Monument Type(s):

• FORTIFIED MANOR HOUSE? (Medieval - 1066 AD to 1540 AD)
• TOWER (13th century to 15th century - 1200 AD to 1499 AD)
• TOWN DEFENCES (13th century to 15th century - 1200 AD to 1499 AD)

Summary

Scheduled Monument: The surviving remains (lying below the present road surface) of one of the towers on the 'New Work' (PRN 01459), an extra stretch of Shrewsbury's 13th-14th century town walls built to control traffic over a ford downstream of the present Welsh Bridge. Demolished c.1800.

Related records

Associated Finds: None recorded

Associated Events

• ESA1316 - 1977 field observation by Shropshire County Council
• ESA1317 - 1960 field observation by the Ordnance Survey
• ESA1318 - 1965 field observation by English Heritage
• ESA1319 - 1985 field observation by English Heritage
• ESA4908 - 1996 DBA and buildings assessment of land between Victoria Avenue and Lower Claremont Bank, Shrewsbury by Richard K Morriss & Associates
• ESA7590 - 2015 Conservation management survey of the town walls, Shrewsbury, by SCAS
• ESA7636 - 2015 WB at Victoria Avenue, Shrewsbury by SCAS

Description

Has a diameter of 5.7m and is 1.9m high, its top being level with the present ground level. ..It is of coursed red sandstone. OS FI 1960 <1>

This tower formed part of the New Work (PRN 01459) which was possibly built temp Edward I to protect the ford below the Welsh Bridge. The tower was discovered in 1911 and is said to have had walls 3ft thick and 18ft in diameter <3>

According to Owen, writing c.1808, it had been demolished not long before [<7>], and according to Henry Pidgeon, quoted by Morriss [<8>], this would have been c.1797. Appears on various 18th-century views and engravings. The tower is now outlined on the road surface with setts. The wall behind is now the boundary wall of the Priory School and does not appear to incorporate medieval work. I Burrow FI 1977 <4>

Tower, forming the south-west termination of the riverside New Work defensive wall (PRN 62559). The tower was discovered when the ground along the riverbank was lowered to extend Victoria Avenue in November 1911 (PRN 60298). Had a diameter of 18 feet, and walls 3 ft thick of red, probably Keele Beds, sandstone, half in the school playground, half in the roadway <5><6>

A tall round tower, with a conical roof, is shown on the Bucks' engraving of the town of 1732. It is depicted as being on the river bank downstream of the old Welsh Bridge with fields to its south that merge with those of the newly-laid out Quany Park, It seems likely that this is the western tower of the New Work. The rest of the site of the friary appears to have been built up by this time and it is likely that the other tower had been demolished. It is just possible that the Pigeon House referred to in a deed of the former friary lands was this round tower; pigeon houses and dovecotes were often round for convenience and the former defensive tower may have been converted for such use; this is, of course, pure conjecture. The surviving western tower was probably the one referred to by Owen in 1808 who stated that a tower, ‘named of late days the Round-house, on the river’s side between the Welsh bridge and the Quarry, was taken down very recently [<7>]. A writer of 1837 was more specific and stated that one of the towers of the New Work was known as the Round House and had been demolished ‘about forty years ago’ (Pidgeon, 1837, 154). This ties in with Owen’s statement and the demolition of the tower would have taken place at around the same time that much of the town wall was pulled down to allow for developments on Claremont Bank and for the construction of St. Chad’s church. The tower does appear on a pen-and-ink sketch dated 1790 and drawn from the north-east; this also shows the remains of the friary building that was within the development site (SRRC 079). The plan outline of this tower are now marked by setts in the tarmacadamed road surface of Victoria Avenue, close to the retaining wall of the grounds of the Priory School (now the Sixth Form College) [<9>]. <8>

A conservation management plan was prepared in 2015 for the entire circuit of town walls surrounding Shrewsbury (excluding around Shrewsbury Castle at the NE corner). This provides a general historic overview of the development of the town defences, together with detailed analysis and management recommendations for individual sections (in gazetteer form in volume 2). This tower is identified as 7b. ->

-> The approximate site of the tower at the western end of the new Work (PRN 01459) is marked by stone setts laid in the tarmac road surface on Victoria Avenue. The New Work was an outlier to the town’s defences which ran along the river frontage to the west of the Welsh Bridge. It seems to have been built in the late 13th century to guard a ford which crossed the river from Frankwell. It comprised a stretch of wall some 100m long with a circular tower at each end. In 1337 the Borough granted the Augustinian Friars the New Work, on the condition that they built an “embattled house” there and allowed it to be garrisoned in time of war (<11>). In 1342 the wall was referred to in inquisitions of that year and the following year, which described the wall as being 20 perches long (c. 100m) with two round towers. By 1620 the post-Dissolution owner of the friary, the barrister Roger Pope, had converted the round tower (of the New Work) into a tanning room (W Champion, 2006). The tower is shown on several 18th century engravings and paintings with a building adjoining its east side, aligned northsouth (Bowen, 1720; Buck, 1732; & anon, 1739). The Bowen painting also shows boatbuilding on the land to the west of the tower. The tower, by then known as the Round House, was demolished c.1800 (<12>). <9>

In October 2015, excavations for a new electricity cable along Victoria Avenue uncovered the remains of the late 13-th century defensive tower. The remains comprised part of the northern arc of the tower and lay at a depth of 0.5m below the road surface, and were undisturbed by the current work. The curved red sandstone wall had been previously rediscovered and excavated in 1911, probably when Victoria Avenue was widened to its present extent. The currently Scheduled Area represents a good indication of the extent of the tower, which is marked on 20th century mapping. By 1971 the remains appear to have been removed or reburied, and a deposit of stone chippings burying and filling the tower would appear to date from this episode. An approximate diameter of 7.5m for the tower was suggested. Stone setts in the road which were taken to mark the line of the tower were shown to be poorly located. ->

-> The remains of the east and west walls of an early post-medieval house that abutted the tower were also exposed in the cable trench. These were of brick and sandstone construction, as depicted on 18th century illustrations. <13>

Included in a gazetteer of castle sites in Shropshire, in connection with the documentary references to an embattled/crenellated house. <14>

Sources

Search results generated by the HBSMR Gateway from exeGesIS SDM Ltd.