Harrison Almshouses

HERTFORD

TL3212SE CHURCHFIELDS 817-1/20/37 (North side) Harrison Almshouses Nos.1, 2 and 3

GV II

Formerly known as: Harrison Almshouses Nos 1, 2 and 3 CHURCH PATH. Almshouses, originally a block of 6 but now refurbished as 3. Dated 1854, with C20 alterations. Red brick, Flemish bond, with cream brick dressings, Welsh slated roof with single and double diagonally shafted chimneystacks with band and oversailing cap. EXTERIOR: single storey, front elevation has 6 small paned wood casement windows recessed under rubbed cream brick flat arches, with yellow brick quoins on jambs, and 3 projecting coped gabled porches, with rubbed cream brick elliptical arches and quoins, recessed C20 half-glazed doors, spacing W:P:W:W:P:W:W:P:W, with central stone coped Dutch gable, and stone coped Dutch gables with external chimneybreasts left and right flank elevations. Inscribed Portland stone tablet in upper central gable laid by John Villiers Townshend to commemorate rebuilding of the Almshouses, in the presence of Lord Dudley Coutts Stewart. INTERIOR: not inspected. HISTORICAL NOTE: the Townshends were successors at Balls Park to the Harrisons; Sir John Harrison (d.1669) left »100 to be invested in property to produce an annual income for the benefit of the poor in All Hallows (All Saints) Parish Hertford, and his widow built and endowed 4 almshouses in Butchery (Bircherley) Green before her death in 1705, her grandson augmented the funds, and the almshouses were rebuilt on the Church Path site in 1854. Bircherley Green had by then become one of the worst slums in the Borough. (Turnor L: History of Hertford: Hertford: 1830-: 366-8, 379-80; Hertfordshire Countryside: Moodey G: Georgian brickwork of the choicest sort: Letchworth: 1946-1973: 28; Page FM: History of Hertford: Hertford: 1993-: 92, 177).

Listing NGR: TL3293212481