Red Lion Inn

The Red Lion Inn is a Grade II* listed pub, built in the late 15th/early 16th century. It is an example of a late medieval hall house. The timber framed frontage is a 20th century addition It is on the Campaign for Real Ale's National Inventory of Historic Pub Interiors. Below the hall is a half-timbered vault, probably from an earlier building, known as the court room. it is alleged to be the site of the trial of the conspirators in the Southampton Plot. This appears to be a local legend. The trial took place in 1415, about 75 years before the foundation of this building, and there is no documentary evidence from 1415 that would locate it here. In any case, the plotters were imprisoned in the castle and it is unlikely that they were moved down the High Street for a trial in an inn when the castle afforded ample facilities. A mournful procession of ghosts reportedly sighted leaving from the inn has been linked to the plotters. It has been claimed that the inn itself is haunted by a barmaid, described as being in her sixties and only visible above the knees, who reportedly drifts through the bar area. During his exile after 1852, Juan Manuel de Rosas, the former governor of Buenos Aires, used to frequent the place.