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White Horse Inn (Nellie's), Beverley
Beverley
HU17 8BL
Reviews (Current Rating Average: 8 of 10) see review guidelines
Old Boots left this review about White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
Probably the best known pub in Beverley, a multi room layout with the counter in the back left room after you enter through the central corridor. The front has I believe, three separate rooms of various sizes and at the back are the main bar, a number of small snugs and a disused old fashioned kitchen. The floors are a mix of cobbles and flags and all very ancient looking, the lights are conversions of older gas fittings but contrived to look as if they’re still gas powered. There is a modern extension at the back near the toilets. Most of John Bonser’s review is still applicable. Beer wise only Old Brewery Bitter of course and a wide range of Sam’s little boxes and bottles. Outstanding interior that’s never changed in all the years I’ve been coming here, except it’s cleaner, however the beer was tired.
On 23rd July 2023
- no rating submitted
[User has posted 3269 recommendations about 2978 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
ROB Camra left this review about White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
Called in a couple of weeks after Will and I am pleased to report that the place was being well run my two older ladies on a Tuesday, early afternoon. Hopefully Will's experience was just a one off. As usual the clientele was mainly older, solitary blokes having a quiet pint or reading a paper. The OBB was indeed still a bit on the cold side.
On 25th August 2021
- rating: 7
[User has posted 3223 recommendations about 3134 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Will Larter left this review about White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
My recent visit to this amazing pub was slightly spoilt by the beaviour of the very young barman, who I would guess from his hairstyle was only just 18. He alternated chatting with two young girls, who were standing at the bar in contravention of the only Covid-19 policy the pub possessed, and looking at his phone. Perhaps he was checking his emails for news of his impending sacking for breaking Humphrey Smith's rule number one. All the time, glasses were piling up on the tables, and two new customers actually cleared a table so that they could sit at it. They didn't get an acknowledgement, never mind a word of thanks.
Whoever is running this place needs to learn that you can't just give a kid a couple of days training and expect them to run a pub properly, even if it was a quiet midweek evening. It was quite disturbing to see an old pub, an old building, not to mention the customers being insulted by being treated so disdainfully. At 18 I'd have been lousy at customer service too, but my nerves were jangling when, with my years of experience, I saw how this undertrained young man was behaving.
The beer was good, though a little too cool, and I wouldn't want my experience to put anyone off going here for a visit.
On 31st July 2021
- rating: 5
[User has posted 3734 recommendations about 3471 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Quinno _ left this review about White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
A Sam Smith outlet that I managed to walk past twice as it doesn't scream 'pub!' from the outside, just a discreet sign and a white horse figurine above the doorway. Locally known as ‘Nellies’ after a former licensee who retired in the 1970’s. It looks a good 300+ years old from the outside and it’s an absolute gem, with a genuinely aged and almost unspoilt interior (bar the fruit machines!), a genuinely wonderful voyage of discovery. The amount of darkly lit rooms, nooks and crannies linked by corridors and wonky flagstone flooring, stuffed with old furniture and bric-a-brac, are too vast to list here, suffice to say you could be drinking in 1818 rather than 2018 at times; John Bonser’s review below outlines it all in rich detail. A small but fully stocked bar, my half of cask OBB was a quid and in good shape. You absolutely must do this one, it’s a national treasure of a pub.
On 1st April 2018
- rating: 9
[User has posted 5081 recommendations about 5064 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Will Larter left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
Say what you like about Sam Smiths, and plenty of people do, they have some cracking good pubs. This one is up there with the best and well worth a visit. As Ray says, it can get busy on a Saturday afternoon, but everyone seemed to be behaving themselves and having a good time. The Old Brewery Bitter on hand pump was much too cold, and I had to wait a while for the distinctive flavour to develop. My partner read a description of the pub elsewhere afterwards, and we had to come back another evening when it was less busy so that we could appreciate the gas lighting, which she'd never seen before. Service was friendly and efficient both when it was quiet and when it was busy, and I'd make a point of calling in here on any future trip to Beverley.
Date of visit: 30th July 2016
On 9th August 2016
- rating: 7
[User has posted 3734 recommendations about 3471 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Real Ale Ray left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
We called in here on a Saturday afternoon and the pub was full to capacity around the main bar and front lounge. After a little wonder around we found a quiet room over on the left of the main entrance. This small room was quite a bonus as you looked out into the passageway and can observe the extremely worn floor area, from lots of foot traffic down many decades.
We went for the Double Four lager at 4%, which was introduced in 2013 to bridge the gap between Alpine 2.8% and Taddy 4.5%.
On 5th April 2016
- rating: 8
[User has posted 3382 recommendations about 3381 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
ROB Camra left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
Well JB's review is very comprehensive in it's description of the pub and I don't have anything to add to it. The main room was quite lively on our Monday lunchtime visit and there were real fires going in two of the rooms. My pint of OBB was in decent nick, if rather cold. The pub is excellent, but the lack of a choice of ales is always going to hold my rating down. We'll be back though, probably just for one.
On 17th March 2014
- rating: 7
[User has posted 3223 recommendations about 3134 pubs]
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John Bonser left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
In the attractive, historic market town of Beverley in Yorkshire’s East Riding, is a pub that is described as “something of a Yorkshire institution” in Yorkshire’s Real Heritage Pubs book. It’s been on my “to do” list for absolutely yonks and I was therefore pleased to get the opportunity to make the short train journey here from Hull recently.
Remarkably, the pub is still affectionately better known locally as “Nellies”, named after one Nellie Collinson, whose family acquired the pub in 1928 – it was previously owned by St Mary’s Church virtually across the road in Hengate - and ran it until the 1970’s, with Nellie, evidently a formidable larger than life character, at the helm.
It’s a brick built building that dates back to at least the 17th century. It was in use as an inn in 1666 when, it is reported, an emissary of King Charles II used to hold office whilst on official business.
The pub is a warren of adjoining dark gas lit rooms featuring uneven flagstoned and tiled floors, bric a brac, old furniture (dressing tables, sideboards etc), nicotine stained walls and old basic benches and settles. A former private kitchen features a large kitchen range. In winter, it’s lit by open fires. Nellie apparently stipulated in her will that the pub must not be substantially altered – hence the gas lights remain
The rather understated entrance is through a walled car park, easily accessed from the nearby bus station. In front of us, we see what was the old coaching inn entrance and, on the left hand side, an original well, now filled in and covered by a locked metal grille to prevent worse for wear customers from an untimely demise.
The main bar area consists of padded bench seats around the edge of the room and sturdy marble topped cast iron tables. This is clearly the favoured haunt of the locals and, based on my visit, a good number of them may well have been around in Nellie’s day. There’s several fireplaces each with an ornate mirror above. The back of this room faces onto Hengate – a busyish road at the back of the pub and, on a table here, we see an old cash register.
Behind the bar a flagstoned corridor leads to a series of smaller rooms which really do look like they belong to a different era. Sitting in these rooms, apart from the traffic outside on Hengate, the only sound is the chiming of clocks, the occasional chinking of beer glasses and the murmur of conversation from the front bar. This is the much older and unaltered part of the pub. These rooms can also be accessed directly from a separate entrance on Hengate, where we see, acting as a pub sign, a much photographed fibreglass rocking horse above the doorway, which was a childhood toy of a former customer who lived opposite the pub.
The pub is listed in CAMRA’s National Inventory of Historic Pub Interiors.
In one of the back rooms, a rather tatty and worn lever arch file contains various newspaper cuttings and articles collected over the years which, combined with framed information articles on the walls around the pub – “White Horse Inn, Facts not Fiction” – provide us with a fascinating history of the inn and the redoubtable Nellie in particular. For instance, we learn how Nellie ruled with a rod of iron – no women were allowed in the bar, they had to ring a bell and be served in one of the side rooms. Nurses were not allowed. There was no bar counter in those days – the beer came direct from barrels positioned on tables against the wall in the bar room.
Make no mistake about it however, this pub is more than just a museum piece – even at 11.30 in the morning when I arrived, a lively bunch of regulars were engaged in animated discussion in the front bar about how to put the world to rights.
A candle lit pub quiz takes place on Tuesday evenings.
Sam Smiths acquired the pub in 1976 and, apart from the introduction of a bar servery in the main room and a large extension up a few steps at one side through the former private kitchen which houses several pool tables, the interior is untouched, particularly the back rooms that front onto Hengate, where a certain air of timelessness prevails.
The Sam Smiths OBB is £ 1.80p and, whilst it’s no one’s favourite beer, there’s no better place to drink it than here.
You really should try and get here sometime
On 7th September 2012
- rating: 9
[User has posted 560 recommendations about 560 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
hondo . left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
Proper old school sam smith's pub. The pub is made up of a number of nooks and crannies and quirky rooms although it does have a modern extension at the rear. Usual sam smith's selection at cheap prices. Well worth seeking out.
On 19th May 2011
- no rating submitted
[User has posted 2883 recommendations about 2820 pubs]
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Alan Winfield left this review about The White Horse Inn (Nellie's)
The White Horse is a Samuel Smiths tied house situated on a very busy one way road not far from the middle of town.
Once inside this pub it is like going back in time there are at least four rooms there may be more!.
The pub has gas lights throughout it which makes the place seem quite dark which i think adds to the atmosphere of this pub.
On the beer front if you dont like Sam Smiths products dont come here,we had the Old Brewery Bitter which was very drinkable and at £2.25 for a pint and half was a bargain.
If you are in Beverley i think this pub is a must visit.
On 19th August 2010
- rating: 9
[User has posted 6113 recommendations about 6113 pubs]