Volunteers' Arms Hotel

In February 1864 Richard Hargreaves applied for a publican's license for a hotel called the Volunteers' Arms, located  in Nicholas Street. Hargreaves was a carpenter who had been an innkeeper in England. The hotel had 2 sitting rooms, a bar room, and four bedrooms. The property was rented from Stephen Broom. Apparently the building had been kept as a public house prior to Hargreaves's application.  

Other licensees were Charles Baldrey and H.O. Vincent.

In 1895 T. C. Beirne & Co., cash drapers, were next door neighbours. 

William Vowles, an early resident of Ipswich (1842 to his death in 1894), lived on the site where the Central Hotel and Volunteers' Arms would stand in later years. Vowles was a pioneer timber getter who was the first man to be married in Ipswich. He also built the first house in Ipswich and erected the first police buildings in the town. 

In 1903 the name of the hotel was changed to the Central Hotel.