“Although plans to turn the pub into an embassy to escape the smoking ban have temporarily gone up in smoke, there are still plenty of reasons to visit this charming Southampton pub.

The Wellington Arms in Freemantle hit the headlines last month after becoming a consulate to a tiny uninhabited Caribbean island called Redonda.

An audacious idea to upgrade the Wellington Arms to an embassy making it the only pub in Britain where smoking was legal has since been thwarted by the Government and smokers are now banished to the beer garden.

But the recently knighted landlord of the Wellington Arms, Sir Bob Beech boasts that its collection of eleven Real Ales and five lagers on pump is enough to keep the punters happy.

Apart from the flag of Redonda hanging above the bar and a clock notifying regulars of the time on the distant island, another curious feature of the pub is the collection of flattened coins stuck to the bar.

Sir Bob, who has been landlord of the pub since 2004, said:
"The main pulling point of the bar is the selection of real ales on tap. It's a great back street local. Where else would you go to find this ambience? It's got character to it."

But it's not all bad news for the Wellington Arms’ smokers as Bob has put up a large shelter in the pub garden to accommodate the smoking fraternity'.

Among the regulars in the Wellington Arms is the Cardinal of Redonda, Edward Elder, who knighted Bob and turned the premises into a consulate on behalf of the King of Redonda last month.

The pub on Park road was known as the Swan Inn until December 1975 and dates back to the early 1860s when a Miss Belford was the landlady.”
 - extract from the Daily Echo July 2007