A tiny parish with a long memory
Staunton in the Vale
A Vale of Belvoir village of listed landmarks, deep family history, country-pub hospitality and nearby wildlife.
- Best for
- Village history, a country-pub meal and nature spotting
- Give it
- A half day, or longer with Belvoir Castle
- Don't miss
- Eight centuries of Staunton family monuments in St Mary's
The Fox verdict
Small village, unusually deep history
Staunton in the Vale rewards a focused visit built around its listed pub, parish church and quiet Vale landscape.
The village is little more than a crossroads, cottages, a pub and surrounding fields, but the Staunton family's long presence gives it an exceptional historical thread. Add the listed K6 kiosk, the quarry reserve and nearby Belvoir Castle for a varied visit without padding the itinerary.
Where to go
Places in Staunton in the Vale
Every place below is checked against a published source, listed with what it is and how long to give it.
Local signatures
3 placesThe Staunton Arms
A traditional listed country pub with a restaurant, beer garden, three cask ales and guest rooms in an early-19th-century brick building.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 90 minutes
- Locality
- the village crossroads
- Access
- Dog owners are asked to eat on the front verandah.
St Mary's Church
A Grade II* parish church holding eight centuries of Staunton family monuments and tombs, with roughly seventy carved stone heads on its exterior walls.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 45 minutes
- Locality
- Staunton in the Vale
Belvoir Castle
The historic castle and gardens in the Vale of Belvoir, seat of the Duke of Rutland.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 2 hours
- Locality
- the Vale of Belvoir
Walks & outdoors
1 placeStaunton Quarry Nature Reserve
A small 2.5-hectare reclaimed gypsum and limestone quarry reserve with a vegetated water body, grassland and woodland, nationally important for the scarce Grizzled Skipper butterfly.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 60 minutes
- Locality
- the Back Dyke
History & heritage
1 placeK6 Telephone Kiosk outside The Staunton Arms
A Grade II listed red K6 telephone kiosk using the 1935 Giles Gilbert Scott design and standing outside the village pub.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 15 minutes
- Locality
- right outside The Staunton Arms
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Three ways to explore Staunton in the Vale
Signature outings
The Listed Village Pub
Settle into the village's only pub for freshly prepared food and one of three cask ales, including a LocAle.
The Red K6 Kiosk
Look for the Grade II listed red K6 telephone kiosk standing right outside The Staunton Arms.
The Reclaimed Quarry
Explore a small quarry reserve whose grassland, woodland and vegetated water body support the scarce Grizzled Skipper.
The village story
Staunton in the Vale Village Guide
A crossroads village where a listed pub, family church and Vale landscape carry an outsized history.
A Landmark and a Listed Pub
The telephone box outside the Staunton Arms is a Grade II listed K6, cast in 1935, and it's about as close as the village gets to a landmark. Staunton in the Vale doesn't extend much further than the crossroads it sits on: a scatter of brick cottages, the pub, and fields running out toward the Leicestershire and Lincolnshire borders. The parish held 66 people at the last census, spread across two square miles of the Vale of Belvoir.
The Staunton Arms is the only pub, and it's also the only shop, the only restaurant, and the only thing resembling a village hall. It's an early 19th-century brick building on the corner, Grade II listed, with ashlar detailing and a pantile roof, built originally to house workers on the Staunton Hall estate. For its first century and a half it held a six-day licence and closed on Sundays — a condition of the Staunton family's religious beliefs, not tradition or law — and didn't open on a Sunday until the family sold it in 1978. CAMRA's Vale of Belvoir branch has since named it Pub of the Year twice, in 2013 and 2016.
Food, Rooms and No Shop
The kitchen runs a Summer A La Carte alongside Light Bites, a vegan menu, and a Sunday Lunch for adults and children, with Fish Friday and Steak Night on rotation. Three cask ales are on at any time, always including a LocAle, with Castle Rock's Harvest Pale and Draught Bass regulars among the rotating guests; CAMRA members get 20p off. Dogs are welcome, though owners eat on the front verandah — "in warm weather it's a treat for all," as one visitor put it. Eight en-suite bedrooms and a two-bedroom cottage nearby mean you can stay without going anywhere else.
There's no shop. The only other commercial premises in the parish are a small industrial estate and a Montessori nursery run by Robert and Adrienne Staunton from a converted barn on the estate. For groceries, it's Newark, six or seven miles north.
Vale Walks and Church Monuments
A circular walk of around seven kilometres starts and finishes at the pub, taking in Kilvington and Alverton. The village sits about a mile from the Threeshires Bush, where Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Lincolnshire meet, and footpaths run on to Flawborough and the wider Vale.
St Mary's Church was the Staunton family's private chapel before it became the parish church, and it still holds eight centuries of their monuments — an early-14th-century knight with a dog carved at his feet, effigies of Alicia de Loudham and Sir William de Staunton, roughly seventy carved stone heads on the outside walls. A WWII memorial inside incorporates a propeller blade from a crashed Lancaster bomber; another Lancaster came down nearby in 1943, killing all seven of its crew.
Family History and Wider Connections
The Stauntons have held the manor since before the Conquest — Bryan de Staunton is recorded here in 1041 — and during the Civil War Colonel William Staunton raised a regiment for the King at his own expense, which nearly finished the family off. Parliamentary troops besieged Staunton Hall and drove out his wife and children; she is said to have fired on the attackers from a porch window before the garrison surrendered.
Newark is fifteen minutes away, Belvoir Castle about five, and the A1 a few minutes' drive from the crossroads; bus route 857 runs to Newark Bus Station. In spring, walkers along the Back Dyke sometimes spot Grizzled Skippers at the old quarry reserve — a butterfly scarce enough that its presence here, in a parish of 66 people, is worth mentioning to whoever's staying.
Stay around Nottinghamshire
Make a longer stay of it
Travel Fox holiday homes around Nottinghamshire, linked directly to their property pages.
Nottingham
Camila's Penthouse Central Stay with Balcony
- Sleeps 16
- 5 bedrooms
Nottingham
Anna's Central Stay
- Sleeps 16
- 5 bedrooms
Nottingham
Blair's Central Stay
- Sleeps 16
- 5 bedrooms
Nottingham
Melissa's Central Stay
- Sleeps 13
- 5 bedrooms
Nottingham
Stephanie's Central Stay
- Sleeps 6
- 2 bedrooms
A guide with a point of view
Written from research. Edited for real journeys.
Use the Official site links for live practical details, then use this guide for context, ideas and room to explore.
Sources
Every place on this page is checked against a published source. Each entry links the record we used and names who publishes it.
- The Staunton Arms — stauntonarms.co.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- K6 Telephone Kiosk outside The Staunton Arms — historicengland.org.uk statutory register or public authority record not machine-readable; publisher restricts automated access
- St Mary's Church — historicengland.org.uk statutory register or public authority record not machine-readable; publisher restricts automated access
- Staunton Quarry Nature Reserve — nottinghamshirewildlife.org other published source
- Belvoir Castle — belvoircastle.com operator, sector body or destination organisation