Coroners Courthouse

Coroners Courthouse

County courthouse and police station, now serving as a Coroner's courthouse. Built in 1902 by HC Scaping of Grimsby for Lindsey County Court. The building is constructed of orange brick in English garden wall bond with composite stone and terracotta dressings, featuring a Welsh slate roof and a leaded roof to the cupola. The style is Edwardian Freestyle, employing an unusual mixture of Baroque and Art Nouveau detailing. The plan comprises a T-shaped main courthouse range with two wings and a small courtyard to the rear.

The exterior presents as a tall single-storey structure of three bays with a symmetrical composition. A projecting central gabled wing contains the entrance. The plinth is chamfered, with a base featuring a string course carrying angle pilasters and full-height Doric pilasters flanking each bay. Flush ashlar bands run to the gables. The entrance occupies the full width of the central wing and comprises a pair of segmental-arched doorways. Carved double doors with stained glass panels incorporate shields beneath large stained glass overlights displaying Art Nouveau-style floral designs. The arches are ovolo-moulded and carried on short columns, with tall keystones and a band of pellet mouldings clasped by scrolled ribbons. The spandrels feature elaborate cartouches and ribbonwork, with a shield inscribed "LCC" at the centre. This is all contained within a surround with double pilasters and dosserets carrying broken pediments with obelisk finials and strapwork supports.

The recessed central section displays a terracotta frieze with ribbon-style lettering reading "COUNTY POLICE", flanking a central bowl-shaped projection decorated with relief strapwork. Above this sits a tall two-light first-floor window with an eared and scrolled shouldered architrave and a pedimented head carrying a medallion with the Royal crown and date in relief. A parapet and steep gable with finial and moulded coping scrolled at the base complete the centrepiece, with projecting angle pilasters carrying moulded cornices and urns on pedestals.

The side elevations of the central wing each have a single ground-floor two-light window in an eared brick surround with shaped apron and broken pediment with tall keystone, flush sill band, and moulded string course at lintel level. A first-floor band and single oval window in keyed architrave appear above.

The side bays to the main range feature twin windows in moulded brick reveals and eared brick architraves with corniced sills and a flush ashlar sill band, beneath brick flat arches with stepped keystones linked by a string course. All windows to this range are tall and narrow, of two lights, with moulded composite stone mullions and transoms and patterned leaded lights.

A boldly projecting eaves cornice, parapet, and gables with moulded coping and angle pilasters carrying urns on scrolled bases frame the composition. The steeply pitched roof features crested ridge tiles and a central cupola with keyed round-arched openings, cornice, and onion dome with finial. A lateral stack to the rear has a panelled shaft, frieze, and ornate cap with keyed segmental pediment and cornice. The left gable-end displays similar decorative details, including a stepped triple two-light window, with the taller central window having a tall keystone carrying a cornice and relief above of an obelisk with strapwork supports. The gable above this features three shaped slit-lights and a relief cartouche at the apex.

A single-storey two-bay wing to the rear left has a segmental-headed entrance to the left with an original panelled half-glazed door beneath an overlight with glazing bars in a chamfered surround with rusticated arch. Twin sashes with glazing bars, stone sills with shaped aprons, flush sill band, and eared surround rising to moulded swagged arches with stepped keystones appear in a plain stone eaves frieze with moulded cornice. A coped gable and panelled stack complete this elevation. A lower section to the left has a small-paned window, plain stone frieze, and cornice with a hipped roof. The wing to the rear right is similar but one bay longer.

A rear courtyard entrance porch to the main range has a shaped parapet. The rear of the main range displays a pair of three-light courtroom windows beneath shaped keyed heads in stone surround.

The interior courtroom features a panelled dado and a complete set of court fittings in panelled pine. A painted sculpted Royal Arms sits on a corbelled moulded shelf above the dais. Panelled doors in architraves with open segmental pedimented overdoors lead to a four-bay roof with boldly carved hammerbeams decorated in Baroque and Art Nouveau style, carrying a central basket-arched vault. A panelled solicitors' room occupies the front left.

The building operated as a Lindsey and Lincolnshire County Courthouse until the 1970s, with the County Police Station occupying the rear (Grimsby Borough maintained its own courthouse and police station at the Town Hall). This is a distinguished building in an unusual style and, together with Cleethorpes Town Hall in Edwardian Classical style, represents HC Scaping's best work. It forms a group with the garden walls and gates to the front and those to the north, now in the front garden of No. 36 Brighowgate.