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Chelmsford - A History & CelebrationSelected extracts and photosReturn to Book | Search for another Book | View all photos for Chelmsford | Chelmsford homepage |
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 Chelmsford, New Street 1920 (ref. 69027x) | The new library and mayoral suite were seen as the first phase of a new block of civic buildings, though in fact it was another 30 years before the rest of the site - the Civic Centre and Civic Theatre - was opened. In the meantime, the lower end of Duke Street, opposite the cathedral, was largely being given over to another administrative development: County Hall. Essex County Council had been formed in 1888, the same year as Chelmsford Borough Council, and had initially held their meetings in the Shire Hall. However, they soon outgrew those notoriously encumbered rooms and tried scattering their departments around the town, in various rented buildings. For a while, these included the Grammar School's recently vacated Georgian classroom. In 1903 some new administrative offices were built just behind, in King Edward Avenue. Finally, the Council decided to combine all its activities in a new County Hall, to be built on the corner of Threadneedle Street. The construction programme was delayed by the war, but the five-storey block was at last ready in 1931. It gained extra wings and offices as the decade wore on, creeping along Duke Street and engulfing the old school. The 1930s also saw the opening of Chelmsford's first proper bypass. The new thoroughfare swept in a wide arc from the old Stump Cross, and along Van Diemen's Road, to join Baddow Road at a new roundabout by the Army & Navy pub. In keeping with its new role, the pub mutated from a modest, square- fronted, 18th-century building into an expansive mock-Tudor roadhouse. From here, the bypass crossed the floodplain of the Chelmer and rejoined the Colchester road on the far side of Springfield. The first leg of the road was christened Princes Road, after the future King George VI, who performed the ribbon-cutting duties on 23 May 1932. New London Road was no longer the newest road to London. |  Add your own Memory Add to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Infirmary 1895 (ref. 35525) | In the late 1870s the Grammar School boys had lost a corner of their cricket field when a new area was being laid out for the weekly market. The local Board of Health had put their foot down over the amount of debris that the market was depositing in the High Street every Friday. It was February 1880 when the new site opened. Built at the bottom of Threadneedle Street, it was given a new service road - Market Road - that cut through the open land between the Corn Exchange and the railway station. Cattle, pigs, horses and sheep could all be corralled there without causing too much of a health hazard. The gentle gradient meant all effluent would hopefully drain down towards the river. The Board then got its teeth into Chelmsford's twice-yearly fair. The pleasure fair, which had once lined both sides of the High Street, was now reduced to about half a dozen stalls. The railway had opened up new opportunities for leisure, and the fair's array of gewgaws and freak shows had rather lost its appeal in these more sophisticated times. The railway had also unseated the cattle fair from the New Street field where it had been since 1800. It relocated to Fair Field, between upper Duke Street and the Burgess Well. But Fair Field was sold to developers in 1877, and six years later Chelmsford's fairs were abolished altogether. The High Street shopkeepers no longer wanted them on their doorstep. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, the Public Library 1906 (ref. 56890) | The building nearest the camera, Rainsford House, was built around the turn of the century. From1924 it housed the town's municipal offices, but was eventually replaced by a new Civic Centre. Just beyond it stands the 1930s library. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Oaklands House 2005 (ref. C73718k) | The building nearest the camera, Rainsford House, was built around the turn of the century. From1924 it housed the town's municipal offices, but was eventually replaced by a new Civic Centre. Just beyond it stands the 1930s library. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Duke Street c1950 (ref. C73008) | The building nearest the camera, Rainsford House, was built around the turn of the century. From1924 it housed the town's municipal offices, but was eventually replaced by a new Civic Centre. Just beyond it stands the 1930s library. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Grammar School 1892 (ref. 31516) | For a while the Bewleys' only local rival had been the London Road Ironworks, which was opposite a house called The Cloisters. This house had been built on the site of The Friars, a private residence that stood where the Dominican priory's tumbledown refectory had once been. It is conceivable that, following the Grammar School's hasty exit from the old refectory, it had been patched up and gentrified until, by the 18th century, it had mutated into one of the town's more respectable residences. The priory's last vestige, the gatehouse on the west side of Moulsham Street, was demolished in 1857. The pathway leading through it had solidified into the road known as Friars Place. The Grammar School itself had had a rough ride through the 19th century. Ever since the town's Georgian gentrification, the school, with its curriculum of dead languages, had seemed increasingly out of date. What Chelmsford's wealthy tradesmen wanted was a school that taught accounting and the three Rs - and they accordingly took their sons elsewhere. By 1846 the school only had three pupils, and was soon forced to shut. It reopened in 1856, with a wider range of subjects on offer, and numbers started to rise dramatically. The washhouse had to be converted into a second classroom. It was, of course, only a temporary answer, as the site was so constricted. In 1892 the school moved to its third official home, in new buildings just up Broomfield Road (see photograph 31516, below). There was now space for 126 day-boys and 24 boarders. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, New London Road 1919 (ref. 69033x) | Chelmsford had always been primarily a market-town. As late as the 1830s, the topographical writer Thomas Wright was saying that 'there being no manufactures here, the labouring population is engaged in the business of agriculture, and in conveying supplies of various kinds to the London market.' Industry, however, was about to take a hold of Chelmsford. A millwright called John Bewley had established an iron-foundry in New Street in 1808, on the site of some hop kilns. His son set up a new foundry in Anchor Street, using some plots he had acquired from the land sales of 1839. After the Bewleys faded out of the picture, the Anchor Street Ironworks were taken over by T H P Dennis, and production began to focus on steam- and water-valves. A new partner, Colonel R E B Crompton, joined the firm in 1875, and soon transformed it into Crompton's Arc Electric Works. Now specialising in the forward-looking field of electric lighting, Crompton's was set to be a major employer in the town for some time to come. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Tindal Square 1906 (ref. 56881) | Elizabeth gave one Chelmsfordian another cause to smile: in 1563, she sold the manor of Chelmsford to Thomas Mildmay. Three years later he was dead. In the terms of his will, however, he left instructions that his estate - which now consisted of Moulsham and Chelmsford - should remain in one piece as it passed to his successive male heirs. This bequest was known as the Mildmay Entail. No sooner had Thomas Mildmay obtained the manor of Chelmsford than the townspeople began to clamour for a new Market Cross: the old one was falling down around the judges' ears. He died before anything could be done, but his son, Sir Thomas, revamped the building in 1569. It still took the form of an open space with a roof. The latter had dormer windows and stood on eight oak pillars. The judge, jury and other court officials sat in the open space, while the first-come spectators were able to watch from a gallery that ran around the inside of the building, below the rafters. Everyone else simply watched from the street. Some of the Market Cross's duties were, in due course, farmed out to a second courthouse. Known as the Little Cross, this was a weatherboarded building just to the west of the Cross itself. It dealt mainly with civil cases. It also contributed greatly to the town's congestion problems. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, the Cathedral, the interior 1919 (ref. 69024) | Both Back Lane and the High Street were well supplied with inns: the Blue Bell, the White Hart, the Talbot, the Three Arrows, the Dolphin, the Rose. Near the top of Back Lane stood a lock-up, a pillory and stocks. There was even a maypole where HSBC Bank now stands, and beside it a dunghill. The level area where the marketplace opened out was called Cornhill. Here, in the middle of all the people, animals and carts, stood the Market Cross - an open-sided structure consisting of a roof supported on wooden posts. Corn transactions took place there. Just behind it, backing onto the edge of the churchyard, was the Tollhouse, an administrative office where the market tolls were collected, and where the manor-court sat. Chelmsford was now an assize town, and the court hearings were sometimes held in the Tollhouse, sometimes in the Market Cross. In 1394, 11 respectable Townsmen were hauled before the manor-court for 'playing at ball… over the church'. The church cannot have been particularly big if a group of shopkeepers were able to punt a football over it. It was not a good size for the church of a county town, and a complete rebuilding began in the first half of the 15th century. The nave and clerestory were added in 1489, and the final details - the chancel, tower and south porch - were added in the early 1500s. A host of human-sized wooden angels hung from the nave's roof. Outside, the handsome new church was topped-off with an inscription requesting prayers 'for the good estat of the Townshyp of Chelmsford'. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Mother and Child, Mildmay Road 1906 (ref. 56886x) | Around AD 120, a mansio was built on a slight rise overlooking the site of the fort. This was a state-run building where persons on official business could change horses, take a bath and have a bed for the night. It appeared to overlie the foundations of a timber structure that had been destroyed by fire a few decades earlier. Boudicca may or may not have been responsible. For a while, the mansio and its attendant shops were surrounded by a series of banks and ditches. The small settlement was called Caesaromagus, meaning 'Caesar's marketplace' or 'Caesar's plain'. No other town in Britain had 'Caesar' in its name, and we do not know why this particular gaggle of buildings was accorded the honour. Maybe the mid-Essex 'plain' was earmarked as a future administrative centre. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Moulsham Street 1919 (ref. 69020) | The cluster of half-timbered houses dated from the late 15th century. Known as The Friars, they marked the position of the Dominican priory's gatehouse. In 1931 these were dismantled and replaced by a block of modern shops - which was in turn swept away by Parkway in 1967. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Tindal Street 1906 (ref. 56882) | The town was getting bigger. It began to spread westwards along Brochole Street (now Duke Street). The High Street itself was filling up. Some of the freeholders had been setting up stalls in the middle of the road that were now becoming permanent structures. By the end of the 14th century these had solidified into a block of shops called Middle Row. It effectively divided the street into two - the High Street and Back Lane (or Tindal Street, as we now call it). Middle Row, of course, still exists today. The rest of the street was full of movable stalls on market days. Different parts of the street specialised in different types of goods: poultry, fish, leather. There was a shambles - a slaughterhouse - in Middle Row. The conduit stream was usually awash with blood and market refuse. It was a busy, smelly place. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Queens Head Inn, High Street 1892 (ref. 31508x) | The town was getting bigger. It began to spread westwards along Brochole Street (now Duke Street). The High Street itself was filling up. Some of the freeholders had been setting up stalls in the middle of the road that were now becoming permanent structures. By the end of the 14th century these had solidified into a block of shops called Middle Row. It effectively divided the street into two - the High Street and Back Lane (or Tindal Street, as we now call it). Middle Row, of course, still exists today. The rest of the street was full of movable stalls on market days. Different parts of the street specialised in different types of goods: poultry, fish, leather. There was a shambles - a slaughterhouse - in Middle Row. The conduit stream was usually awash with blood and market refuse. It was a busy, smelly place. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Roman Road 2005 (ref. C73703k) | When the Romans came to Britain in AD 43, they placed their seat of government at Camulodunum (Colchester). This had already been the capital of the Trinovantes, the tribe whose territory covered Essex and east Suffolk. By this time, however, another Roman town had been founded not far away, on a sheltered stretch of the River Thames. This was Londinium. A long, straight road connected the two towns. It was probably a pre- Roman trackway. For the most part the going was fairly easy, but there was a midway point where the road had to traverse the Can and the Chelmer. One was wide, the other boggy. Luckily, the legionaries were used to such things and had soon constructed a crossing over each river. Bridges were important strategic points, especially in such disordered times. From the word go, the Romans probably installed a small military post beside the Can, on the site of the Iron Age houses. Whether or not it was continually manned, we do not know. However, in AD 60–61 the proverbial horse bolted: Boudicca staged her famous revolt against the invaders, laying waste to Camulodunum and Londinium. The Roman army now put a garrison here - just in case trouble flared up again. It didn't, and ten years later the army was gone. But they had been there long enough for an assortment of shops and tradesmen's houses to spring up around their fort. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, the Stone Bridge 1919 (ref. 69030) | And the architecture? It is very varied. Entering the town, you may see some of the following: several acres of Victorian housing, from railway-side terraces to detached, self-confident villas; a church with a nice green spire; a white tower-block with a jazzy stonework pattern on the side; the turrets of an old schoolhouse or a 1930s factory; and, in the middle, a vast, grey building with the words 'Chelmsford Market' picked-out in plastic lettering. Ah yes, the market… Whatever else it is, Chelmsford is primarily a tradesman's town. Industry has only recently arrived here. Chelmsford, as we now understand it, was the creation of a handful of 13th-century market people. There was no unbroken link back to the earlier settlers who had been drawn here by the fertile gravel farmland. Nevertheless, it is with those primordial settlers that we shall begin. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Roman Centurion 2005 (ref. C73702k) | And fair enough - the road signs to Chelmsford do not shout 'Historic Cathedral City' - they say things like 'County town since 1250', or 'The birthplace of radio'. Good old Chelmsford: straightforward, practical, and aware of civic duty. What often gets overlooked though, is that it is also an historic cathedral city, in the sense that it is both a cathedral city and historic. And although it is foolish to say that one place is more historic than another - because everywhere is equally historic when it comes down to it - it is indeed true that some places' histories are more interesting or better documented than others. Chelmsford has been smiled-upon in both respects. Follow a heritage trail around Chelmsford, however, and you can be forgiven for thinking that half of its history lies under car parks. In some cases, you would be right. But if Chelmsford wears its history lightly, it is because it has always been mindful of moving forward, of building on the past. Consider this: give or take a few yards, Guglielmo Marconi founded the world's first radio factory on the very spot where a 1st-century pagan temple had once stood. Ley-line enthusiasts would undoubtedly discern a paranormal significance in this. I prefer to see it as an example of how a town can rise and rise again, like a phoenix. Anyway, Chelmsford still retains a lot of overground history - it is just a matter of knowing where to look. There can be enormous history in the kink of a pavement, the width of an alleyway. And, being relatively flat, this is a good town to explore on foot. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, Children, High Street 1898 (ref. 41504x) | The situation resulted in the formation of a local Board of Health. Their headquarters, ironically, were in the same Middle Row house where the first cholera victims had died. The Board brought about swingeing changes in Chelmsford - although much of it was a question of getting the townspeople to alter things they were perfectly happy with. The members of the Board took steps to get the entire town properly drained, and to restrict animals wandering the High Street too freely on market-day. In 1851 the members of the Board finally shut off the conduit stream, and replaced the domed conduit-head rotunda with Judge Tindal's statue. From then on, Conduit Square and Back Lane became Tindal Square and Tindal Street, respectively. Market-day was also posing problems for the corn merchants. They were not satisfied that the new Shire Hall provided them with a suitable trading floor. Inside, the building was darkened and cluttered by dividing walls and architectural fripperies. They could only inspect their corn properly by taking it outside. The magistrates made an effort to improve the space, but it was not really a solution. Finally, a purpose-built Corn Exchange was erected in Tindal Square. It opened for business in June 1857, and was certainly a grand building. Its yellow-brick Italianate façade masked a long, glass-roofed trading-area. There were no more complaints about insufficient light. The architect was Frederic Chancellor, a Londoner. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
 Chelmsford, High Street 1895 (ref. 35514) | By now, the High Street was crammed with houses: all the plots had been filled. The tenements could only expand lengthways along their own ‘backsides’, and most buildings had a jumble of outhouses, barns and sheds at the rear. Middle Row, which had hitherto backed onto the conduit-stream, now began occupying pockets of land on the west side of the stream, too. Initially, these were used as woodyards, but they soon evolved into half- timbered outbuildings; so Back Lane became somewhat narrower. The High Street, too, grew more restricted when another line of market stalls, permanent enough to have tiled roofs, was erected immediately to the east of Middle Row. These were known as Little Middle Row. The High Street, at this point, was now nine feet wide. Many of the town’s inns were now large and well established: these included the Boar’s Head, which stood on the site of Woolworth’s. Across the road - and stretching down to the bridge - were two inns fused together, the Lion and the Hart; and on the far corner of Springfield Road - where Next now is - was the Crown. Each had a carriageway opening onto a large, enclosed courtyard. Ranged around this major road junction, they were well placed to receive passing custom. | Add your own MemoryAdd to your Album |
