Grimsby Heritage Walk

We are proud to unveil our first Heritage Walks - masterminded by Heritage Committee chairman Ernie Brown with contributions by many Civic Society members. For a healthy, fun, "interactive" exploration of the town's history, feel free to print off a copy of the Heritage Walk for your own enjoyment.
Below you can find the Gory Grimsby Trail, The Saint James Trail, the Riverhead Trail, or for the particularly energetic, the Complete Grimsby Trail. These are living documents, so please direct any comments or amendments to the Civic Society.

THE GORY GREAT GRIMSBY HERITAGE TRAIL

The Town of Great Grimsby in North East Lincolnshire has been occupied since Neolithic times. Cinerary urns, excavated from burial mounds in Great Grimsby, date back to a time when the first of the great pyramids were being built in ancient Egypt, more than 4000 years ago.

We begin our Gory Grimsby Walking Trail at the site of the towns old Market Cross, at the junction of Flottergate, Victoria Street West and Bull Ring Lane.

With Victoria Street West behind you and Old Market Place to your left, walk along Bull Ring Lane towards St.James Square.

As its name suggests this part of Great Grimsby, like many other Market Towns throughout Europe had its own bull ring which, as well as being an arena for festivities and markets, was also an arena for barbarity. An iron ring, attached to a wooden stake, was driven into the ground. Tied to this ring with a 15 ft rope was a bull destined for the slaughter house. Ferocious Lincolnshire bulldogs were then released upon the tethered bulls and the 'sport' began.

These cruel displays were encouraged and maintained with a local bye-law, produced by the Corporation during the 16th century, "No butchers shall in future kill a bull within this borough, nor shall any bull's flesh be sold or any bull brought into the market for sale unless it has been baited openly before the Mayor and Burgesses under a penalty for every default of six and eightpence. It is further ordered that the butchers of this franchise and all others that keep slaughter shops and sell meat shall annually hold a bull bait at a convenient time of the year in the presence of the Mayor and Burgesses according to the custom of the borough". This barbaric custom was abolished in Great Grimsby in 1779 when Thomas Hesleden was the Mayor.

On entering St.James Square, carry on walking straight ahead around the perimeter, in an anti clockwise direction. On your left, on one of the many green swathes that surround the Parish Church of St.James is a statue dedicated to the many fishermen, who died at sea, risking and losing their lives, to feed their families during the hundred years or more that Great Grimsby could proudly proclaim itself to be the largest fishing port in the world.

Walking the perimeter of St James Church, towards its west door, it's hard to imagine today the uproar that this once overflowing graveyard caused to the inhabitants of Great Grimsby. There are an estimated 12,000 bodies lying in this acre and in 1847, Mr Thomas Stephenson second master of the Corporation Grammar school wrote to the Bishop of Lincoln, "It is with the greatest difficulty, that the sexton can find a clear spot. In too many instances he is compelled to disturb the decomposing remains of the respective tenants to make way for the new occupants". Mr Thomas' pleas to the Bishop went unheeded and the following year he wrote another letter to the General Board of Health. "On leaving clothes out to dry on a line, people living in a house nearby complained that the nausea that had been absorbed was so bad as to render it needful to rewash them. It was also stated that a coffin had been disturbed one day and a human head taken out with the hair fresh on it and the decomposing matter shovelled out, thereby causing a most hurtful effluvia, to say nothing of the humanity of the affair".

A poster, produced by the Corporation in 1831 also announced that, "Some evil person, or persons did, on the night of Thursday March 31st, disinter the body of Mary Hollingshead, which was buried on the 25th of February and with circumstances of great brutality, broke in the coffin lid and exposed the corpse to public view, on a tombstone adjacent to the turnpike road, where it was seen on the morning of Good Friday". The graveyard was finally closed for burials in June 1854 when the new Doughty Road cemetery was opened on what are now Ainslie Street recreation grounds.

The western door of St. James Church is the oldest part of this grade1 listed building. 200 yards to the west of this door, on the north side of Cartergate, near to the level crossing was another of Great Grimsby's religious houses. The Franciscan monks, black friars, had a Friary here.

Carry on walking around the perimeter of the Churchyard with Deansgate Bridge on your right hand side.

Deansgate Bridge was built in 1848 and cost the Railway Company several thousand pounds to build. The arrival of the railway brought large teams of navvies, to the area with hardly any provision for their accommodation or entertainment. There were ample drinking houses in the town, the Old Coach House or as it is more commonly known, the White Hart, at the foot at the bridge being the oldest pub in Great Grimsby, would have been frequented by these railway construction workers during the first half of the 19th century, but for gambling and bare knuckle fights they had to walk the few miles east of the Haven to the Horse Course where horse racing and prize fighting were regular events. One blood-splattered, bare knuckle fighter, reputed to have fought many prize fights here was Thomas Sayers who worked as a bricklayer on Deansgate Bridge as well as other bridges and viaducts around the country, before going onto become the first Heavyweight Champion of the World.

Looking along Wellowgate, across the road to your right is another junction where the road meets Brighowgate. A short detour along Brighowgate will lead you to a row of renovated cottages on your right hand side. These were the last buildings, added on to the Great Grimsby House of Industry, which was built in 1802 to hold 100 inmates. It also housed a treadmill which was powered by the force of four men and ground enough grain for all the inmates, as well as grinding bones for manure. The treadmill was designed by William Sherlock for "the purpose of curing sham, sick and disorderly inmates". It finally closed its doors in 1832, when an Act of Parliament moved all of the inmates to Caistor Workhouse. One local ne'er do well who would have enjoyed the option of going to the workhouse was Sarah Turner, twice convicted felon who was 'burned in the hand' for her first offence of stealing a sheep and, when she offended again six years later, she became the only person ever sentenced by the Borough Quarter Sessions to seven years transportation to one of His Majesty's American plantations'.

Returning to our Gory Grimsby Trail, cross Bethlehem Street at the pelican crossing and with St. James Church behind you, turn left, walking towards the Yarborough Hotel. On the opposite side of Bethlehem Street is a bronze sculpture by Howard Gosney, recalling the impact that the Norse invaders had on this area. Their violent warriors gained land and power in battles with the locals who were totally overwhelmed when, in 866 AD, Twenty thousand Norsemen fearlessly passed through Grimsby, with bloodied sword, on their way to sack York and take control of Northern England.

Carry on walking along Bethlehem Street towards the Yarborough Hotel

The Yarborough Hotel, built in 1852, was the unlikely scene of a St. Valentines Day riot, during the elections of 1862, when the behaviour of the enraged electorate caused 50 policemen from Hull to attend, in an attempt at keeping the peace. On the other side of Bethlehem Street at the towns Corn Exchange, where the Exchange pub is now, the supporters of John Chapman had heard that two out- voters had been brought in to the Yarborough Hotel to raise the vote count of Heneage and his supporters. Tempers quickly rose and the supporters of Mr Chapman began to "treat the occupants to a fusillade of stones before carrying the Hotel by storm". Within an hour practically everything inside the building was destroyed. Three of Chapman's supporters were subsequently charged at LincolnCastle that they "feloniously, unlawfully, riotously and tumultuously damaged and injured the Yarborough Hotel. Tables, chairs and other valuables were thrown, cast away and destroyed". They were also charged with "Wounding, assaulting, beating and ill-treating their opponents and the police", and were sentenced to three months hard labour. Their political leader Mr John Chapman was however duly elected as the MP for Great Grimsby.

Cross Bethlehem Street at the pelican crossing, keeping the Yarborough Hotel behind you.

Taking a detour from our gory Grimsby, trail a little further along Bethlehem Street, walking away from St. James Church, the road changes its name to South St. Mary's Gate.

Number 26 South St. Mary's gate, at the corner of East St. Mary's Gate was the scene of a blood thirsty gathering in May 1871, when the theft of a penny stamp brought the untimely death of a chambermaid. Sarah Anne Graves, aged 25, who worked in this house looking after Dr Holland and his family when she was accused of stealing a postage stamp. Having previously been accused of stealing meat from her last employers, she was found guilty at the Borough Court and sentenced to a day in jail. She lost her job and income, her boyfriend deserted her and she went back home to nearby Louth to stay with her sister. A couple of days later, according to the Stamford Mercury of May 12th, she visited her local druggist in Eastgate, where the chemist remembered selling a packet of Battles Vermin Killer to a young lady earlier that day. "She had been upstairs about 20 minutes", her sister told the coroner. "When I heard her scream out, said she had taken the poison. She said nothing to me about why she had taken the poison, but lay on the bed struggling". The Surgeon, Mr T. James, stated that "she had begged that he let her die." The Stamford Mercury went on to reply that "A demonstration was got up and a procession was formed down the main street, with an effigy, a band of music and tar barrels. A considerable crowd of persons surrounded Dr Holland's house and some of its windows were broken".

Continue on our gory Grimsby trail towards Old Market Place and stop for a moment in front of Chambers, before we reach the end of our trail.

This was the site of the largest of Great Grimsby's nine water pumps and was the scene of many public whippings. The last person to be punished in this barbaric manner was William Dales, a tailor of the Town, who walked away from his wife and family, leaving them without income and a burden on the Parish.

In January 1820 William, like hundreds of convicted felons before him was brought here to the Town pump, stripped to the waist and tied by the wrists to the back of a cart which was drawn slowly through the Market Place to the old Town hall about a 100 yards away while Sergeant Major Wardale executed the sentence with a cat-'o'-nine-tales until the felons' skin was torn and bloodied.

© GRIMSBY, CLEETHORPES & DISTRICT CIVIC SOCIETY

THE GREAT GRIMSBY ST JAMES SQUARE HERITAGE TRAIL.

The Town of Great Grimsby lies in a sheltered position on a plot of high ground, connected to the River Humber, nearly a mile away, by a safe natural harbour called the Haven, which has been occupied since Neolithic times. Cinerary urns, excavated from burial mounds in Great Grimsby, date back to a time when the first of the great pyramids were being built in ancient Egypt, more than 4000 years ago, although it was only after the arrival of the Norsemen in the latter part of the first millennium AD, that written records began.

We begin our St. James Square Heritage Trail at the junction with Victoria Street, Old Market Place, Bull Ring Lane and Flottergate, where Great Grimsby's Market Cross used to stand. Walk along Bull Ring Lane before reaching the open space of St. James Square.

As its name suggests this part of Great Grimsby, like many other Market Towns throughout Europe had its own bull ring which, as well as being an arena for festivities and markets, was also an arena for barbarity. An iron ring, attached to a wooden stake, was driven into the ground. Tied to this ring with a 15 ft rope was a bull destined for the slaughter house. Ferocious Lincolnshire bulldogs were then released and the sport began.

These cruel displays were encouraged and maintained with a local bye-law, produced by the Corporation during the 16th century, "No butchers shall in future kill a bull within this borough, nor shall any bull's flesh be sold or any bull brought into the market for sale unless it has been baited openly before the Mayor and Burgesses under a penalty for every default of six and eightpence. It is further ordered that the butchers of this franchise and all others that keep slaughter shops and sell meat, shall annually hold a bull bait at a convenient time of the year in the presence of the Mayor and Burgesses according to the custom of the borough". This barbaric custom was abolished in Great Grimsby in 1779 when Thomas Hesleden was the Mayor.

On entering St. James Square, carry on walking straight ahead around the perimeter, in an anti clockwise direction. On your left, on one of the many green swathes that surround the Parish Church of St.James is a statue dedicated to the many fishermen, who lost their lives during the hundred years or more that Great Grimsby could proudly proclaim itself to be the largest fishing port in the world.

Walking the perimeter of St James Church, towards its west door, it's hard to imagine today the uproar that this once overflowing graveyard caused to the inhabitants of Great Grimsby. There are an estimated 12,000 bodies lying in this acre and in 1847, Mr Thomas Stephenson second master of the Corporation Grammar school wrote to the Bishop of Lincoln, "It is with the greatest difficulty, that the sexton can find a clear spot. In too many instances he is compelled to disturb the decomposing remains of the respective tenants to make way for the new occupants". Mr Thomas' pleas to the Bishop went unheeded and the following year he wrote another letter to the General Board of Health. "On leaving clothes out to dry on a line, people living in a house nearby complained that the nausea that had been absorbed was so bad as to render it needful to rewash them. It was also stated that a coffin had been disturbed one day and a human head taken out with the hair fresh on it and the decomposing matter shovelled out, thereby causing a most hurtful effluvia, to say nothing of the humanity of the affair". The graveyard was finally closed for burials in June 1854 when the new Doughty Road cemetery was opened on what are now Ainslie Street recreation grounds.

The western door of St.James Church is the oldest part of this grade1 listed building. 200 yards to the west of this door, on the north side of Cartergate, near to the level crossing was another of Great Grimsby's religious houses. The Franciscan monks, black friars, had a Friary here and although the date of its foundation is unknown, it was already in existence when King Henry III granted them twenty of his finest oaks from the Royal Forest of Sherwood. In 1542 King Henry VIII ordered the dissolution of the monasteries and the building was left to ruin.

Carry on walking around the perimeter of the Churchyard with Deansgate Bridge on your right hand side.

Deansgate Bridge was built in 1848 and cost the Railway Company several thousand pounds to build. The arrival of the railway brought large teams of navvies, to the area with hardly any provision for their accommodation or entertainment. There were ample drinking houses in the town, the Old Coach House or as it is more commonly known, the White Hart, at the foot at the bridge being the oldest pub in Great Grimsby, would have been frequented by these railway construction workers during the first half of the 19th century, but for gambling and bare knuckle fights they had to walk the few miles east of the Haven to the Horse Course where horse racing and prize fighting were regular events. One bare knuckle fighter, reputed to have fought many prize fights here was Thomas Sayers who worked as a bricklayer on DeansgateBridge as well as other bridges and viaducts around the country, before going onto become the first Heavyweight Champion of the World.

Pause before you reach the road junction at Wellowgate, Church Lane and Bethlehem Street, the large square 1960's building Hampton House, designed by Sir Charles Nicholson and Rushton, has a very unusual and noteworthy piece of sculpture in fact the first piece of modern sculpture to be erected in Great Grimsby, designed by Mr P Pape, attached to its wall.

When you reach the pelican crossing, stop and choose which direction you wish to take next, from here you could take a detour and visit St. James Church by walking to the North door.

St James Church is the only Parish Church in the country with its own choir school; look out for the effigy of Sir Thomas Haslerton carved in stone near the entrance. This monument to Sir Thomas was brought from St. Leonards Nunnery to rest in St. James Church after the dissolution of the monasteries. St. Leonard's Nunnery, sited on the present day Nun's corner, roughly where the Grimsby Institute is now, was founded in the 1180's by King Henry I. Despite being destroyed by fire in the 13th century it was rebuilt by the Bishop of Lincoln, Robert Grossteste and Sir Thomas Haslerton of Aylesby. At the dissolution, its possessions, as with all of the monasteries were granted to the Dean and Chapter of Westminster and the removal and subsequent recycling of the building was so complete, that excavations of the site have revealed no trace except a single voussir with dog tooth ornament.

From this spot you could also detour from the Heritage Trail by walking past the Old Coach House, along Wellowgate.

At the far end of Wellowgate was the largest and richest of all the religious Grimsby houses. The Augustinian Abbey of St Olaf and St Augustine was founded around 1130AD. Its last Abbot, Robert Whitgift, uncle to the future Archbishop of Canterbury, finally surrendered the Abbey and its connecting lands, mill and orchard etc to King Henry VIII in 1539. Nothing remains today of this once great Abbey but it still makes it presence felt in the street names, Abbey Road, St. Olafs Grove and St. Augustine Avenue.

A detour along Brighowgate will lead you past the old cattle market on your right and further along on your left, the Brighowgate Childrens Home, which opened in 1913, caring for the welfare of local waifs and strays until its closure during the mid 1950s. It later reopened again in 1959 as the Salvation Army Hostel, which it remains to this day. After passing the old Lincolnshire County Constabulary building on your left, a little further along Brighowgate, on your right hand side is a row of renovated cottages, which were the last buildings, added on to the Great Grimsby House of Industry, which was built in 1802 to hold 100 inmates. It also housed a treadmill which was powered by the force of four men and ground enough grain for all the inmates, as well as grinding bones for manure. The treadmill was designed by William Sherlock for "the purpose of curing sham, sick and disorderly inmates". It finally closed its doors in 1832, when an Act of Parliament moved all of the inmates to Caistor Workhouse.

One local ne'er do well who would have enjoyed the option of going to the workhouse was Sarah Turner, twice convicted felon who was 'burned in the hand' for her first offence of stealing a sheep and, when she offended again six years later, she became the only person ever sentenced by the Borough Quarter Sessions to seven years transportation to one of His Majesty's American plantations'.

Returning to our Great Grimsby, St James Square Heritage Trail, cross Bethlehem Street at the pelican crossing and with St. James Church behind you, turn left, walking towards the Yarborough Hotel.

Look out for Regents Arcade on your right, a narrow alleyway with specialist shops and further on along Bethlehem Street look up at the date mark 1781 above Canters Estate Agents which shows the antiquity of the surviving buildings in this area. To your left, on the other side of Bethlehem Street is another of Great Grimsby's large metallic sculptures, designed by Harold Gosney and recalling the influence that the Norse invaders of old, had on the formation of Great Grimsby, over a thousand years ago.

Stop at the junction where Bethlehem Street meets the Old Market Place. On your right, at the end of a short approach is Grimsby Town Railway Station. In the autumn of 1844 a group of influential businessmen and wealthy landowners, met at the Red Lion public house in Caistor. With Lord Yarborough as its Chairman, a route between the mainline at Gainsborough to Great Grimsby was surveyed and the details were passed to the Town Council, who agreed that a railway link would help bring improvements to the area. On the 1st march 1848 the Mayor of Great Grimsby William Heaford Daubney, proclaimed that all of the shops and offices in the town were to be closed for the day. The Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (or Money, Spent and Lost as it was known by its shareholders) had arrived.

Lord Yarborough, who was born in 1809 and died in 1862, was the largest land owner in the area. The Yarborough Hotel, built in 1852, on the corner opposite where you stand today, was the unlikely scene of a St.Valentines Day riot, during the elections of 1862, when the behaviour of the enraged electorate caused 50 policemen from Hull to attend, in an attempt at keeping the peace. On the other side of Bethlehem Street at the towns Corn Ex