Just lately the Wiltshire Buildings Record seems to have got involved in some big projects. Our latest commission in Salisbury is just such a one. Salisbury city centre is laid out in a grid pattern, all in one go, known as the Chequers. This ancient layout dates from around 1220, when work on St Mary’s Cathedral began. Each chequer has its own colourfully quaint name. Three Swans chequer and Three cups chequer stand side by side above Antelope chequer. Our present project is in Blue Boar Chequer, to the north of the market place.

One of the buildings in the Blue Boar Chequer

Imagine how excited we got, being given the chance to penetrate the interior of one of these historic chequers! As we amble along the myriad streets of Salisbury all we normally get to see are the shop fronts lining the edges, or modern interior shop fittings, and sometimes the historic fabric of the buildings, warts and all, where this has been kept and subsequently exposed in the current trend for nostalgia.

Lloyd’s Chemist is next to Debenham’s, and is sited on the south side of the Chequer, facing the Market Place. This tall, smart building was constructed in about 1740, no doubt replacing an older, timber-framed one, and contains a grand staircase, panelled walls and old fireplaces, none of which you can see from the shop. The front of the building was modernised in the later 19^th century, and the ground floor shop front in the middle of the 20^th century. To find out about the fascinating documents discovered within the buildings, please 'read more'...

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February. A month which hides between the excitement and liveliness of the New Year and the impending delights of spring. Often grey, rather dull, with only Valentine’s Day to cheer up the lucky few. However, if you are bored with the weather, frustrated with the new diet or already given up that New Year’s resolution, then a visit to one of Wiltshire’s many museums will light up the month for you. Within their varied collections lie many a fascinating item, and with that in mind, I have compiled a ‘February’ list to entice you to discover them.

February does seem to have a historical link with gloom, but how fascinating to travel to Mere Museum in south-west Wiltshire to discover the February 6^th souvenir copy of the Illustrated London News commemorating the state lying-in of Sir Winston Churchill, or the photographs showing the stone memorial built by local labour in 1999 and dedicated to the airmen killed in a Dakota crash at Beech Knoll, Stourton, on 19^th February 1945. On a lighter note, you may like to read the handwritten rules of the fife and drum band belonging to the Mere Temperance Society, February 1874 and while you are at the museum why not take a look at their six volumes of old local photographs and the local history collection.

Dakota crash memorial

Travel northwards to Warminster Dewey Museum and you will discover a wide range of local history material, including the Victor Manley collection of geology, and various Valentine dance tickets, such as the Frome Young Farmers dance (please contact our blog if any romance was found at the Longleat Restaurant, Horningsham, February 1969!). Whilst at the museum you might  be interested in the 78 rpm gramophone record of bell-ringing at St Denys Church, Warminster, 25^th February 1960, or the scrapbook donated by Barbara Norris containing details of local events, drama festivals, Women’s Institute and Girls Training Corps, compiled from 20^th February 1946 to 8^th June 1948. 'Read more' to find out which other Wiltshire museums have items associated with the month of February...

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Just recently I have been called to Cricklade, a lovely old Cotswold town north-east of Swindon. This Saxon walled town is situated at the highest navigable point of the Thames where it is crossed by Ermin Street. Its town crest bears the Latin words ‘in loco delicioso’ meaning ‘in a delightful place’.

We came to look at what might be one of the oldest houses in the High Street. From the rendered front, there is no indication at all that the interior hides an ancient blackened cruck timber frame. 

The Cruck Truss

In fact, the façade is much as you would expect an early Victorian shop front to look – old multi-paned bay windows with thick moulded glazing bars. As soon as you open the front door you stare down a dark, narrow passage straight through to the old planked back door hung on heavy pintle hinges. To the left is a step down to the old, originally unheated parlour. In the end wall is a heavy beam – a mid-rail - which divided the framing into upper and lower panels, now replaced in stone. The upper room, traditionally the hall or parlour end, was reached by going back into the passage, going to the back and around the massive stone stack that was inserted c1600.  Once in the hall the massive weight of an over-engineered ceiling is the first thing you notice. When the old open hall was improved with the addition of a proper chimney stack, floors were inserted, using the chimney breast as a support for one end of the ceiling beam – a typical arrangement for this kind of modification. To go upstairs a neat little winder stair was tucked in between the chimney stack and the outside wall, very steep and precipitous! You wonder how they ever got the furniture up there!

Upstairs, the room over the old hall has had its ceiling removed to show off the impressive double-arched braced jointed cruck truss which would originally have been seen from the ground. From inspecting the timber framing closely it is apparent that there was another separate timber framed house next to it, though you would never know this as the building there now is entirely of stone. To find out more please click on 'read more'.

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