Venue Type & Location
Guildhall
Site Name: Blandford Forum (Unlocated)
Location: Blandford Forum
County: Dorset
Location Type: Town - multiple sites at uncertain locations
Overview
On the N side of the market place but it is not known if the present town hall occupies the site of the original.
Current Status
Still in use
History of the Venue
Nothing is known about the location or design of the original town hall.
1713 and 1731 Town destroyed by fire. The second and more serious destroyed virtually everything that had survived the first fire, so the only buildings remaining were the Old House c.1660 in The Close, and the Ryves Almshouses c.1682 in Salisbury Street. Rebuilding, with a widened market place, commenced immediately. 1734 New town hall completed.
Record Source
REED Dorset/Cornwall
Patrons who owned this venue
[No data found.]
Bibliographic Sources
- Hutchins, John. The History and Antiquities of the County of Dorset. 1773. 4 vols. Westminster: J.B. Nichols & Sons, 1861--73
- Tittler, Robert. Architecture and Power: The Town Hall and the English Urban Community c. 1500–1640. Oxford: Clarendon P, 1991
- Underdown, David. Fire From Heaven: Life in an English Town in the Seventeenth Century. London: HarperCollins, 1992