King William IV

This popular local pub was converted from two Georgian cottages into a beer shop in 1830 and a separate tea room added around 1900 for weekend cyclists. 

This village pub started life as two Georgian cottages with ‘coffin windows’ in the front bedroom.  Stairs in such cottages were frequently very steep, and these windows allowed furniture – and coffins – to be lifted out. It is now a Grade II listed building.

In 1830, an Act was passed which allowed beer to be sold from unlicensed premises, and around this time Edmund Collins purchased this pair of cottages. He converted the two downstairs rooms of each cottage into an alehouse, which he named after the reigning monarch of the day as ‘King William IV Beer Shop.’ He also opened an ale shop in Cranmore Lane, and bought the village bakery and Malthouse. This enabled him to malt the barley to make his beer.  

Edmund Collins is listed as a beer seller in the 1841 Census. ‘The King Billy’ – its familiar Horsley name – remained in the Collins family for 158 years, until the 1980s. 

In the early 1900s, when parties of cyclists started coming down from London to enjoy the countryside, a room was built on the south side to serve teas. The cyclists still come today.