I mentioned in an earlier column the epic expedition of my wife Ann and myself to visit all the 137 pubs then in the Forest of Dean. These were be identified through a schedule of licensed premises maintained by the local police. We carried out this essential piece of historical, social and cultural research from 1991 to 1993, and discovered some real gems, in remote rural areas as well as in our towns and villages.

A more recent survey has shown that 137 has now declined to 86. This is a decline that has been going on for many years. In the 19th century there were many beer houses scattered around remote rural areas like St Briavels Common, and since then the numbers of pubs have steadily dwindled. You may see many dwellings around the forest which display the ‘Best In the West’ sign of West Country Ales with as its emblem a mediaeval castle, showing that this building was one of the former pubs which have been reassigned to the housing sector.

We have lost the pubs named after the local railway network, the Railway at Cinderford, and also the Junction and the Silent Whistle on the long-gone Gloucester to Ross line. The Railway (which rejoiced in the name of ‘Trax’ during its last few years of its existence) was one of the pubs that was demolished, along with another Cinderford pub the Bridge.

Three of the riverine pubs have gone, the Old Ferry at Beachley, the Old Severn Bridge at Purton, and the Red Hart at Awre, which was not quite on the river. And the Victoria in Newnham, again not quite on the river, lies empty, as it has for the last 18 years. Another ‘Old’ pub, the Old Engine at Steam Mills, has also gone. But the heroic campaign by the local community may save the Brockweir Inn, another waterside pub, from a similar fate.

In the days when my wife and I commuted to the Gloucester/Cheltenham metropolitan business headquarters of the county, we would often call into the Greyhound at Popes Hill on the way home. Alas, this great place for winding down has now closed down, with its now sadly decaying dinosaur fading away in the garden. The White House, on the hill behind the Greyhound, is now no more.

The Dog and Muffler at Joyford is still flourishing, but is now perhaps the only thriving pub in the Forest without a big local population to support it (with the honourable exception of the House in Mosely Green, which they call the Rising Sun, recently serenaded in ‘Forest View).

I do regret the passing of the Crown, one of my locals in my St Briavels days (the other pub in the village, the George, is very much going strong).

It’s farewell to the Feathers, Courtfield Arms, Anchor, Hearts of Oak, the Apple Tree, and many more. And to the ‘New Inn’, where we now live in Newnham.

Rural pubs are declining, but the only pubs that I can think of that have emerged in our area in the last 30 years are Dog Houses, also known as Micropubs, based on the middle of Cinderford and Coleford.

Remember the words of Hillaire Belloc, a writer from the first half of the 20th century: ‘When you have lost your inns, you may drown your empty selves. For you have lost the heart of England’.