Searching for Gloverstone.

Even though I've written a book on Chester, I keep on finding something new.

On this,  my second Heritage Day Tour for 2017, I found out more about the area of Chester known as the Gloverstone and grew to understand it more.

First: its location.  I had thought that it was approximately just beneath the site of the Military Museum.

Military Museum (and therefore site of Gloverstone) to the right.

And so it is, but our guide was able to be more precise.  It was the triangle of land between the castle ditch

The southeast portion of the castle ditch leading parallel to St Mary's Hill down to the river.

and Castle Street and the southern end of Bunce Lane.

Castle Street - Military Museum (Gloverstone to the right).

It consisted - just for a couple of hundred years until the beginning of the nineteenth century - of two courts of houses one either side of the castle entrance. The courts were notorious places of dense housing, which in the nineteenth century were generally considered to be slums.

However, the courts of Gloverstone were sought-after places to live because they were independent and outside the jurisdiction of the city.  They did not have to abide by city regulations or pay their taxes, and so were particularly attractive to craftsmen and traders who were 'foreigners' and had very little chance of becoming members of the city guilds. The Gloverstone had its own markets and fairs in which they did not have to pay taxes or tariffs, and so were, no doubt, greatly unpopular with the city corporation.

The boundary of this Gloverstone area was also marked by a stone. At this stone, criminals from the county were handed over to the mayor and corporation to be hanged outside the city at gibbet hill in Boughton.  It may also have been used to stretch out skins for glovers to make gloves.  The location of this Gloverstone is now uncertain.  It might be under the step of the military museum's yard to Castle Street.  Or it might be in the garden of the Water Tower at the north west corner of the city wall - put there as 'a curiosity' when the city baths were built in the nineteenth century.

When Thomas Harrison came to build the new court and county gaol in the nineteenth century, the Gloverstone area was cleared of houses.

A fragment of the Gloverstone land to the south was donated to Mary's churchyard

Piece of Gloverstone (green grass are in distance) donated to St Mary's Churchyard.

in compensation for land that was dug away for the new gaol.

East side of St Mary's Churchyard - ditch to the right of railings.

And on the subject of the County Gaol, I hadn't realised quite so much of it remains.  Not just the debtors' wing in rusticated stone, and the wall to the yard, but the smoother stone of the polygonal viewing tower where the warder could see all the felons in their yards below. 

Looking at polygonal warder's lookout of Chester County Gaol (centre of picture).

In this scene there is both - as well as 1950s old council offices to the left, now part of Chester University, and the 1990s covered bridge for access to Crown Court Number 4 (I think).

We discussed lots more: the chemical factories, the tanning, the skinning, and all the other changes that have affected this small part of Chester.  Altogether, a very interesting tour.

Western Command: Heritage Day 1 2017.

I have long wanted to visit 'Western Command': the imposing Classical-looking building on the banks of the Dee.

Western Command from Riverside

I've gone past the gates in Queen's Park and looked through the gates

Original 1930s gateposts

but today I had the chance to look inside thanks to Chester University and the Heritage Open Day.

Entrance to Western Command from south

Beginning with what 'might' have happened during World War Two (the meeting of Winston Churchill, Dwight Eisenhower, and Charles de Gaulle), two members of staff gave a very interesting potted history of the place from the first floor.  As well as having a great view from the balcony over the river

View from the second floor

it also contained one of the largest tables I've ever seen in my life.  I was hoping it was Churchill's mapping table, but it was not.  It was part of the furnishing of the bank when it took over in the 1990s.  The bank was also responsible for the Portico additions front and back,

North side of Western Command facing the river.

and the Art Deco interior design.

Entrance lobby

Eventually, the bank gave it up and the University took over a couple of years ago and named the building after Churchill, whose bust adorns the entrance.

Bust of Churchill

One of the main points of interest was the bunkers.  I read somewhere that these were a mirror image of the offices above ground, but it seems, from the descriptions we were given, that this is not quite the case.  They are not directly below the building, but a little to the east and north due to geological considerations.

Plan building and bunkers provided by staff from the university

They are also inaccessible due to being in an unsafe state, although this has not stopped some urban underground explorers.

Secret Underground Tunnels, Western Command Chester

Garage number 7 (built by the bank for their car pool) is approximately over one of the corridors of the bunkers,

Number 7 garage - location of bunkers (beneath)

which would have been entered via this door at the side

Original 1930s entrance (possible location of bunker entrance)

or via an entrance inside the building which has now been blocked off

Possible location of bunker entrance.

or a couple of entrances on the river bank.

There is talk that one day these bunkers may be open to view to the general public - but the river is intent on claiming them too, and I suspect may get there first.

Altogether, an extremely interesting tour - whetting my interest to find out more.