Streets of Exeter - A to C

Streets A to C
Streets D to H
Streets I to O
Streets P to Z

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Latest update 19th February 2008

Allhallows Court and Churchyard

This open park area marks the former church and burial yard of Allhallows-on-the-Wall. The city wall runs along one side, while two sides are bounded by Bartholomew Street West.

The area was known as Friernhay, after eight Franciscan monks built a friary in the early 13th-century. They moved to a site outside of the city in 1300. On St Bartholomew's Day 1637, the site was consecrated as a burial ground after Cathedral Yard was becoming dangerously full.

The original Allhallows-on-the-Wall church was situated at the bottom of Fore Street and was badly damaged by the Parliamentarians during the Civil War. Left derelict, it was eventually demolished to make way for New Bridge Street in 1770. A new Allhallows Church in the popular decorated Gothic style, was built in Bartholomew Yard in 1843 to a John Hayward design. In 1931 it was deconsecrated, and it became a corset factory and during the war it was used for making parachutes. The church was demolished in 1951, leaving a rather lovely green space, just above the city wall and the Catacombs.

Allhallows Court is a small court of apartments at the south west end of the old churchyard, opposite the former rear entrance of the Wheaton's printing works. These houses along with the Baptist Church and the houses running along the top of the city wall, and around the Snail Tower occupy the western part of the original burial ground.

Bailey Street

Situated between the High Street and Rougemont Castle, Bailey Street only came into existence in 1953 when Exeter was rebuilt after the war. The wall beneath the British Legion building, now the Timepiece, was underpinned and built up from below with concrete, as the new street was below the previous level. The whole was then faced in Heavitree stone.

Marks and Spencer was completed in 1951 on a site opposite Little Castle Street. Its construction was unusual for the time, in that the builders initiated an early version of 'just in time' delivery of materials, requiring no land for storage next to the site. In addition, all the site huts were sited on the building ground, making a very clean, and non disruptive construction.

The Castle Hotel had been destroyed by the bombing in the war, but some more buildings above blocked Bailey Street from joining with Castle Street. The buildings were demolished in 1959 and a large, wooden buttress was put in place to support the next standing building - many will remember the timbers covered with vegetation, until their removal and the addition of a retail store on the site. Initially, it opened as Monsoon, but it is now the jewellers, Michael Spiers. Because of the steep approach to Little Castle Street, care was taken to merge Bailey Street in a gentle slope.

The other end of Bailey Street, incorporating Bailey Street Square was not completed until 1964.

It was supposed to have been named Bailey Street because it ran along one side of the castle bailey. However, the Express and Echo reported in 1995, that it was named after Frank Bailey, father of Henry Preston Bailey.

It is now a service road for the rear of the High Street and gives access for vehicles to the City Library and the Castle.

Barbican Steps, City Wall

These steps in the corner of Allhallows Churchyard punch through the city wall and lead down to Exe Street and Bonhay Road, near the Mill on the Exe.

Further along the wall to the west was the Snail Tower, which was a 13th-century defensive tower, demolished in 1810. Along the wall to the east can be found the early Victorian Catacombs.

A barbican is an opening in a wall, or a stronghold. The steps emerge into the lane on the other side of the wall. Gravestones from the former graveyard are against the wall.

Baring Crescent     

Work started to build Baring Crescent on 3rd September 1818 with twelve houses completed by 1828. The development was by a Mr John Brown 'the projector of this extensive improvement to the city of Exeter'. They were described at the time as 'superior cottages' and have simple, if striking facades. The houses are built in a semi-circle with gardens, an access road and a communal pleasure garden in the front.

Three of the houses were burnt out during the blitz and eight saved due to the prompt action of the fire watch. Ten houses survive, leaving a pleasant, if slightly austere semi-circle of houses with a private, semi-circular pleasure ground in front. Although described as 'cottages' they had eight bedrooms, a butlers pantry, wine and beer cellars, a housekeeper's room, a breakfast room, a dining room and two drawing rooms. Plus the usual kitchens and other workrooms.

The Barings Bank Fiasco

The crescent is named after Sir Thomas Baring; his grandfather, John Baring, a Lutheran migrated to Exeter from Bremen, Germany in 1717 and married Elizabeth Vowler, the daughter of a wealthy grocer; At his death in 1748, Baring was the wealthiest merchant in Exeter. His son expanded the Baring empire and established the world famous Baring Brothers Merchant Bank in London, which was, in 1995,  the victim of the infamous Nick Leeson, who bankrupted the firm for £1.3 billion through his share dealing in Singapore - Barings were sold for £1 to the Dutch ING, after 233 years of trading.

Bear Street 

Linking Cathedral Close and South Street, this narrow street is named after the Bear Inn which was the town house of the Abbots of Tavistock. In 1286, the town house of the Abbots was named Bere after the small peninsular of land formed by the Tamar and the Tavy rivers in west Devon. The Abbot of Tavistock was charged by Edward I to administer the silver mines that were situated there. The sign of the inn was a bear with the word Bere, and hence a pun. They seemed to like puns in those days! The Inn remained after the monasteries were dissolved by Henry VIII and was a centre for merchants to trade. A carrier service by Russell's was based at the site of the Bear Inn from before 1800, with heavily laden horse-drawn wagons bound for London departing at dawn, every day of the week. There was a second Bear Inn situated further up South Street from about 1820 to 1871.

This list of occupants in 1897 indicate how few lived in Bear Street.

   Bear street, South street to Deanery place.
   1 Loney Miss Emma, wardrobe dealer
   2 Phillips Miss E.crape cleanr
   2 Callaway Charles, tailor
   3 SiIbey Charles, boot maker
   5 Sibley Wra Chas. engraver

Bear Gate

The Bear Gate was situated at the opposite end of Bear Street (sometimes referred to as Bear Lane) and its position is marked with a small ring in the wall. It is thought that the gate had wooden doors and a simple pitched roof. A chamber was added over the gate by 1613, probably for the keeper. It was demolished in the Spring of 1813 and a certain Thomas Matthews paid the princely sum of £10 for the salvaged materials.

All the buildings dating back several hundred years, on the northern side of Bear Street at the Cathedral Yard end, were demolished in the 1930's. The Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart situated in South Street replaced the old Bear Inn in 1885, on the corner of South Street. On the opposite corner can be found a tree and shrubs, marking the site of the 14th Century Bear Tower which was demolished in January 1966.

Blackall Road

Blackall Road was laid out in 1872 as a private road, and named in 1876. In 1877, the City Council widened the road at the Hillscourt end, and the first housing in the new road was completed. By 1897, the rest of the housing was built. Number 6 and 7 Blackall Road were listed as a total loss after the May 1942 blitz.

The Bishp Blackall Girls' School was built in 1888, on land that belonged to the Episcopal Schools Trust. Opened as the Middle Class School for Girls, it became the Episcopal Modern School and finally, in 1934, Bishop Blackall School before closing. It is now an annexe of Exeter College.

Blackboy Road

This road is named after the Black Boy Inn which used to stand in the road. Royalists met at the inn, plotting the overthrow of Oliver Cromwell, and named it the after the future King Charles II, whose mother, Queen Henrietta Maria nicknamed him 'blackboy'.

Looking up Blackboy Road from the Sidwell Street, Old Tiverton Road roundabout the building on the right replaced a bomb damaged area - it was built for Sanderson's the wallpaper, and soft furnishing company. The pre 1942 line of the road runs parallel to the road from the roundabout for about 100 metres. Blackboy Road served as the main route out of Exeter to Taunton, Bristol and Bath, and was often referred to as the Bath Road.

The historian, Jenkins wrote of a fire in 1799 at the Blackboy Turnpike:

"On the 28th day of July a dreadful fire, which consumed thirteen houses, inhabited chiefly by poor weavers, happened (at) the Black Boy Turnpike, in-the parish of St Sidwell; occasioned by a brick kiln being erected-too near a large stack of furze, which taking fire, communicated itself to the adjoining houses. By this accident a number of poor families were reduced to great distress."

The Blackboy or Withyridge Tollgate was at the start of the Pinhoe Road, on the Polsloe Road side of the junction. It was removed after the turnpike trust expired in 1884. This end of Blackboy Road was also the terminus of the horse drawn tramway - the electric tramway continued as far as St Michaels Church.

In 1873, the City of Exeter Improved Industrial Dwellings Company was formed for 'providing commodious and healthy dwellings for the poor classes'. The tenement Kendall's Building or the Improved Industrial Dwellings in Blackboy Road was built by the company in 1876, along with Mermaid Yard in the West Quarter.

In the first fatal bombing raid of the Second World War on Exeter on the 17th September 1940, four people were killed in Blackboy Road. See Blitz Casualties.

Bluecoat Lane

Situated between Post Office Street and Bedford Street, this small lane was a modern addition to the Princesshay development, and not completed until 1962. The entrance to the lane was the site of the original 16th century, Bedford House.

The site of St John's Hospital School, founded in 1636 in the buildings of a dissolved medieval hospital, stood close to this spot. It famously had a statue of a Blueboy at its entrance, and was locally known as the Bluecoat School. After the destruction of the school in the May 1942 bombing, the statue was moved to a place very close to its original position in Princesshay.

The photo of the side of the post office, was taken just before its demolition in May 2005. Bluecoat Lane has disappeared with the redevelopment.

Broadgate

This small street, linking the western end of Cathedral Yard with the High Street was the main gate into Cathedral Close when it was created in 1286, with the permission of Edward I. The Cathedral's scavenger (cleaner) lived in Broadgate.

During the age of the stage coach, Exeter's inns and hotels would compete for business by ensuring they were the terminus for prestigious services. The Royal Clarence was no exception, as it offered its clientele the Royal Bath and the London Mail services. Indeed, after a particularly frightening accident, in which a Clarence bound stage coach ran amok across the Close, after it clipped the narrow entrance of the Broadgate, the city authorities decided to demolish the old gate and ease the entrance.

Work to remove the gate commenced on 28th December 1824 and the highway was reopened on the 28th February 1825. During the two months of demolition, the Defiance and other coaches that served the Clarence Hotel used the narrow Martins Lane. The building that is now Pizza Express constructed on the corner. During 2005, Broadgate has been pedestrianised, and the entry of cars into the Close is restricted. The photo shows the post marking the gate and a commemorative plaque. Also see Broadgate in Areas.

Buddle Lane

Buddle Lane in St Thomas may have been named after the Budgell family who were landowners in St Thomas. However, there is an alternate story behind the name - some say it was named after the springs of water that burst from holes in the road. It has also been known as Pound Lane after the cattle pound that was once present at one end of the lane. The area became a place of expansion for Exeter when the City Council built 64 council houses in what was then a rural lane, in 1923.

The lane runs between Cowick Street and Okehampton Street, and contains the Green Gables Inn, built by the City Brewery in 1935, an a rather strange design which is a cross Dutch, Art-Deco. The inn was built on the land of the Broadmeadow estate.

Castle Street and Little Castle Street

The old street that led from the High Street to Rougemont Castle was replaced by a wider, parallel street in 1772. The old street became Little Castle Street and the new cut, Castle Street.

The block of buildings between, was headed by the Castle Hotel at the lower end. It was lost during the May 1942 blitz. The scrap of bombed land was for many years the site of a huge wooden buttress, designed to support the building above. A rather attractive retail unit, that was initially occupied by the fashion store Monsoon, was built in the mid 1980's. It is now a jewellers. A city library was built in 1930 at a cost of £55,000 on the opposite side of Castle Street. It was burnt out, with the loss of a million county books and documents in the 1942 bombing, but was restored after the war.

A pub and restaurant called the Hole in the Wall can be found in the very narrow Little Castle Street - this street is the closest to how many streets would have looked in Exeter before the 20th century.

Catherine Street and Catherine Gate

Apart from Little Stile, the Catherine Gate site is the least visible of the seven gates of the Cathedral Close. Indeed, since the refurbishment of the modern St Catherine's Square during 2005, there appears to be no reminder of the position of the gate.

St Catherine's Gate was situated by St Catherine's Chapel and had been marked by an iron ring in the retaining wall of the flower bed in St Catherine's Square. Before St Catherine's was built around about 1457, the gate was named Bickleigh or Berkly, a corruption of Ercevesk, because it was situated next to the house of Canon Ercevesk.

Catherine Street runs from the corner of Cathedral Close, by St Martin's Church to Bedford Street. Before 1942, it ran parallel to the High Street as far as Bampfylde Street. It was one of those thoroughfares that was laid out during the time of King Alfred in the 9th-century. Prior to 1942, it was a narrow congested street full of pubs, shops and small businesses. It took its name from St Catherine's Chapel that was on the corner of Egypt Lane. The ruins of the chapel remain as a memorial to the 1942 bombing.

Oddfellow's Hall, now housing a shoe shop and coffee shop, can also be found in Catherine Street. Opposite the church is the SPCK Bookshop, which dates from the 15th-century, and the only one remaining from several in the street. There is evidence that John Whytten, a mason signed an agreement to build them on 14th September 1404, for the cost of £6 6s 8d. They had all mod-cons with an indoor gardrobe on the first floor, for the convenience of the occupants. The houses were probably built to accommodate priests and were converted into shops in the 17th-century.

Cheeke Street

Named after the Cheeke or Chick family of St Sidwells. They were prominent brewers from Elizabethan times onwards. The street was developed during the 19th-century on their land. It is completely modern now, having suffered in the blitz and has little to recommend it.

It runs from Sidwell Street down to the Paris Street roundabout. The new Vue cinema acts as a full stop when looking down Cheeke Street from Sidwell Street. One side of the bus station fronts Cheeke Street and is the main entrance for buses and coaches.

Chute Street

The unfortunate inhabitants of Chute Street live in a street whose name is a corruption of the Saxon word, Shyte. A brook ran down the street which was used, from the Saxon times, to carry away sewage. It became known as Shytebrook or later on Shitbrook, and ran past the bottom of Paris Street, which was once called Shytebrook Street. It emerged at the river in Larkbeare, near Colleton Hill. The brook was covered over in 1843 and carries only drain water, leaving its previous contents to be carried away in modern sewers.

Cowick Street

A Saxon name, from the Saxon manor of Cowic or Coic, which was on this side of the river, now known as St Thomas. Wick is the Saxon word for farm, so it is 'cow farm'. Cowick Street is very straight between the railway bridge and Old Vicarage Road, suggesting that it may have been laid out by the Romans. This is also the limit of the frequent flooding that has occurred over the millennia.

Cowick Street contains some interesting old buildings along its length, including the facade of the former Devon County Debtors Prison, the old Fire Station and Council Offices, St Thomas Church (with a monument to Grace Darling) and a variety of interesting old shops.

Cricklepit Lane, Street

Not always known as Cricklepit, this lane was once the eastern end of Rackclose Lane. It became Cricklepit Lane in 1868, when memories of the rackfields on Shilhay where fading. John Gendall drew an illustration of the Cricklepit end of Rackclose Lane in 1848 for Thomas Shapter's History of the Cholera; it shows children playing amongst the pigeons, ducks, chickens and pigs, all squeezed into a narrow lane of hovels on one side and city wall on the other.

Cricklepit derives from crickenpette, meaning pit or hollow beneath the cliffs and creic, an old word for rock or crag. Nicholas Gervase was granted in 1180 to 1190 by Robert de Courtenay the right to all the water flowing between the corn mills of Thomas the Miller and Crickenpette. Despite at least five fulling mills lining the leat below Cricklepit/Rackclose Lane, Cricklepit Mill had always been a corn mill.

In the 1960's, most of the leat was culverted and Cricklepit Mill of Messrs French was the only remaining mill, of the many mills, that once lined the leat and helped to make Exeter rich on serge production. The suspension bridge with the same name was built in 1988.