The Definitive Guide to the History of
Pubs and Beerhouses in Coventry

Drinking in an Old English Town

Wine and Spirit Vaults, 9 Smithford Street

These premises have been known by different names during their history:	FROM	TO	NAME
			Beerhouse
			Board
	1866	1879	Wine and Spirit Vaults
	1879	1892	City Vaults
	1892	1893	City Wine and Spirit Vaults
	1894	1912	Clarence Hotel
The photograph above, taken by Joseph Wingrave in the 1860s, is exactly how the premises and its surroundings would have looked in its early days. Until 1865 this was a ladies and gents clothes shop, but on the 26th January 1866 Andrew Sumner, having only the day before mutually dissolved his partnership with his father, Charles, opened a Wholesale Wine and Spirit establishment at No. 9 Smithford Street, passing this business on to James Colley in 1870. From 1879 Thomas Ball began to advertise it as the CITY VAULTS, and for just 6 months from July 1892 until early 1993 Hugh Thomas Gregory advertised constantly in the Midland Daily Telegraph his CITY WINE AND SPIRIT VAULTS. When William Hadfield took the reins in September 1894 it became the CLARENCE HOTEL until closure in 1912.
LICENSEES: 1866 - 1870 Andrew Sumner 1870 - 1879 James Colley
Street plan of 1851