“The surrounding streets were strewn with feathers from the ruined mattresses’ .

So wrote W.E. Swale in his book Grange-over-Sands – the Story of a Gentle Township, about the aftermath of the fire that gutted the Crown Hotel at Grange-over-Sands in the early hours of Monday, October 12, 1908.

Built in 1789, the Crown had occupied the most prominent part in Grange. For many years the Crown was the major hotel; another was the Bay Horse Inn, which W.E. Swale suggests became the Commercial and then the Commodore.

Larger hotels were built after the railway reached Grange in 1857. At the end of the 19th Century, the Crown was owned by Thomas Westwood but, after his death, it was bought by Yates and Company, Manchester brewers, who let it to John Coward.

He was followed in about 1903 by John Borwick and the hotel became Borwick's Crown Hotel.

A description of the internal structure of the building (taken from The Westmorland Gazette’s report of the fire dated October 17, 1908), tells us that it had low, beamed ceilings, and ‘curious staircases’ mainly made of wood.

It was thought that the fire was started by overheating of a ventilating flue connected to the gas lighting apparatus.

The Westmorland Gazette reported that the Head Boots, Thomas Kendall, was roused by a suffocating volume of smoke in his attic room at about 2am. He partially dressed and roused the other 13 residents from their beds and then ran to the fire station. A strong wind was blowing, which fanned the flames but also prevented some of the members of the fire brigade hearing the call to duty. However, the brigade captain, the Rev G. Vicars-Gaskell, and the vice-captain were quickly on the spot.

All the occupants escaped in their night clothes.

Rebuilding started immediately.

An advertisement in Bulmer's History of Furness and Cartmel of 1910 boasted that the hotel was enlarged with roof garden, lounge hall, bowling green and good stabling.

The hotel was in business until 1990, when all except the front was demolished and rebuilt as Crown Court, private apartments.