The Elm Tree

There is something ineffably sad about a dead pub. It isn't so much about the ending of new possibilities but the loss of a piece of social history. 

The Elm Tree is about a mile outside Paddock Wood and has very few houses near it. The main industry in this area was agriculture; Paddock Wood was at the centre of the Kentish hop gardens but they've gone and so have the farm workers who might have called in here on the way to or from market or on the way home after a hard day in the fields. A swift bit of research shows that it closed at the end of February, that the previous licensee had been there for three years and won a CAMRA award last year. I think it has a history of closing and reopening so it might be reborn but running a rural boozer is hard work and to find this one most folk would have to be lost - I pass it if I go "the back way" to Paddock Wood.