Shire Hall

This prominent building served as assembly rooms and courthouse from 1767 to 1771, and as a cornmarket from 1771 to 1849. Designed by architect James Adam, it was altered in 1885 by County Surveyor Urban A Smith, had an attic added in 1902, and was comprehensively restored between 1988 and 1990 by County Architect John Onslow, with Russell Moye as Project Architect.

Construction and Materials

The building is constructed of brown stock brick on most elevations (the north elevation uses red-brown brick), laid in Flemish bond. It features Portland stone ashlar dressings, columns, entablature and cornice. The roof is hipped and covered with Welsh slate, with lead roll hips.

Exterior

The building rises four storeys, including two mezzanines. The principal elevation faces east and follows a tripartite composition with projecting wings and a recessed centre, each subdivided into three bays. Tall 12-pane sash windows, recessed under rubbed brick flat arches with stone sills, alternate vertically with squat 6-pane fixed sashes, with coursed brickwork carried across their heads. A plat band runs at main first-floor level.

The centre features a restored 'great window' (1988-1990), its design based on contemporary engravings. This comprises giant 18:30:18-pane sashes recessed between an Ionic order in antis, with pedestals to columns and pilasters linked by blind balustrades, each with a moulded top rail and band, and a swagged frieze decorated with paterae. A moulded cornice with blocking piece runs around the building perimeter at eaves level.

The ground floor has a triple arched entrance (the central arch slightly higher) with brick antae featuring stone plinths, capitals and semicircular arches with moulded surrounds. Modern plate-glass screens and entrance doors are recessed, along with a recessed brick panel and first floor plat band.

The north elevation, built of red-brown brick, extends nine bays. It follows a tripartite division with a central projecting segmental bow window. The outer facades are blank, with the first floor having large recessed panels corresponding to windows on the east elevation, topped with yellow rubbed brick flat arches and smaller recesses above. A first floor plat band is present. The ground floor has similar outer panels flanking a central higher semicircular arched panel. The central bow contains three 12-pane and 15-pane sashes on first and ground floors, with blank panels above the former.

The west elevation spans nine bays, with the extreme left and right bays breaking forward. The first floor has five central recessed 12-pane sash windows beneath rubbed brick arches, two similar-sized blank panels left and right, and nine small blank panels above. A first floor plat band is present. The ground floor features a recessed panel with rubbed brick arch set within a semicircular arched panel, with stone plinth and impost blocks to the first bay left and right. The centre has a seven-bay arcade with stone antae, impost blocks and semicircular stone arches, with recessed modern plate glass doors and screens.

The south elevation generally matches the north elevation but uses brown brick throughout. Above cornice level stands a clock erected in 1824, supplied by John Briant, the Hertford bell founder. It is supported on iron girders and brackets, with a slate-hung enclosure and roof featuring moulded barge boards added in 1866.

Interior

The interior was comprehensively refurbished between 1988 and 1990, restoring the major Adam interiors whilst accepting more frankly modern design in fittings and finishes elsewhere.

The ground floor west room, originally an open arcaded corn exchange, is now subdivided for magistrates' accommodation, with custodial cells on the first floor mezzanine. The entrance hall has restored apsidal ends, leading into the central foyer with a spiral stair rising to the first floor Round Room. The north and south courts have been restored to their original dimensions, with Tuscan Doric columns reinstated as gallery supports in the latter, and ceiling cornices reinstated to original profiles.

The first-floor Round Room or Rotunda was originally planned as the Hertford Council Chamber. It is toplit by a central oculus and has four large semicircular headed niches on the diagonals. The spiral stair from the ground floor has brass handrails and toughened glass balusters surrounding its well.

The vestibule or ante-room on the east front, behind the restored 'grand window', has restored apsidal ends with two smaller niches within, Ionic pilasters, and a dentil frieze.

The two courtrooms are of similar proportions. The Family Court (north room) has a restored cornice with plain frieze, ovolo band, upper cyma cornice, bold core, and gilded guilloche and rosette band. The old Council Chamber (south room) has a similar cornice and a mid-18th century white marble chimneypiece with heavy carved egg-and-dart surround, pilasters with rope and buds, consoles with acanthus leaves, and frieze with carved scrolls, shells and rosettes.

The Assembly Room on the east side has five bays with apsidal ends, measuring 50 feet by 25 feet, with a central entrance on the west wall. Tuscan Doric columns in antis form screens to the apses, featuring moulded bases, fluted necking and egg-and-dart moulding to the echinus. The ceiling was originally vaulted, but due to settlement and lack of restraint to the assembly room roof below collar level, the vault was replaced around 1800 with a ceiling four feet lower, featuring a dentil frieze and cornice, bold cove, and gilded guilloche band with acanthus leaves.

Historical Context

Shire Hall was built on the site of The Sessions House of 1627, erected by Charter of Charles I, which had become inadequate for its purpose by the mid-18th century. By Act of Parliament of George III in 1768, a levy was imposed to finance a new Shire Hall. Advertisements were placed for a design to incorporate two courts, a room for the Corporation of Hertford, and both with and without a County Room. Six applicants were shortlisted and Robert and James Adam were selected, with an initial cost of £4,950, which was exceeded by £2,500 (partly accounted for by the decision to include the County Room or Assembly Room after all). James Adam took charge of the project, which was constructed between April 1769 and April 1771 (the original undertaking had stipulated Michaelmas 1770).

The arcaded western ground floor was used by the Corn Exchange until 1849. The Assembly Room has been identified with Jane Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice', with Hertford as the fictional 'Merrytown', and the room was used throughout the 19th century as a concert and theatrical venue.

The Hertford Board of Guardians of the Poor met in the building from 1835 until 1930. Hertford Borough Council held its meetings there for many years, and County Council quarterly meetings alternated between Shire Hall and St Albans between 1889 and 1939. The Quarter Sessions and Assizes were held in the building until 1971, when the Crown Court was created and moved to St Albans. The building continues to be used by the local bench, County Court and Coroner's Court.

The position of the building created an impediment to traffic flow from the 1920s, and it was suggested that the building should be demolished. In the early 1930s it was proposed to alter the building substantially to accommodate the County Council, but the project was abandoned when the Leahoe site in Pegs Lane was acquired.

In collaboration with the Home Office, the County Council restored the building between 1988 and 1990, and the project was Commended by The Civic Trust in 1992.