The Ship, Keyingham

Image: © Paul Glazzard Taken: 7 Mar 2008

This unassumingly named pub on the corner of Saltaugh Road and Main Street gets its title from one fleeting moment when the village of Keyingham was of some interest to historians. In the summer of 1642, Kingston upon Hull denied entry to King Charles I and therefore prevented him gaining access to a large store of munitions in the town which had been amassed in preparation for a proposed war on Scotland. Charles' wife Queen Henrietta Maria had escaped to Holland from where she dispatched the 300 ton ship Providence laden with arms and ammunition to help her husband in any possible conflict with Parliament, having purchased the arms with money obtained from the sale of the English crown jewels. The farmlands of Holderness to the east of Hull were largely populated by Royalist sympathizers and after being chased into the River Humber by the Parliamentary ship Mayflower, Providence escaped into the narrow Keyingham Fleet where she was able to unload her cargo in relative safety. This cargo probably included a number of cannon used in the siege of Hull which was effectively the start of the English Civil War. It's hard to imagine a ship getting anywhere near Keyingham these days. At the end of the 18th century a number of surveys were carried out to see if the Fleet could once again be made navigable and an Act of 1802 authorized navigation improvements subject to landowners approval. No work was done on navigation but the Fleet was cleared, straightened and extended north of the village, from which time it became known simply as Keyingham Drain.

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