The Bull Hotel
A former hotel of 1828 on Trumpington Street, once a wartime base for American servicemen.
The Bull Hotel was a four-storey hotel at 68 Trumpington Street, next door to St Catharine's College. The building went up in 1828 and has been Grade II listed since 26 April 1950. It no longer works as a hotel, and this page is about what it was.
An inn site with a long past
The 1828 hotel replaced an older inn called the Black Bull, which is recorded as early as the fifteenth century. St Catharine's College received the Black Bull as a bequest in 1626, and in 1828 the site was rebuilt and opened as a hotel. A description from 1936 mentions two acanthus-style posts flanking a stone porch at the front.
Wartime and after
Until the Second World War the Bull was counted among the top hotels in the city. In 1941 it became a centre for American servicemen, and photographs from the war show American and British flags hanging from the building. When the war ended, the servicemen set up a short-lived "Bull College" named after the hotel. In 1945-46 the building then housed courses in Russian for the British Army, after which it merged with St Catharine's.
Notable guest
The guest list includes Woodrow Wilson, recorded as a visitor in 1899.
Seeing the building
The frontage can still be seen on Trumpington Street. Since the hotel merged with the college, treat it as an exterior to admire from the pavement.
Nearby
Within a few minutes' walk
