Tam O'Shanter

History

Dates from

The early nineteenth century

State pub

Number 209 on the 1920 roll

Village

About forty houses, no church, no hall

In January 1966 the Tam o' Shanter at Little Bampton was the State Management Scheme's test case. It was losing money, though the building was in reasonable order, and instead of a salaried manager it was let to a tied tenant. The State Management Districts Council knew this was a radical departure from disinterested management. It worked: the profits rose, and the council decided that any loss-making pub whose manager left could go the same way.

Little Bampton is a hamlet of about forty houses on the Solway plain, eight miles west of Carlisle and six from Wigton. There is no church and no village hall, so the pub is the place the village meets, and CAMRA describe it simply as the focal point of the hamlet. It dates back to the early nineteenth century. The name is Burns's, from the poem of 1790, but the story told locally attaches it to an old-time whisky smuggler who rowed his liquor across the Solway from Scotland. Nothing is written down to settle which came first.

The scheme reached further west than most people imagine. The Cumberland News of 19 May 1917 lists the Tam o' Shanter among five houses put under the Board's direct management in the previous month, and the scheme's roll of 1920 has the Tam o' Shanter, Little Bampton, near Wigton, at number 209, on the same roll as its neighbours the Wellington at Great Orton and the Rose & Crown at Kirkbampton.

It is a small, friendly local with a dog-friendly bar and home-made food on a weekly menu, served on Friday evenings and Sunday lunchtimes, when it fills up quickly. No cask ale at CAMRA's last visit. In 1901 its licence, held by Edward Bell, was one of three in the Cumberland Ward held over at the annual sessions because of a conviction during the year; it was renewed at the adjourned sessions that September, with a warning to be very careful.