Recently I was made aware, via a journalist on Twitter, of a subterranean chamber in Shrewsbury that had been hidden for centuries, but was accidentally uncovered by some road works.
As you can imagine, I was suddenly twice my size. Nothing gets me excited quite like news of a secret underground structure that I can have a nose around in, providing nobody catches me.
News that the council, in their infinite wisdom, wanted to fill it in with concrete gave me a sense of urgency like no other, and even though we live in a town notorious for flooding, even though our summer has consisted of ten minute blips before a day or two of rainfall, I made it my priority to take a look.
I've named it St Johns Hole, because it's on a street named St John's Hill,
Its wordplay but watch as it offends religious bigots, as I come inside St Johns Hole!
The exterior photo was taken during the day, but it was under the cover of darkness that I sought to access St Johns Hole. It was actually pouring down with rain when I got here, which is hardly ideal, but I wasn't sure I'd get the chance again. I had to do this while the opportunity was there. It just meant that slipping into St Johns Hole was going to be a pretty sloppy experience.
It was dark, and I couldn't even see into the hole, nevermind determine whether it was something I could climb back out of. I had to just run on blind faith, and drop in. Some might say that's brave, that would be largely inaccurate. I'm not brave, I'm just stupid and lucky.
Here's the interior of the hole, looking out.
It's a bit of an architectural mishmash down here, the ceiling clearly made out of Georgian bricks, but the walls obviously medieval. This isn't so surprising. By the Georgian era the medieval ruins of the town walls had outlived their purpose and would have been plundered for building supplies. However, according to Victorian maps, these medieval blocks are right on the site of one of the old town gates. My source speculated that this was the remains of Wheeler Gate or Quarry Gate. However, a quick peek at the old Victorian maps of Shrewsbury shows this area as the Site of Shoplatch Gate. This makes sense, given that the street beyond it does lead onto Shoplatch.
I'm not entirely sure why one side is painted black, but that is the side that faces the nearest house, which was built in 1766. The towns archives allegedly have a painting of this house from that era which depict it next to Wall Lane, which was a little path that used to run along the inside of the old town walls.
Its generally speculated that this is the remains of Wall Lane, built over in Georgian times. Allegedly beneath the muddy ground, one can find the original cobbled floor.
The second chamber is a lot narrower, but it also dispenses with the medieval blocks. It is further away from the site of the Shoplatch gate though.
At the far end, black paint has drawn a smiley face with eerie crosses for eyes on what appears to be a bricked up doorway. Right next to that is a set of stairs leading upwards. Presumably once they would have led to street level, but now there's a pavement in the way.
But what are these chambers, and what were they for? I want to say that they are the cellar of a building that is no longer extant, but Victorian maps don't make any mention of these chambers, or any building that might have stood above them. Whatever this was, it was forgotten about by the 1800s.
Should this be filled in? It's worth noting that it's underneath the pavement, not the road, and my source journalist had an interesting idea of covering it with glass so that tourists could see it. I personally would like to see it preserved. But whatever its ultimate fate, I think what's important is that it gets documented while it is open. It's tedious to access, and the scramble out was hilariously lacking in grace, but I couldn't just let it go.
To conclude, it's amazing that some mundane road works have uncovered such a secret. Yes, it's small, and it's true purpose might have been something perfectly ordinary and uninteresting like an ice house or a wine cellar, but the fact remains that it was underground and nobody knew about it. Doesn't it just tease the imagination? What else is beneath our feet, waiting to be discovered?
Thats it for this blog post. My next one will be a derelict school on my international blog. It might even be two schools. However, I'm also playing with the idea of doing then/now rooftop views of Shrewsbury seeing as it's almost been ten years since I started doing this, and I want to celebrate the fact that I haven't died. In the meantime, Like my Facebook page, Follow my Instagram and Follow my Twitter.
Thanks for reading!
