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Origins of Box Market Place
Box NATS History Trail 3 Alan Payne August 2016 The Market Place is full of contradictions. It doesn’t seem to be a place at all but more like a street and its origins are shrouded in mystery and no-one has ever discovered the grant of a market for Box. Before the 1700s the king granted the right to hold markets to people or areas written down in charter rolls or patent rolls but none such exists for Box. |
Bence's shop on left, Chequers pub middle and gas street lamp right (courtesy Box Parish Council)
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The Speke Family
To understand how the area developed, we search out traces of medieval Box, its roads and what the rural village was like in the oldest records. The Market Place is close to Box Manor, which in Stuart times was owned by Hugh Speke, lord of the manor. The house was rebuilt by him in about 1609 but he didn’t live there, he let it out to a farming tenant.
To understand how the area developed, we search out traces of medieval Box, its roads and what the rural village was like in the oldest records. The Market Place is close to Box Manor, which in Stuart times was owned by Hugh Speke, lord of the manor. The house was rebuilt by him in about 1609 but he didn’t live there, he let it out to a farming tenant.
Extract of Francis Allen's map of Speke land in 1626 (courtesy Wiltshire History Centre)
The map above shows the area in 1626. The Manor House was a large building, made of expensive ashlar stone with a central doorway, modern at the time. It was set back off the road but there is no sign of a trackway in the region of the Market Place nor of the A4 London Road to the east. Rather, the house was set in its own farmland called Home Meads (Meadows), now called The Rec. The area is very old and we explore the field beyond Box Brook called Horse mead.
We know the Spekes enclosed much common land in Box and made their money by letting this out as smallholdings. They are reputed to have built properties in Market Place for their workers. It is possible that they also gave permission for a market to be held to the south of their property in order to take rent from the participants. Reputed to be the oldest buildings in the area, possibly about 1670, are former farm labourers’ cottages. The house below left is now called St Judes. And, although it has a modern shop exterior, County Stores, once Mr Ponting’s shop (below right), has a seventeenth century fireplace inside.
We know the Spekes enclosed much common land in Box and made their money by letting this out as smallholdings. They are reputed to have built properties in Market Place for their workers. It is possible that they also gave permission for a market to be held to the south of their property in order to take rent from the participants. Reputed to be the oldest buildings in the area, possibly about 1670, are former farm labourers’ cottages. The house below left is now called St Judes. And, although it has a modern shop exterior, County Stores, once Mr Ponting’s shop (below right), has a seventeenth century fireplace inside.
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Shopping Area
The area on the right going down the hill is now called The Parade, an encouragement for Victorian people to window-shop.
The area has had many different shops over the years: number 1 was the Betty Shop (a ladies clothing shop, later a sweet shop owned by Thelma Haines), number 3 was Mrs Boulton’s coal and wool shop, Les Bawtree's barbers shop was the extension next to St Jude's. Further down is Box Parish Council Offices, which was once a fish and chip shop.
Because the area was well frequented, it became the natural location for shops with accommodation above. Dalebrook was once the doctor’s surgery, Coleridge House was reputed to be the shop where the Romantic poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, stayed when he slept in a bedroom above the grocer’s gunpowder kegs.
There were more shops at the bottom of the hill including an antiques business in Frogmore House, later an iron-mongers run by Mr Schofield and Bence’s General Stores run by Les Bence, then his son Geoff, whilst brother Nigel took over Frogmore as a radio repair and retail shop after World War 2 (see heading picture).
The area on the right going down the hill is now called The Parade, an encouragement for Victorian people to window-shop.
The area has had many different shops over the years: number 1 was the Betty Shop (a ladies clothing shop, later a sweet shop owned by Thelma Haines), number 3 was Mrs Boulton’s coal and wool shop, Les Bawtree's barbers shop was the extension next to St Jude's. Further down is Box Parish Council Offices, which was once a fish and chip shop.
Because the area was well frequented, it became the natural location for shops with accommodation above. Dalebrook was once the doctor’s surgery, Coleridge House was reputed to be the shop where the Romantic poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, stayed when he slept in a bedroom above the grocer’s gunpowder kegs.
There were more shops at the bottom of the hill including an antiques business in Frogmore House, later an iron-mongers run by Mr Schofield and Bence’s General Stores run by Les Bence, then his son Geoff, whilst brother Nigel took over Frogmore as a radio repair and retail shop after World War 2 (see heading picture).
Victorian Industrial Area
The area is much more than just a shopping location and in the mid-Victorian period it was highly industrialised. The name is still recalled in Steam Mill Cottages which was probably a corn milling area started in about 1871 by George Browning, son of the owner of Drewetts Mill. The mill was possibly where the cottages now stand and the owner lived next door in Dalebrook.
The area now occupied by a car park and the Jubilee Centre was once the malting house for Box Brewery where seeds were left to germinate on the floor of a store yard until they had matured for fermentation needs.
The area is much more than just a shopping location and in the mid-Victorian period it was highly industrialised. The name is still recalled in Steam Mill Cottages which was probably a corn milling area started in about 1871 by George Browning, son of the owner of Drewetts Mill. The mill was possibly where the cottages now stand and the owner lived next door in Dalebrook.
The area now occupied by a car park and the Jubilee Centre was once the malting house for Box Brewery where seeds were left to germinate on the floor of a store yard until they had matured for fermentation needs.
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Remnants of Medieval Past
Commerce also featured at the Chequers Pub, and the building was a registered ale-house as early as 1822. It may have been used for traders to settle up their debts, calculating £.s.d by using an abacus-system based on a chequers board. At a later date, one side of the pub was used as a butcher’s shop and the windows still reflect this used of the premises. There are still signs of the medieval use of the area in the name Glovers Lane. This part of the Market Place probably refers to the Tudor and Stuart glove-making, inspired by the fashion of Queen Elizabeth I, when seamstresses would finish off products by hand stitching at home. |
Chequers pub with butcher's shop window and Glovers Lane (courtesy Carol Payne)
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There are several references to the word frog, including Frogmore House and part of the roadway which was once called Frog Street; frog being another cloth-making term. Beyond Glovers Lane and suddenly we are out of the old village as commemorated by the area called Townsend. Another very old building exists at the Old Dairy which has origins back to the 1500s. It was once used as the home of the manager of Box Brewery. Later the house was used for milk distribution by Clem Dyke until the 1980s being a north-facing, cool property convenient for milk storage.
Box Brewery (courtesy Eric Callaway)
Box Brewery
Perhaps the most famous business in the Market Place was the Box Brewery (above) established there by the Pinchin family after 1864 and, at one time, run by Edwin Skeate Pinchin, whose father emigrated to Australia in the Gold Rush. Horse-drawn dray carts used to pull casks up onto the London Road (before it was raised) past a house called Clock House, now the site of the Co-op building. Until the mid-1900s the brewery’s chimney still existed on the London Road.
The signage of the Brewery can still be seen on the arch to the building’s entrance. When the brewery closed, the buildings became Murray & Baldwin’s tennis racket factory and Dave Hill’s father took over their glueing and drying room in 1960 and converted it into the present butcher’s shop.
Perhaps the most famous business in the Market Place was the Box Brewery (above) established there by the Pinchin family after 1864 and, at one time, run by Edwin Skeate Pinchin, whose father emigrated to Australia in the Gold Rush. Horse-drawn dray carts used to pull casks up onto the London Road (before it was raised) past a house called Clock House, now the site of the Co-op building. Until the mid-1900s the brewery’s chimney still existed on the London Road.
The signage of the Brewery can still be seen on the arch to the building’s entrance. When the brewery closed, the buildings became Murray & Baldwin’s tennis racket factory and Dave Hill’s father took over their glueing and drying room in 1960 and converted it into the present butcher’s shop.
Conclusion
And the absolute proof of the origin of Box Market Place? Well, you will have to join us Sunday 7 August 2pm at Rec car park to hear more. Please book tickets in advance with boxpeopleandplaces@yahoo.co.uk or 01225 743614
And the absolute proof of the origin of Box Market Place? Well, you will have to join us Sunday 7 August 2pm at Rec car park to hear more. Please book tickets in advance with boxpeopleandplaces@yahoo.co.uk or 01225 743614