Appleby History > History Tour > Church Street
Church Street
Church Street is a long road in Appleby terms. Running roughly parallel to the stream, it winds its way from the Church in the centre of the village past the Church Hall (the old infant school), the Crown Inn and a row of old Victorian artisan cottages, past the houses on the site of the now-demolished Queen Adelaide Inn and Baptist chapel and out into the fields, taking a sharp left turn to cross the stream and emerge into Top Street just before the point it becomes New Street, close to the Sir John Moore School. Along its length you find a wealth of old features: a red phone box, the old bakery and grocer's shop, and a lovely example of a Leicestershire style farm house (Church Farm, now a private home and its barns converted to further dwellings - see In Focus 23, Making a Living for an aerial view of the old farm buildings).
Thanks are due to Margaret Cater for providing most of the images on this page.
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Church Hall
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This was built as the village primary school and it opened in 1845. There is a lovely description of what it was like to be a pupil here in the 1940's written by Anne Silins, click here.
The Crown Inn
One of Appleby's three remaining pubs, the others being the Black Horse and the Appleby Inn (formerly the Moore Arms). There were two others, the Queen Adelaide which was also in Church Street (see below), and the Red Lion which was closed, then demolished to make way for the motorway junction. A further inn, the Anchor in Appleby Parva, ceased to be a public house when the licensee transferred to the Moore Arms (ref In Focus 19, Richard Dunmore).
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This view of Church Street showing the Crown Inn, Church Farm opposite, and the church at the end of the road, is very much the same today. Here it is in the early part of last century.
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The Bates' Shop
Just down the road from the Crown was the shop run by the Bates' which Anne Silins talks about in her article - click here. The building still exists and has been converted to a private house, as has also the Old Bakery behind the shop. The picture below is from 1913.
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The Queen Adelaide
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This old inn stood on the corner of Bowleys Lane, where a more modern house now stands. Here we see the inn being decked with garlands for the coronation in 1953, and below shows the inn with the old baptist chapel further down the road. |
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The Baptist Chapel
This old chapel was used as the village infant school between 1940 and 1957. Like the Queen Adelaide, it has been replaced by modern houses. Between the chapel and the inn is a row of chapel cottages known as Monkey Row.
Anne Silins talks about this school in her article on growing up in the village: click here.
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Dormer's Hall and the Area Behind the Church Hall
Strictly speaking this former residence of the Dormer farmily was not in Church Street, but stood on the land behind the existing Church Hall and Church Farm. Richard Dunmore's article (In Focus 11) tells its story.
The pictures below are of Glebe Cottage, formerly Butt Yard Cottage, which also stood in this area. The picture is taken in the early 1950's, showing a young Patrick Gothard (on the right) and his mother Dora (on the left). Dora was Verger of the Church for many years.
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A comparative picture of Glebe Cottage in the 1970's kindly supplied by Richard Dunmore.
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More about Church Street
Anne Silins was born in the Bates' shop and attended the Chapel school and the village Church School. Her memories are in three sections starting with
Other articles relating to the Church Street area:
- In Focus 11: Dormer's Hall, Richard Dunmore
- In Focus 22: The Census of 1841, Part 4, Richard Dunmore (which includes several additional photographs of the street and its buildings)
- In Focus 23: Making a Living, Richard Dunmore (with images of Church Farm and the old smithy)
- In Focus 25: Non-conformist Chapels in Appleby, Richard Dunmore
There is a lovely map drawn by Doris Unger which shows the position of Dormer's Hall and other Church Street land mark in:
- Open Fields and Enclosures, Alan Roberts
>> Next Stop on the Tour: Appleby Parva and Appleby Hall