Wells, The Ancient Gatehouse 1963
Photo ref: W47071
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Photo ref: W47071
Photo of Wells, The Ancient Gatehouse 1963

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In 1451, Bishop Bekynton commissioned his 'New Works', which included the Dean's Eye, or Browne's Gate, built in 1453, which connected the cathedral precinct with the city. The Dean's Eye forms part of Nos 20 and 22 Sadler Street, once called the Mitre Inn, now known as the Ancient Gatehouse hotel and tea room and the Rugantino restaurant (a narrow, winding stone staircase inside the hotel leads to the room above the gateway, which is furnished with an antique carved four-poster bed). In the late 1690s there were about five inns in Sadler Street. The Mitre Inn had occupied three other sites here before vanishing by the late 19th century with the arrival of the temperance movement. Wells always had a large number of inns, and by 1900 there were still fifty inns in the city.

An extract from Wells Photographic Memories.

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Wells Photographic Memories

Wells Photographic Memories

The photo 'Wells, the Ancient Gatehouse 1963' appears in this book.

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A Selection of Memories from Wells

For many years now, we've been inviting visitors to our website to add their own memories to share their experiences of life as it was, prompted by the photographs in our archive. Here are some from Wells

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I'm surprised there are so few memories of Wells. In the late '60's to '70's I lived in nearby Shepton Mallet as a schoolboy & later worked on a farm there. At weekends my elder brother, Colin, would arrive on the coach from Bournemouth, where he worked for the MoD. This was usually on a Friday night, & he would bring fish & chips - a great treat, picked up from the Shepton chippy. Saturday we ...see more
During the Second World War there was an Italian prisoner of war camp at Penleigh, on the outskirts of Wells in Somerset. The Italian POWS were put out to work on local farms, and one of them was Gaetano Celestra, who had been a sculptor and mason before the war. When a stray enemy bomb fell at Beech Barrow and damaged a wall belonging to the farm where he was working, he rebuilt it ...see more
I think the date at 1974 is correct but I would have been 6 then!! We owned all of what is Beechbarrow now and as a young man I had the run of the place! I hope the beech walk is still there, I built my first tree house in there! It was on the other side from the barn that Ron Chard had. Ron Chard was the farmer that used the paddocks we had. His son Tom is hopefully running it now, if Ron is not. Romulus ...see more