PAGE TWELVE

“Now glance we back

To time-corroded chronicles of old;

When the fierce Briton pierced his winding track

Through its dark opening to his nightly fold;

And Druid priests, from memory’s book, unroll’d

A portion dire of horrid mysteries.”

Robert MILLHOUSE

“NOTTINGHAM BELOW GROUND” might form the subject of a large and interesting volume. Throughout the town rock-cellars are everywhere prevalent, varying in depth from twenty to thirty-six feet. They are excellent receptacles for ale, and have, no doubt, helped the Nottingham beverage to acquire its renown. Some of the cellars are used as malt-rooms, and, from an early time, malt was made in them in the hottest days of summer quite as well as in winter. Under divers houses on the Long row, Timber hill, and elsewhere, structures of very considerable extent, hewn out of the rock, arched in a regular manner, and supported by columns with carved capitals, &c., framed for places of worship, have been discovered.

DEERING relates that “one Edward GODDARD, a bricklayer, yet living, assures me that, being at work on the east side of the Weekday cross, he there got into one of these subterranean fabricks, which he found supported and adorned with pillars as has been mentioned, and that he made his way from one spacious place to another till he came as far as the upper end of Pilcher gate.” Under the Bell yard, on the Long row, is an extensive cellar, occupied by Messrs. HOMER and CROSSLAND, wine merchants. This subterranean cave was examined by the Archaeological Association when they visited the town in 1852, accompanied by his grace the Duke of Newcastle.

But of all the caverns of the ancient Troglodytes the most remarkable are the PARK ROCK-HOLES. Dr. STUKELEY describes these excavations on the north bank of the Leen as consisting of a church, houses, chambers, dove-houses, &c, - the church resembling those in the rocks of Bethlehem and other places in the holy land. LAIRD, writing in 1820, says, “It has suffered considerably from the effects of time and weather since STUKELEY wrote; but enough still remains to invite and , at the same time, to gratify curiosity. The outer part has fallen down in several places, evidently from the effects of damp and frost; but the church and altar, and even some vestiges of the ancient paintings, may be clearly traced. Some ingenious artist has added a number of paintings, such as elephants, &c,” The “papists’ holes” have been put in order, whitewashed, glazed in front, and converted into banqueting rooms, &c., in connexion with the bowling green. Excavations exist in a rock facing the queen’s garden, in the Park; on the Derby road; in Narrow marsh; on the High, Middle, and Low pavements; and on the Mansfield road. Some of the caves on the Mansfield and Radford roads have been formed by poor persons excavating for sand.

The TOWN WALL. - About 910 the town was fortified by Edward the Elder with a strong wall and a ditch. In 1797 the ditch could be traced near the castle hill, and northwards towards Chapel bar. The wall was flanked with towers and buttresses. By portions of the ditch, revealed by the opening of new streets on the north-western side of the town, it appears to have been from twelve to fifteen feet wide, six feet deep, and chiefly cut out of the solid rock. The wall and ditch joined the outer defences of the castle on the western side, and thence ran in a northerly direction by Park row to Chapel bar. The ancient wall did not include Carter gate, Fisher gate, or the Narrow and Broad marsh, which, with the streets and buildings lying between the Meadows and the south rock of the town, constituted a suburban district situated without the walls.

The last ancient gate, CHAPEL BAR, was pulled down in 1743. It contained two arched rooms, one serving as a guard-room, the other as a chapel for the convenience of the guard. Previous to its destruction it had been transformed into a brewhouse, and was so occupied by Thomas HAWKSLEY, an alderman and mayor of the town. A little flower garden at the top of the archway was famous for the variety and the superiority of its tulips. A bridge thrown across the town ditch, near a postern which stood on what is now Park row, gave to the spot the name of “BOSTON BRIDGE,” a corruption of Postern bridge. The ditch was converted into kitchen gardens. Henry II rebuilt the town wall. The modern wall passed, north of the castle wall, along Park row to Chapel bar, like the old fabric; thence it proceeded through the yard of the Spread Eagle inn, where part of the wall still exists, forming the greater part of the north end of Mr. RAYNOR’s stable - down the north side of Parliament street, along Parliament row, where it joined Edward’s wall at the end of Stoney street; thence in succession, to Coalpit lane, Old Glasshouse lane, Carter gate, Fisher gate, Hollow stone, High, Middle, and Low pavements, Castle gate; finally rejoining the castle wall at Brewhouse yard.

The CROSSES, formerly numerous, are now totally obliterated. There was the Hen-cross, “east of Timber hill, at the point where four streets met,” at the distance of twelve yards from what is now the “Elizabethan House;” the Weekday cross, in the centre of the open space at the Guild-hall; the Malt cross, at the west end of the Long row, near Sheep lane, where all proclamations and declarations were usually made; and the Butter cross, on the east side of the Market place, near the shambles.

An ANCIENT BATTLE-FIELD exists in the neighbourhood. On a hill near Nottingham, at the commencement of the year 1827, more than 200 skeletons were dug up in removing sand. MILLHOUSE, in a note to his poem of Sherwood Forest, suggests that they were the remains of the slain in some forgotten battle, at the time of the Saxon invasion.

At the southern entrance to the town there stood a steep rock, connected with the town wall. The narrow passage through this formidable barrier was secured by a portcullis of great strength, marks of which could be seen little more than a century ago. This was the HOLLOW STONE. Within the gate there was a cavity in the rock, situated “on the left hand going up to the town,” and just at the elbow of the stone. This apartment was fitted up with benches and a fire-place, and here a score of men could make themselves comfortable. A staircase cut in the solid rock led to its summit, and hither the sentinel might repair occasionally to renew the look-out. In December, 1740, a house on the Hollow stone, belonging to the Duke of Kingston, was, by his Grace’s permission, levelled; the descent was rendered more gradual, and the roadway widened so that two or more carriages might conveniently pass each other.

“About a mile from Nottingham,” says THROSBY, “at a place called Nottingham hill, are some lines of fortification, between which are three or four of these sort of eminences which are now called BARROWS, in one of which have been found great quantities of human bones.

The MOOT HALL stood on the spot subsequently occupied by the Feather’s Inn, and now by the wine and spirit vaults of Mr. John BROWN, Wheeler gate. In 1750 some of the ruins were visible. The structure was raised after the Norman Conquest; and was for the newly-created Norman borough, what the Guild-hall was for the English.

In 1777, a number of human bones in a good state of preservation, a dagger, and two coins, were found by workmen digging on Standard hill.

Among the OLD HOUSES, the Green Dragon public-house, on the Long row, built in 1615, was the oldest brick house extant in the time of Dr. DEERING; the window frames of this building were of stone. A highly interesting specimen of ornamental plaster-work was recently brought to light on an old house in St. Peter’s gate. In 1503 the first house in the town with at tiled roof was built on the Long row; at the beginning of the last century this house was occupied as the Unicorn Inn, and afterwards it passed into the possession of Mr. STANTON. Besides being the first it was somewhat singularly the last roof of the kind on the row. From an early period there were several houses of Jews, as also a synagogue in Nottingham, and from the particular people inhabiting this spot, one of the thoroughfares in the town, was called Jew lane. The most remarkable ancient houses still remaining are in Peter gate; an old building in Bottle lane commonly known as “King John’s palace;” the Old Bear Inn, Chapel bar; the Talbot Inn, Long row; the house on the Long row occupied by Mrs. PICKERING, hosier; a public house in Chandler’s lane; two or three in Wheeler gate; one in St. Nicholas’s street; a curious old brick house in Castle gate, two centuries old; most of these have been remodelled

There are still in our utilitarian age remnants left of those OLD MANSIONS, in which our nobility and gentry were wont to reside, before the spirit of centralization carried them to London. We can see shreds of those buildings, the

“Lodgings once of Kings and Nobles, silken stirs and trumpet’s din.”

But as we linger for a moment within their walls we must exclaim:

“ ’Tis past ! and never more shall these walls ring

With dance and song, and music’s dulcet strains;

Beauty will here no more her daughters bring,

Nor stately pleasure shake her golden chains.”

PLUMTRE HOUSE, Stoney street, built early in the eighteenth century, is now partly occupied as a seminary. It was sold at auction in 1853, for £8,410. The property was offered by the same auctioneer in 1841, and would have been sold at that time for £4,000, but no sufficient bidder was found for it.

BROMLEY HOUSE, on the south side of the Market-place, one of the largest and best built mansions in the town, was erected by Sir George SMITH, baronet, whose son took the name of BROMLEY, and removed to Stoke.

BUGGE HALL, the town residence of the BUGGES, was afterwards possessed by the BLACKWELLS, and transformed into the Old Angel Inn, St. Mary’s gate, now pulled down.

THURLAND HALL, (called Clare Hall,) was the property of the Duke of Newcastle; it stood in Pelham street.

A hundred years ago the county nobility and gentry did not think it degrading to spend a large portion of their time in the old provincial city on the banks of the Trent. In the days of DEERING eleven townsmen kept coaches or chariots; a considerable number besides had chaises and chairs. In 1853 there is not one person in the borough who regularly maintains his carriage and horses.

In a mansion on the Low pavement, now occupied by Mr. BIDDULPH, resided the Hon. Rothwell WILLOUGHBY, brother of Lord MIDDLETON.

In Castle gate still stands the house occupied a hundred years ago by Mrs. NEWDEGATE; here Marshal TALLARD, who was taken at Blenheim, by MARLBOROUG, spent the period of his captivity in the cultivation of fruits and flowers, and the initiation of Nottingham bakers into the mysteries of the French roll manufactury. In addition to TALLARD, many other distinguished prisoners taken a Blenheim, were likewise sent to Nottingham.

1999.

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