The Blue Anchor British Pub

two centuries. Back to foggy London Town and to the days when Jack the Ripper prowled the
shadowy streets and Queen Victoria ruled the free world.Erected in 1864 on the site of a 17th
century coaching inn, the Blue Anchor provided a cheery welcome to London's rich, famous and
infamous for almost 150 years before "Time, Gentleman please" was called from the bar for the
last time and the pub was pulled down to make way for a parking lot.But she was to rise again!
This time in Delray Beach, on Florida's balmy Atlantic coast. The whole of the outside of the
original pub with its beautiful dark, oak doors and panelling and unique stained glass windows
was dismantled in sections in England and shipped across the pond in 1996 to become a
landmark on trendy Atlantic Avenue.The pub's present location is a far cry from her birthplace in
London's historic Chancery Lane.The ancient street has been home to many famous residents
over the centuries, including Cardinal Thomas Wolsey (1474-1530) who was Henry VIII's Prime
Minister. Then there was William Pickering, the first publisher in the world to use cloth to bind
books. He moved into the street in 1824. Three years later Izaak Walton, author of The Compleat
Angler took residence.When the Blue Anchor was constructed by the William Younger Brewery
(hence the name "Wm. Younger" above the front door), Charles Darwin was on the high seas
searching for evidence of evolution; Florence Nightingale was still nursing and Abraham Lincoln
was president of the United States. The very same doors you will enter today were also well
known to Winston Churchill. As a young Fleet Street journalist and later as a back-bench
Member of Parliament in the early 1900's, he often dropped by the old Blue Anchor for his
nightly snifter of fine French cognac!But if it's infamy you're after, the pub has seen that, too!A
couple of Jack the Ripper's victims, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddows, are said to have
spent their last night alive drinking with a well-to-do gentleman at The Blue Anchor in
1888.Shiver Me Timbers!For a hundred years or more The Blue Anchor has been haunted by the
spirit of a young woman called Bertha Starkey who was stabbed to death at the bar by her
jealous seafaring husband after he found her in the arms of another man. Her footsteps and
spine-chilling wails were often heard by employees after the pub closed for the night. And even
today at its Delray Beach location, the haunting appears to continue. Strange, unexplained events
have been documented in a host of TV and newspaper accounts."How do you explain the eerie
sounds of footsteps in the ceiling late at night or the sudden shattering of a half-inch thick
reinforced glass shelf behind the bar on the anniversary of Bertha's gruesome demise?" asks
British owner Lee Harrison. "And how do you explain table candles extinguishing themselves and
then re-igniting seconds later? Or heavy kitchen pots lifting themselves off meat-cleaver size
hooks and crashing to the floor? It's all very creepy!""In fact, experts in the field of paranormal
studies have told us they are not aware of any previous case where a ghost has travelled more
than 4,000 miles to set up residency in another country."