Lock up 20m south of Little London Cottage in the High Street

Reasons for Designation

Lock ups or blind houses are small buildings built as temporary prisons for the incarceration of drunkards, vagrants and people disturbing the peace. Generally stone built but occasionally wooden, they are square, round or octagonal, containing either one cell or one for either sex. A small, sometimes barred window was often included but the inside was always dim, hence the term blind house. In some examples an iron cradle or wooden bench survives, on which the prisoner slept. They were often built by the parish or as a gift to the village or town by a wealthy resident and are generally centrally placed. Blind houses went out of use in the mid-19th century when they were made redundant by the formation of a regular police force. The lock up 20m south of Little London Cottage in the High Street is a well- preserved example of a lock up which preserves original fittings in the form of a wooden bench and a chain.

Details

The monument includes an 18th century lock up on the north side of Heytesbury High Street. The village is situated below the south facing scarp of Salisbury Plain to the south east of Warminster. The lock up, which is a Listed Building Grade II, is set into the garden wall of Little London Cottage, projecting partly into the garden and partly onto the pavement. It is octagonal, 3.4m wide from face to face, and built of ashlar limestone. The walls are 2.5m high and 0.5m thick and the roof is conical, built of thick stone tiles surmounted by a ball finial. The doorway is to the south, facing the street and the studded door is of oak. There is a small barred square window above. Inside the building there is a wooden bench with a chain attached.

MAP EXTRACT The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

34209

Legacy System:

RSM

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: Wiltshire, (1975), 268

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