How Old is That Building?

Some of the buildings of Coventry had dates written on them and in other cases, areas were known to be built after certain dates. From a Sydney Bunney painting I know that number 10 Broadgate, the building on the corner of Broadgate and Trinity Church Yard/Spicerstoke had a drain pipe dated 1726, making it contemporary with Kirby House and 11 Priory Row. The building to the right is identical in styling and the one after that has a date on it of 1623 (as seen on the Broadgate etching). The one after that is likely even older. While much less grand looking, it seems that this building at 5, 5a Fleet Street was probably from the same era as number 10 Broadgate. Zoom in to the top of the drain pipes and you'll see 17. A pity that you can't see what the rest of the number was. (Picture from Historic England). Whereas this stretch of Broadgate (or at least the front faces) didn't exist until after 1820, when the original Broadgate was demolished.

What absolutely fabulous photos! Thats the Coventry which I would so loved to have known in person.

Great pictures Helen. Love the lights and street lamp outside of Astleys.

The lights were brief fad and I'm guessing that they were gas because they had such a short period of popularity. Once shops got electricity they were probably well lit from inside and rewiring the lamps was too fiddly to bother with. Early on there was very little lighting and where you see a lantern outside a building, they were often one of the pubs. A social service to help guide people in the dark but mostly to attract drinkers in.

I see the Maypole grocery shop on the right. They used to have their biscuits in large tin boxes with see through lids, slightly canted against the counter. The end one was filled with assorted broken biscuits and you could but a bagful for a few pennies. I was a regular customer.

Helen, Re the 5/5a Fleet Street photo (H Bass/Simmons) there is a photo of the building taken from a very slightly different angle but clearly from the same set of images in the thread on Fleet street (started Wed 11th Jan 2012 by Foxcote) Post 22 of 63 Sun 21st Oct 2018 10:41am from Neil's Yard which he says is from Historic England though I haven't been able to trace it there (some images seem to be unavailable), I'm staggered that you were able to see the '17' next to the drainpipe! You must have 20/20 vision, certainly better than mine. If you can trace a zoomable image you may be able to see the rest of the number. Goodluck, Geoff

Hi rocksolid, I'm very short sighted which means that I can see things close to very well, but I could only see it when I zoomed in and spotted the 17 by accident. I was looking at the columns and windows for signs that they'd originally had render detailing. The other image is available at this part of Historic England. While it's partially zoomable, nowhere near good enough to see a number.

It looks like a Swallows nest on the other side of the pipe?

Beware the fake buildings. Most of us are familiar with this view of Bond's Hospital on Hill Street curtesy of Wikipedia here. But while the section closest to the camera looks the part, it's not original as the picture below shows. Originally the town wall stood where the gable end section now stands. Not to mention, a very different gateway to the school. While the school gateway was changed after 1819, the end was changed earlier in 1816 (thanks Rob for the information ). The picture below is from the Ayelesford Collection - The collection is the result of a project initiated in 1792 by three Coventry businessmen, Thomas Sharp, John Nicholson and George Howlet, who wished to illustrate their copies of Sir William Dugdale's Antiquities of Warwickshire. To this end they employed the services of a drawing master, Mr. Jeayes of Coventry, to take views of the seats of the nobility and of manor houses, churches, etc. in Warwickshire.

More great posts Helen As a reminder and for those not aware these great images are off Coventry Digital which 'Guv'nor Rob, Steve, Helen, myself and bk Ben (amongst others) are working on. It's free to view you just need to pre-register first.

And while I'm talking about Bablake/Bond's the fancy extension on the right was added between 1850 and 1888. The porch in the middle was added in the early 1800s. The wing on the left of this photo was added between 1890 and 1906. Which replaced this building, which itself wasn't original to the school/hospital. It was built in 1832.

Thanks for drawing my attention to that aspect of Historic England, I didn't know of its existence. There seem to be a lot of 'hidden' images etc on the internet (or maybe I'm just not that clued up).

This comment is about using demolition dates as markers and how photos can lie. Below is a very familiar Wingrave stereo view of Ford's Hospital. You can tell it's old (apart from the damage) because Ford's has buildings on both sides. One neighbouring building was cleared between 1850 and 1888. The other side was damaged in the war and what was salvaged was reused to help repair the damage to Ford's. Here on Ebay is a similar photo (that I suggest you don't buy) from after the first demolition. The problem is that both photos are back to front. The demolished building was to the right (south) of Ford's. At some point these photos will vanish or be corrected but for now, the post makes sense. This next image shows the lane the right way round but it also shows a view well before Wingrave and even before 1850, despite coming from Coventry Past and Passing published in 1927. Most images of the shortly to be demolished building show a doorway next to Ford's. That was new. The building had been shortened at the south end to make way for a new property and the ownership of the original doorway (with the woman and child shown above in the photo) was gifted to the south end of the property, leaving the north end without a front door. And the new property that needed the extra space was this one. Thus dating this building to pre 1850 and post 1825 (there is a painting showing no doorway next to Ford's at that date). It's probably from about 1830 when Coventry had quite a building boom. The building was pretending to be from the 1700s but can't have been.

We've been trying to determine more about the Knave's Post and the building it was attached to. We now know that it was at 130/131 Much Park Street and was rebuilt in about 1820. I guessed that it was from the early 1800s because of the style of the window surrounds. There was a big building boom at that time in Coventry. One area that is datable is the south west end of Broadgate. It saw a whole row of ancient houses demolished to widen the area south of The Castle Inn from about 1820. On the left, you can see the same style of window framing as on the Knave Post house. And here on the left we see it again in Hertford Street, which was built after 1800. The style was still in fashion after 1850 as you can see here in Gilbert Street, which hadn't been started when the Board of Health Maps were drawn.