he following set of pages provide a brief 'tour' of the historic buildings still standing in the centre of Coventry.
Compared to the beginning of the 20th century, few ancient buildings remain. It is commonly believed that most of the destruction was carried out by the Luftwaffe in 1940/41. However, more buildings (and indeed, whole streets) disappeared at the hands of Coventry's own Town Planners than by bombs and incendiaries in WWII. In the 1930's Butcher row and surrounding streets were razed to make way for Trinity Street. That alone deprived the city of dozens of Medieval and Tudor aged houses and shops, and for some, a whole way of life.
Fortunately, many noteworthy features survived, and with present day councils attempting to redesign the city with a more sympathetic hand, Coventry's future might be a little more attractive....
Mini-maps, like this one on the right, display an approximate location to aid finding the relevant building. Clicking on these will take you to a town map on which you can find the appropriate links back to your place on these pages.
The Old Grammar School, Hales Street
We can begin our tour at a convenient point - Pool Meadow Bus Station.
As you walk along Hales Street past Swanswell Gate towards Corporation Street, the first ancient building that you will see is on the right at the corner of Hales Street and Bishop Street. Most people in Coventry recognise that it was once home to the Free Grammar School, a purpose served by this place from 1557 after the school moved here from its brief beginnings in the church of the then recently dissolved Whitefriar's monastery in 1545. The school remained here in Hales Street until 1885, when it moved to its own dedicated premises in Warwick Road. (Pictured in an early 20th century postcard, below.)
Before this time however, it had been founded in the 1100's as the Church of the Hospital of St. John. The building was originally much larger and extended out to the right in this photograph. (See Old Grammar School - now and then.) However, in the early 1800's that part of the old school was demolished to create a path for the building of Hales Street.
It is from two structures associated with this ancient institution that a modern street name was to evolve. The north end of Cross Cheaping crosses two rivers: - the Sherbourne and its tributary, the Radford Brook. (Refer to street maps of 1400 to 1807.) The bridges were known as 'St. John's Bridges', and the street became known as "Between the Bridges" (inter pontes) or "Between St. John's Bridges" (inter pontes Sancti Johannis). We can perhaps learn something about our local dialect and the way our language evolves, by realising that the "bridges" part eventually corrupted and became "Burges".
Would this view of the Grammar School have been possible before 1931? Take a look at this page in the Now and Then section to find out!
Old Grammar School - > River Sherbourne, Palmer Lane
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