HERTFORD HUNDRED 



Fore Street, is an interesting pargeted house of the 

 latter half of the 17th century. It is flush-fronted 

 and of three stories with an attic and tiled roofs. The 

 walls are decorated with well-modelled plaster panels, 

 arranged in three bands, and each having a scroll orna- 

 ment of acanthus foliage. The window openings have 

 for the most part been enlarged in the I 8th century, 

 and the ornament has been much disturbed by subse- 

 quent alterations. The ground floor has been given 

 over to shop windows. At the north-east corner of the 

 market-place is the 'White Hart,' an early 17th- 

 century building with 1 8th-century additions. Of a 

 similar date is the house on the north side now occu- 

 pied by the Hertfordshire County Council Education 

 Office. On the west side are two good early 18th- 

 century houses with an enriched modillion cornice of 

 wood. The 'Salisbury Arms,' on the south side of 

 ForeStreetoppositetheShireH.il!, dates from the early 

 1 7th century. The buildings are of brick and timber 

 and surround a central courtyard. The front has 

 been rebuilt, but the elevation towards Church Street 

 remains nearly in its original condition. The main 

 staircase, in its lower part, is original. The raking 

 balusters are square moulded and the square newels 

 have pierced tinials. On the east side of the Shire 

 Hall, at the corner of the market-place and Fore 

 Street, is a three-storied building of the same date, 

 the upper stories of which are supported at cither end 

 by Ionic columns. The whole of the intervening 

 pan of the ground stage is occupied by modern shop 

 windows. No. 56, on the south side of Fore Street, 

 3 little distance to the eastward, is a gabled half- 

 umber building of the late 16th century. Some 

 original panelling remains internally. 



The buildings of the girls' school of Christ's Hospital 

 stand at the west end of Fore Street, which forms the 

 southern boundary of its site. Of the original build- 

 ings which were completed in 1689 for use as a pre- 

 paratory school for boys as well as for girls, only the 

 schoolroom and steward's house adjoining, together 

 with the entrance gateways and portions of the boun- 

 dary walls, now remain. The buildings as then laid 

 out inclosed a long tree-planted rectangular courtyard 

 with the schoolroom at the north end, the entrance 

 gateway on the south, placed axially with the school- 

 room, and a block of ten cottages on either side con- 

 verted in 1760 into ten wards. The original girls' 

 school block, which faces Fore Street on the west side 

 of the entrance gates, and the head master's house at 

 the south-east of the courtyard were erected after 

 1766 ; they are not shown on the plan of Hertford by 

 J. Andrews and M. Wren, published in that year. 

 In 1800 the dining hall adjoining the schoolroom on 

 the west was built. The site was extended west- 

 wards to South Street by the purchase in 1897 of 

 the adjoining brewery buildings, together with the site 

 of Brewhouse Lane which divided the two premises, 8 

 the Blue Boy Inn being, however, left standing 

 at the south-west. On the removal of the boys to 

 Horsham in 1902 and the reservation of the school for 

 the girls only, the old wards were demolished and new 

 buildings planned on modern principles were erected 

 in their place. The schoolroom is a plain building 



BOROUGH OF 

 HERTFORD 



with a pedimented centre slightly broken forward, 

 lighted by large square-headed windows and crowned 

 by a tiled hipped roof. The south front has been 

 re-faced with red brick to correspond with the new 

 buildings. The interior is quite plain, with a coved 

 plaster ceiling and a later bay on the north side 

 divided by columns from the main room. Over the 

 entrance doorway is a nichp containing the oaken 

 figure of a 'blue boy' brought hither from the 

 former school at Ware. The steward's house at the 

 north-east corner of the courtyard indicates the 

 character of the elevations of the wards which have 

 been pulled down. The dining hall to the west of 

 the schoolroom, erected in 1800, is a plain building 

 of stock brick, lighted by large semicircular-headed 

 windows. Like the schoolroom its south front has 

 been re-faced with red brick. Some shields and 

 panelling from the demolished hall of Christ's 

 Hospital in Newgate Street, London, are preserved 

 here. The entrance gateway, with its stone piers, 

 surmounted by leaden figures of ' blue boys,' is of 

 the original date. These figures are known to have 

 been placed in their present position in 1 689. Sl The 

 original girls' school block is a long two-storied build- 

 ing of brick, with a large schoolroom in the centre 

 extending the whole height and surmounted by a 

 pediment. It is lighted on the south front by a large 

 'Venetian' window, flanked externally by semi- 

 circular-headed niches, each containing an excellently 

 modelled figure of a blue-coat girl. Among the 

 g relics preserved in the builJ:ngs :s 

 to Thomas Lockington, Treasurer of 

 Christ's Hospital from 1707-16, which was brought 

 here from the church of St. M.irv Magdalene, Great 

 Fish Street, destroyed by fire in 1888. In the 

 modern chapel is a fine brass almsbox inscribed 'The 

 Gift of a Govemour Sept. zist 1787.' 



In Maidenhead Street, which runs parallel with 

 Fore Street on the north side of it, are some good 

 early 17th-century houses. At the corner o r Honey 

 Lane, et which connects Maidenhead Street with the 

 market-place, is the Old Coffee House Inn, 3 Jacobean 

 building of two stories with an attic. The roof has 

 projecting eaves finished with a plain plaster cove, 

 and between the windows of the upper story are 

 elaborate baluster pilasters. The window openings 

 have all been altered. Next door, in Honey Lane, 

 is the 'Highland Chief,' a much modernized house 

 of the same date. Bull Plain is a short wide street 

 leading northwards from Maidenhead Street to Folly 

 Bridge, containing some 17 th and 1 8th-century work. 

 No, 16 is a brick two-storied house of the latter 

 date, with a wood modillion cornice and moulded 

 brick string-course. Some panelling remains inside. 

 Fronting southwards upon Bull Plain, the back 

 bordering upon the branch of the River Lea which 

 is crossed here by Folly Bridge, is Lombard House, 8s 

 a plastered building of timber and brick two stories in 

 height, dating from about the year 1600. The front 

 appears to have been rebuilt of brick in the early 

 18th century, but the back with its five gables, over- 

 hanging upper story and wood-mullioned windows 

 its original condition. In the t 



s = Formerly called Malloryes 

 :t that Robert Mallory lived th 

 :n.Vl and could dispense i'top* 



