After my last post about my 6 x great-grandfather, Samuel Borton’s residence, I wanted to see if I could find out the name of the inn he owned, which, I now knew stood at the southern end of St. Giles. In a book of old Oxford photographs, which I bought a few years back, I found the following image:
It shows St. John’s college and a building next door called the Dolphin building, which at the time of this photograph c1870 was part of the college. The text beneath the photograph stated that it had once been an inn, and digging a little deeper, I discovered that it had indeed been the Dolphin Inn.
This then is a photograph of my 6 x great-grandfather’s inn before it was demolished.
The engraving below, is that of the same inn, made in 1779, probably at the time when my ancestor was resident.
