PLYMOUTH |
The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History |
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The market in what was at the time known as Plymouth Dock was at the end of Fore Street near the Dockyard gate. This was moved in 1762 to a new site when stalls were erected on the site of some stagnent ponds. These were rebuilt in about 1800. This was not a corn or cattle market. Poultry and butter were sold in an extensive loft over the shambles. The Market Act of 1835 allowed the establishment of a grain market. Mr James St Aubyn, Lord of the Manor, laid the foundation stone of a new market on July 13th 1852 -- the building that still survives today. It was designed in the Italian style by Mr James Piers St Aubyn of London and built by a Mr Clift at a cost of £17,944 7s 7d. The tower at the south end of the butchery was in the style of an Italian camponile and is 124 feet high to the weather-vane. It contained a bell and each face displayed a clock. Market days were Tuesdays, Thursdays and Satuirdays. The building had three iron-trussed roofs with iron lattice balconies supported on slender iron columns with palm-leaf capitals. In 1940 the ARP used the basement of the Market as a control room but it was damaged in the air raids of April 1941. A sign on a pillar in the basement indicated that it had previously been used as a garage for the Royal Hotel. In November 1952 it was occupied by a Mr Cecil E H Jones and Arthur E and Frederick G Marquand, the fruiterers. The Market was taken inside the Dockyard boundary in 1956 and became a Sale Store for the Principal Supply and Transport Officer (Navy). It still survives and is now a scheduled ancient monument.
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