WORKING at the back of his cellar, the landlord of the Rising Sun at Bream, Peter Hicks, found some old planks set in a wall. Prising one of them away, he found a void behind.
"I was quite excited. I thought it might lead to a secret room or something," said Mr Hicks.
He called in the services of Clearwell Caves owner Ray Wright and fellow cave Bruce Freeman to explore it, and they found a substantially-built stone lined tunnel with a flagstone floor – but no secret room or treasure.
"Some of the locals say the pub had associations with smugglers who worked on the river, so perhaps it is some sort of escape tunnel," said Peter.
Ray Wright, who worked along the tunnel with Bruce Freeman, said: "It is about 100ft long I guess, and the walls have been properly lined with stone and bricks in some places. And there is a slope towards the pub.
"There are some iron pipes leading into it, but these are clearly later additions – also here are some clay pipes, again later additions, of the sort you can still get at a builders merchant.
"I would say that it is more of a culvert than a tunnel, though what it was made for is a mystery. It certainly isn't a coal hole, because the slope is too slight.
"At the far end there is a wall, and up above is a stone slab – there is no way of knowing how close to the surface this is but the chances are the stone can be lifted from above for access."
Ray said it seemed to him the pub was too far away from known underground iron workings and a cavern system beneath Bream – it was closer to the edge of the coal measures.
There remain some baffling aspects – in places there are hooks in the ceiling, for example – and now Peter has found another tunnel entrance in the cellar which needs further exploration.
Ray has pledged to come back and make a proper survey of the original tunnel, which should be a pub talking point for many years to come!