travelers of higher station changed into their best garments here before being ferried across the River Thames to the castle.
Other people gratefully stopped at the inn to wash away dust and mud, enjoy a hot meal, and rest their horses and themselves overnight before moving on.
Some never left.
What follows is a hair-raising tale that happens to be true.
Mr. and Mrs. Jarman, the Ostrich’s innkeeper-owners for decades in the late Middle Ages, devised a horrific way to enrichen themselves with nobody the wiser. When a guest lodged here whom they thought might be carrying large sums of money- there were no banks or other means to safeguard jewels and coins, so people kept valuables close- the Jarmans put the unlucky traveler into a spacious, nicely appointed bedroom directly over the kitchen, where a ‘mightee greate cauldron’ full of boiling water was positioned. (Many inns, including the Ostrich, brewed their own beer and liquor ‘in house’ using cauldrons of various sizes, so this one never aroused suspicion.)
In dead of night the pair pulled two specially made iron pins free, thus dropping the head of the bed through the bedroom’s hinged floor. The mattress remained attached to the bedframe; the (sometimes inebriated) snoring guest slid headfirst straight into the boiling water.
There was no time to scream.
Victims were immediately scalded to death.
But those two weren’t done yet. They ran a ladder through the opening and clambered up into the bedroom to pocket valuables and remove evidence. After that, they dragged out the body and chucked it into the River Coine (which still flows by the inn and empties into the tidal Thames). The dead guest’s stabled horse was altered the same night- a long mane was shortened, a tail was docked or an eye removed- leaving no evidence, should anyone ever inquire after the murdered man.
When finally caught, because the last victim’s horse got away and wandered the High Street, Jarman, knowing the jig was up, boasted that they’d dispatched at least sixty lodgers in this way over the years (while continuing to brew booze in that cauldron)!
The two were hanged, with a huge crowd as witness, and for a good while the Ostrich Inn was infamous around the world.
P.S. It no longer houses overnight guests, is infested with ghosts, including that of a child – and serves up a darn good meal.