Patrick Comerford
Berkhamsted is an old market and coaching inn town on Akeman Street, the old Roman road that linked Watling Street just north of Verulamium (near modern St Albans) with the Fosse Way at Corinium Dobunnorum, now Cirencester.
This road running east-west across southern England is about 117 km (73 mi) long and the route may have been an older track, upgraded by the Romans. Its runs through Hemel Hempstead, Berkhamsted, Tring, Aylesbury, Alchester, Stonesfield, Chesterton, Kirtlington, Ramsden and Asthall.
Akerman Street, the royal importance of Berkhamsted Castle, the wool trade and the later development of the Grand Union Canal and the railway from London , ensured the prosperity of the town throughout the middle ages and beyond.
The old coaching inns, each with a wide opening by the side leading to former stables at the rear, are reminders of the day when Berkhamsted was once a major staging post for coaches on their way to and from London.
The architectural legacy of the town, alongside the churches and castle ruins, includes the Victorian town hall, a Caroline almshouse, half-timbered Tudor houses, and a High Street shop that some claim is the oldest shop in England – or, at least, the oldest extant jettied timber-framed building in England.
Curious and unique street names too survive from the 17th century, such as ‘Grab-All Row.’
The Town Hall on the High Street is an ornate neo-Gothic building with a distinctive façade. It was designed by the eccentric Victorian architect Edward Buckton Lamb, and was built by a charitable trust in 1859 to house a new market hall and the Mechanics’ Institute, and to provide a large public meeting room.
The Town Hall was extended in 1888-1890, and after years of neglect and dereliction was restored between 1982 and 1999. It now includes a restaurant facing onto the street and community facilities above, including space for weddings, public meetings and concerts.
The architect Edward Buckton Lamb (1806-1869), who designed the town hall, has been described as a ‘Rogue-Gothic Revivalist’ who ‘gloried in repetitive notchings and chamferings’. The architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner described him as ‘the most original though certainly not the most accomplished architect of his day.’
Yet, Benjamin Disraeli chose him to remodel Hughenden Manor, and Lady Marion Alford, the mother of the young Earl Brownlow, chose Lamb to design the Town Hall in Berkhamsted.
The Market House replaced the Tudor Market House that had burnt down in 1854. The freehold of the old market house was owned by the Duchy of Cornwall but leased to Earl Brownlow, who received all the market rents.
The Duchy agreed to release Brownlow from his obligation to rebuild the burnt-out building provided he gave at least £500 towards the new Market House. Brownlow also had to hand over the market rents to the Town Hall Trust for 99 years, after which the rents would revert to the Duchy of Cornwall. Brownlow bought the freehold of the market rights from the Duchy in 1863.
From 1859 and until well into the 20th century, it was known as the Market House and Town Hall. The front part of the building was used for trading and to store market stalls. The first floor was used by the Berkhamsted Mechanics’ Institute, with a library, museum, card room and billiard room. The garden was first created in 1890.
The Town Hall Trust bought the freehold from the Brownlow estate 100 years ago in 1923, ensuring that the trust would receive the market rents in perpetuity.
But by the 1970s the town hall had been closed, partly because it failed to comply with fire regulations, partly because the income it generated was insufficient to maintain the building. It was neglected and derelict and as a major dispute dragged on for over six years it was threatened with demolition.
As the corporate trustee, the council was advised that the building was beyond economic repair. It decided to build a new hall behind the High Street façade, but its efforts were frustrated, at first because of a defect in the title, and later by a moratorium on local government capital spending. Meanwhile, the building continued to deteriorate and became the victim of vandalism.
In desperation, the council tried to sell the building, but the Charity Commission refused permission because of local objectors. The Rescue and Action Group included three local schoolboys, and the objectors were supported by well-known Berkhamsted personalities, including the author Graham Greene, the broadcaster Richard Mabey and the composer Antony Hopkins.
The town clerk advised the council that it no longer bore responsibility for the town hall. A new trust was established in 1979, and the town hall was restored between 1982 and 1999. The ground floor was converted into a shopping arcade in 1983, and was officially opened by the actor Bernard Miles (Lord Miles), one of the trust’s patrons, on New Year’s Eve, 31 December 1983.
The arcade prospered throughout the 1980s until shopping patterns changed. The ground floor arcade has since become a restaurant, and is now Prime Steak and Grill.
Across the street from the Town Hall, No 173 High Street is considered to be the oldest extant jettied timber-framed building in England. It has been dated by dendrochronology of the structural timbers to between 1277 and 1297, when Berkhamsted was a large, prosperous wool trading market town.
The building was given a Victorian façade and was used as a pharmacy in the 19th century. But its historical significance was not recognised until 2001, after the mediaeval timber framing was exposed during renovation work.
Investigations suggest it has always been a shop, with evidence of an early jeweller’s or goldsmith’s shop with a workshop behind. Newspaper headlines at the time claimed England’s ‘oldest shop’ had been discovered. The age of the building makes it a contender for the title, but there is doubt about how long it served as a shop. It is now believed to have originally been a jettied service wing to a larger aisled hall house that has since disappeared.
The building has received grants from English Heritage. It is now Grade II* listed and is the premises of Sterling estate agents.
The pretty Tudor Court House beside Saint Peter’s Church dates from the 16th century and is now the parish hall. It is a fine example of an English timber-framed building of red brick and knapped flint with a jettied wooden first floor.
The present building is Tudor in origin but may have been built on the site of an earlier, mediaeval building. It has also been known in the past as the Church House and the Town Hall.
The Court House was originally used as the courts of the Manor of Berkhamsted and today serves as the church hall for Saint Peter’s. It could be considered as the town’s first town hall as the town council, created by a royal charter from by James I in 1618, first met there.
The corporation included a Bailiff or Mayor and 12 chief burgesses, and fell into abeyance in the 1660s.
The Court House had a variety of uses over the years. It was a school from 1838 until the 1870s, and then a court house. Meanwhile, Lord Brownlow bought the Manor and Honour of Berkhamsted, with the exception of the castle, from the Duchy of Cornwall in 1863. This included ownership of the Court House, which was leased back to trustees at a nominal rent.
During World War I, the Court House was used as an orderly room. During the Spanish Flu epidemic in 1918, it was used as an extension hospital. During World War II, it was used as a school once again to cope with the surge in school children among the war-time evacuees.
Today, the Court House is the church hall for Saint Peter’s parish.
Across the street from Saint Peter’s Church on the High Street, Dean Incent’s House is a timber-framed building. Sir Nikolaus Pevsner described it as ‘the best house in Berkhamsted.’ It dates from the late 15th century and is the birthplace of John Incent (1480-1545), who was the Dean of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, from 1540 to 1545.
Evidence suggests an older mediaeval building stood to the rear of the house, at right angles to the High Street. Part of this older house was incorporated into the Tudor house which was built facing the High Street.
The house belonged to Robert and Katherine Incent in the late 15th century. Robert Incent was secretary to Cecily Neville, Duchess of York, the last royal resident at Berkhamsted Castle, wife of the Duke of York and mother of two kings of England, Edward IV and Richard III.
John Incent was a chaplain to Henry VIII during Henry’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon, and the king appointed Incent Dean of Saint Paul’s in 1540. He founded Dean Incent’s Free School in Berkhamsted in 1541, using land he appropriated from the monastic hospital of Saint John the Baptist during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The school is today’s Berkhamsted School.
Dean Incent’s House was a traditional tearoom and restaurant from 1930 until 1970, and it was listed in 1950. Later it was used to house schoolmasters at Berkhamsted School. The interior has original exposed timber framing. David Sherratt, one of the resident schoolmasters, uncovered extensive remains of wall paintings in the house in the 1970s. These paintings are thought to date from the late Tudor or early Jacobean era.
The house is now a private dwelling and is not normally open to the public.
At the west end of the High Street, the Sayer Almshouses, on the corner of Cowper Road, were given to the town by John Sayer, a prominent local resident.
John Sayer was Charles II’s chief cook and a friend of Samuel Pepys. A plaque on the façade of the almshouses bears his name, his coat of arms and the date 1684.
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