Lancaster Town Hall is a municipal building in
Dalton Square,
Lancaster
Lancaster may refer to:
Lands and titles
*The County Palatine of Lancaster, a synonym for Lancashire
*Duchy of Lancaster, one of only two British royal duchies
*Duke of Lancaster
*Earl of Lancaster
*House of Lancaster, a British royal dynasty
...
,
Lancashire
Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...
, England. It was built in 1909 and is a Grade II*
listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
.
History
The building was commissioned to replace the aging
town hall
In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...
, now the city museum, in Market Square.
The new building was designed by
Edward Mountford and
Thomas Lucas in the
Edwardian Baroque style and the stonework, furniture and carvings were undertaken by
Waring & Gillow
Waring & Gillow (also written as Waring and Gillow) was a noted firm of English furniture manufacturers and antique dealers formed in 1897 by the merger of Gillows of Lancaster and London and Waring of Liverpool.
Background Gillow & Co.
The fi ...
.
[ The carvings on the front pediment were sculpted by ]F. W. Pomeroy
Frederick William Pomeroy (9 October 1856 – 26 May 1924) was a prolific British sculptor of architectural and monumental works. He became a leading sculptor in the New Sculpture movement, a group distinguished by a stylistic turn towards na ...
and the stained glass windows were manufactured by Shrigley and Hunt.[ The tower behind the pediment contains a clock and five bells by ]Gillett & Johnston
Gillett & Johnston was a clockmaker and bell foundry based in Croydon, England from 1844 until 1957. Between 1844 and 1950, over 14,000 tower clocks were made at the works. The company's most successful and prominent period of activity as a be ...
of Croydon.
The facility accommodated a police station in the basement and a magistrates' court on the ground floor and it included an assembly hall, to the rear of the main building, which became known as the "Ashton Hall".[ The concert organ in the Ashton Hall was designed and built by ]Norman and Beard
Norman and Beard were a pipe organ manufacturer based in Norwich from 1887 to 1916.
History
The origins of the company are from a business founded in Diss in 1870 by Ernest William Norman (1851–1927). In 1876 he moved to Norwich where he wen ...
for the hall in time for its opening.
The whole complex, as well as the Queen Victoria Memorial in Dalton Square, had been personally financed by Lord Ashton who officially opened the facility on 27 December 1909.
A war memorial, designed by Thomas Mawson & Sons together with the Bromsgrove School of Art and sculpted by Morton of Cheltenham, was unveiled by the mayor, George Jackson, in a memorial garden adjacent to the town hall, on 3 December 1924. Queen Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 19268 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. ...
, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh
Duke of Edinburgh, named after the capital city of Scotland, Edinburgh, is a substantive title that has been created four times since 1726 for members of the British royal family. It does not include any territorial landholdings and does not pr ...
, visited the town hall in her new capacity as Duke of Lancaster
The dukedom of Lancaster is a former Peerage of England, English peerage, created three times in the Middle Ages, which finally merged in the Crown when Henry V of England, Henry V succeeded to the throne in 1413. Despite the extinction of the ...
on 13 April 1955.
Highly publicised cases to come before the courtroom on the ground floor of the town hall included the initial stages of the trial of Dr Buck Ruxton
Buck Ruxton (born Bukhtyar Chompa Rustomji Ratanji Hakim; 21 March 1899 – 12 May 1936) was an Indian-born physician convicted and subsequently hanging, hanged for the September 1935 murders of his Common-law marriage, common-law wife, Isabell ...
, who in 1935, was accused of murdering both his wife and his housemaid.
The town hall became the headquarters of Municipal Borough of Lancaster on completion but following the amalgamation of the Municipal Borough of Lancaster with the Municipal Borough of Morecambe and Heysham
Morecambe and Heysham was a municipal borough in Lancashire, England. It was formed in 1928 by the merging of Morecambe
Morecambe ( ) is a seaside town and civil parish in the City of Lancaster district of Lancashire, England, on Morecambe ...
in 1974, meetings of the full council of the City of Lancaster
The City of Lancaster, or simply ''Lancaster'' (), is a non-metropolitan district, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in Lancashire, England. It is named after its largest settlement, Lancaster, Lanca ...
have been held in Morecambe Town Hall.[
In May 1995 Priory Records released a recording from the Ashton Hall entitled ''Lancastrian Organ Gems'' which involved excerpts of music composed by ]Felix Mendelssohn
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic music, Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions inc ...
, Malcolm Archer
Malcolm Archer (born 1952) is an English composer, conductor and organist. He was formerly Organist and Director of Music at Bristol Cathedral, at Wells Cathedral and at St Paul's Cathedral and Director of Chapel Music at Winchester College.
...
and Henry Smart
Henry Thomas Smart (26 October 1813 – 6 July 1879) was an English organist and composer.
Biography
Smart was born in London, a nephew of the conductor Sir George Smart and son of a music publisher, orchestra director and accomplished violin ...
performed by Malcolm Archer on the concert organ.
Episode 14 of series 28 of the ''Antiques Roadshow
''Antiques Roadshow'' is a British television programme broadcast by the BBC in which antiques appraisers travel to various regions of the United Kingdom (and occasionally in other countries) to appraise antiques brought in by local people ( ...
'', which was broadcast on 14 March 2014, was filmed in the Ashton Hall within the complex.
The Magistrates' Court had moved to a new building in 1985, but the old Magistrates' Court within the Town Hall was brought back into use as an emergency ' Nightingale Court' during the 2020-2021 COVID-19 pandemic. The Ashton Hall was similarly used as an emergency Crown Court.
Gallery
References
{{City of Lancaster buildings
Buildings and structures in Lancaster, Lancashire
City and town halls in Lancashire
Grade II* listed buildings in Lancashire
Government buildings completed in 1909