A GWENT pub landlord who sold coffins from the back of his premises has died.

Eighty-year-old Joe Godding, landlord of the Cupid's Inn, Grosmont, gave a new meaning to the phrase 'last orders' - because as well as selling beer he also sold hand-crafted coffins.

Mr Godding, who had lived at the 400 year-old pub on the Monmouthshire border all his life, passed away in his sleep on May 8.

He is expected to be buried in a steel creation he had made in anticipation of his death at nearby Kent Church in the Hamlet of Kent Church Court today.

The coffin arm of the business had been handed down over the generations and the coffins were produced in a special workshop at the back of the pub. Speaking to the Argus in October, Mr Godding said: "It is something my father did and taught me how to do. I learnt the trade as an apprentice as well as how to make wagons and carts for the farmers.

"I supply about 20 to 30 of them year. It is usually by word of mouth - a customer will come in and ask for a coffin.

"I don't keep them in the pub but in a workshop at the back and yes there is often plenty of banter about the coffins from customers in the pub!" Mr Godding explained.

Paying tribute to the popular member of the community, local member for Grosmont, Councillor Bob Wilcox, said: "He was a tremendous man. The pub will most probably be sold as a private house - it will be sadly missed as will Joe.

"He used to do all the funerals around here and was known by everyone. "His funerals were very dramatic and he would always wipe his eye with a handkerchief at the end of them. It is an end of an era for Grosmont you could say."

Visitors to the pub expecting mod-cons such as a jukebox and gambling machines would have been disappointed.

For the traditional pub was virtually unchanged over the years with the only entertainment provision being bar skittles.