Stag Inn

It stood on the north side of Union Street just a few doors to the east of the Brighton Inn, between Battery Street and Manor Street, in the Stonehouse stretch of the strip.

Although either side of Union Street was relatively rural at first, it soon became heavily built up and it is unlikely, therefore, that the name of the pub reflected some sort of relationship with a country hunt, as many other Stag Inns do.

Not only did the development around the area rapidly impact on the original make up of the street, but the creation of Millbay Docks and the arrival of the railway ushered in another era in the life of the street. Increasingly it became a popular haunt of servicemen. Hence the number of photographers who came here to cash in on the early boom for the new media as servicemen were keen to leave likenesses for their loved ones before they went to sea, and they were keen to take personal portraits with them. So it was that when the Stag closed sometime around 1860 it was a photographer who moved in, along with another two photographers on either side of him!


1847 - Isaac Beckford
1850 - John Mitchell
1856 - Charles Kenniston