5th Hants Volunteer Arms new landlord to "embrace" its history and restore it as a traditional pub

A historic pub in Portsmouth is being given a new lease of life with its new landlord looking to “embrace” its history.

Ally Wearn is taking over the running of the 5th Hants Volunteer Arms on Albert Road and she is looking to return it to its “old school” roots with “real ales, pork pies and pickled eggs”. It will be the second historic pub that Alison and her team will run in the city having been at the helm of The Lawrence Arms in Lawrence Road for over 15 years.

The 5th Hants, which is 141 years old, closed suddenly in August with Admiral Taverns announcing they were searching for someone new to run it.

Having seen it was available, Ally started to think about what she would do if she was in charge. She is no stranger to the Albert Road pub, when the Lawrence Arms closed temporarily in 2023 after a car crashed into the front of it, they ran a ‘borrow a barmaid/man’ scheme with staff helping out in pubs across the city.

Ally said: “I did a shift there and thought this a lovely pub. At that time it was being run as a traditional pub but when they left it was a bit more mixed. I always looked at it and thought it would be nice to have a traditional pub there. When it closed it made me look at it and think about what I would do, I was chatting about it and I thought why not actually have a go.

“We would like to embrace the history of the pub, in the 70s it was where the Portsmouth CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) branch was born so it has a lot of history and I have lots of fond memories of it as a traditional pub. We would like to take it back to that.

“I see it as somewhere with real ales, pork pies and pickled eggs, that very old school style of pub.”

The 5th Hants was opened in 1885 by a man called Ted Walker who then passed it on to his daughter Gladys. It was later sold to a John Nash before being taken over by Fuller’s. It only had three owners in its first 130 years but in recent times it has changed hands more regularly.

Alison is confident that her and her team will be able to run both the 5th Hants and The Lawrence Arms successfully.

She said: “I have excellent team of staff who have been with me a long time. They are really supportive and they are really excited to be involved in somewhere new.”

Having announced the news on social media, Alison has been blown away by the response.

“The announcement had such a huge response on Facebook, it went crazy and had around 90,000 views,” she said. “I do feel slight pressure now as a custodian of the place. People are desperate for it to be loved and to be a nice pub again.”

Alison will be collecting the keys for the 5th Hants in early October with a view of reopening the pub in the middle of October.