Book online here…
Built as a safe elegant haven for a sea-fairing family recovering from the vigours of life at sea, Steeple View, now owned by the grand daughter and great granddaughter of local sea captains offers wholistic Bed and Breakfast accommodation to those who might be in search of some sort of escape from the everyday. I hope that today you too will find peace and tranquility during your stay here and enjoy all that Steeple View offers you.
The Accommodation
Two brand new refurbished comfortable airy double, ensuite bedrooms. Tastefully decorated, fusing traditional and attractive contemporary style furnishings with up to date facilities and boasting fabulous power showers and enchanting views. Both bedrooms are furnished with comfortable beds that are constructed with 1400 pocket springs and wool. Bedding is 100% cotton.
- The garden room – Garden View. An ensuite with power shower has twin beds with 100% cotton bedding, which can also serve as one superking bed if requested, a desk and a window seat with views over the picturesque back garden. Television/DVD player, and internet access, hair dryer and hospitality trays and access to mini fridge.
- The front room – Church View. An ensuite with power shower kingsize double bedroom with 100% cotton bedding, a table top and a window seat with views overlooking the church, the lanes of Newport and the distant hills. Television/DVD player, and internet access, hair dryer and hospitality trays and access to mini fridge.
- The Guests’ lounge and dining room. This would once have been the posh drawing room for important guests only. Well it is still for important guests, you! This is your own sitting room/ dining room with cosy wood burning stove, TV, internet access and books to borrow and is available for you to use at any time.
- The Quiet Room. Need a little personal space on your travels? Want time on your own just to be? Well there is a little quiet room for you to withdraw to. A calm atmosphere, music available and a little writing bureau.
A little social history of the people who built and inhabited Steeple View
Steeple View was built around 1889 of local granite stone in the modest, elegant style of the Victorian for whom it was intended. Master mariner James Richards born in St Dogmael’s made his money sailing from Newport as master of the smack Price Jones in 1876 and as Mate on the Constance Ellen in 1882, trading in all manner of goods.
There is a secret passage under the kitchen where he most certainly would have stored treasures and curiosities and no doubt certain contraband goods. An interesting and harsh life in those days, he lost two sons to the sea and the third died in New Zealand in 1910. Steeple View would have been his haven where he would recover from, and reflect on the rigours of life at sea.
Here, back on dry land, in the comfort of his new home, he and subsequently his son-in- law James Ernest Richards, another master mariner, would both have entertained their family and relatives with tales of their adventures, and shared news of what they had learned from across the seas.
Captain Richards may well have been asked, on many occasions to recount his tale of the Silver Salver, a treasured gift he received from the King of Siam. A Welsh family, worldly, dignified and proud members of a British Empire, which at that time “ruled the waves” chose a name in the English language for their home – Steeple View. For at that time there was indeed a steeple atop the tower of the Church of St Mary of Newport.