History according to Salisbury's Plaques

For the purpose of this website, the definition of a plaque is a textual memorial. However, in one or two cases, memorials which are purely pictorial have been included, thus Salisbury is very rich in plaques.

This website concentrates on the area of Salisbury which includes the railway station, the bus station, the market place, the Cathedral, Fisherton Street and Castle Street. Date information has been taken from the plaques and arranged here in a table in chronological order. This gives an interesting Salisbury view of history. For example John Halle's famous house was completed in the year that the Duke of Buckingham was executed!

If you click on the plaque number at the end of any row in this table, you obtain further details and photographs. Not all plaques contain dates so do not appear in the table. The whereabouts of plaques is also illustrated in the map found below the table. To see thumbnails of the plaques click here.

If you have any comments relating to this website, please click here Plaque Webmaster

Click on any of the section titles below to go straight there.

Section 1: Plaque history by date
Section 2: Location of Plaques
Section 3: Viewing the Plaques
Section 4: Plaque Thumbnails
Section 5: A Plaque Walk
Section 6: Plaque details via Plaque Number
Section 7: Future Plaques
Section 8: Links to other Web Sites

Plaque history by date

Location of Plaques

Hover over a numbered blue square on the map below with your cursor to see the short name for the plaque.
Click on a blue square on the map to open up a new web page describing the plaque(s) found in that location.
There are a number of locations where there are a number of plaques close together.
Thus on the map in these locations there is only one blue square for a number of plaques.

Viewing the Plaques

Whilst walking around Salisbury, you will have to look carefully to find all the plaques. For example one set of text is on the top (roof?) of the Market Place Guildhall. It can be seen by looking up towards the Guildhall from the market place war memorial. The text has been renewed in gold not many years ago but you will probably still need binoculars or a good camera to be able to read the text clearly.

Some plaques are inside buildings. The Market Place Guildhall has some magnificent plaques inside, including the one commemorating Princess Diana's visit. The Military Museum in the Cathedral Close has a number of plaques on the wall of its memorial garden grounds. These can usually only be accessed by visiting the Military Museum. The plaque to John Halle is just inside the cinema in New Canal. This can be viewed without payment if the cinema is open. The plaque on the Poultry Cross is to be found well camouflaged on the central support.

A GPS Garmin has been used to determine 5 figure values for the Eastings and Northings using the British National Grid as used by Ordnance Survey. These values are not always as accurate as their precision due to the obscuration of the satellites by buildings and trees.

Plaque Thumbnails

Thumbnails are miniature pictures. To see thumbnails of all the plaques click here.
To get back to this current page you will need to use the 'back' on your browser.

A Plaque Walk

Information has been extracted from this website and made into a leaflet.
A copy of this leaflet can be downloaded here either in Microsoft WORD or in pdf format.
Click here for Microsoft WORD version (0.9 megabytes).
Click here for pdf version (5.3 megabytes).
If you have the skills and facilities, you can then print the 8 pages on your own colour printer on two double-sided A4 sheets with two pages per side, short edge binding in page order 8,1,2,7,6,3,4,5. The A4 sheets can be put together and folded in half to make the A5 leaflet. Armed with this leaflet you can then walk around our beautiful city, and see how many of the plaques you can find, and learn some of the history of Salisbury. This leaflet contains a plaque map and a date table. Plan a route and use the date table to tick off the plaques you discover.
As an alternative to printing, you could view the leaflet on your iPhone or such.
To do so click here.

Plaque details via Plaque Number

As you will already have gathered, every plaque has been given a number. If you know the plaque number you are interested in, then this grid here will give you a quick access to it. Simply click on the number within the grid.
Note numbers 9,10,12,32,58,63,66,68,70,71,72,102,104-110 are not currently in use.

Future Plaques

The webmaster welcomes proposals for plaques. There are no absolute rules but if it is to celebrate the life of a person it is preferred that the person should have been deceased for a number of years. The Plaques Webmaster is very much biased to plaques being placed within Salisbury and keen that the plaques should be able to be seen by the public, not internal to a building. Plaque suggestions are dealt with and if not proceeded with for some reason at the time, they have a tendency to end up lost in history. It is intended now to try and keep a record of all plaque suggestions on this website. When a suggestion is proceeded with and a plaque is unveiled, then its suggestion will be removed from here and the information become a full instance in the main website. Having a full list here means that the suggestions can always be easily reviewed, even years later. It also means that information can be added here to any plaque suggestion and maybe over a number of years sufficient evidence will accumulated to warrant a change of decision in a particular case and for that plaque to go ahead.

Plaque Suggestions

To make a suggestion for a future plaque, please email by clicking here Plaque Webmaster.

Cartoon originally published in Saga Magazine and provided courtesy of Ian Baker 10/01/2011

Agnes Bottenham publican, and founder of Trinity Hospital (1372). Possibly a blue plaque on Brown St on the wall of the pub where Agnes was the publican as it was the profits from that trade that allowed her to open an almshouse. For further details click here.
William Corbin Finch - In 1813 The Corbin Finch family opened Fisherton House Asylum (Old Manor Hospital) for business.
Dr Chubb - Founder of the Old Manor hospital in Wilton Road.
Richard Woods (1715-1793) - Designer of the Bourne Hill gardens.
Florence Nightingale - A famous nurse who might have practised at Salisbury Infirmary.
The Saxon Cedric - The name Cerdic remained Cerdic until Walter Scott popularised him as Cedric in Ivanhoe in 1819. See plaque number 97.
According to the Anglo-Saxon chronicles:
A.D. 534:- This year died Cerdic, the first king of the West Saxons. Cynric his son succeeded to the government, and reigned afterwards twenty-six winters. And they gave to their two nephews, Stuff and Wihtgar, the whole of the Isle of Wight.
A.D. 552:- This year Cynric fought with the Britons on the spot that is called Sarum, and put them to flight. Cerdic was the father of Cynric, Cerdic was the son of Elesa, Elesa of Esla, Esla of Gewis, Gewis of Wye, Wye of Frewin, Frewin of Frithgar, Frithgar of Brand, Brand of Balday, Balday of Woden. In this year Ethelbert, the son of Ermenric, was born, who on the two and thirtieth year of his reign received the rite of baptism, the first of all the kings in Britain.
Edwin Young - He gifted an Art Gallery to Salisbury. See plaque numbers 37 and 38
John Marsh - A local composer.
James Wyatt - The architect who in the late 18th century was commissioned by Bishop Shute Barrington to carry out the controversial and destructive restoration of Salisbury Cathedral.
Augustus John - A major british artist who used to lived at Fryern Court near Fordingbridge and drank at the Haunch of Venison in a room known as the Captain's Cabin.
Edward Seago - Another major british artist who was based at Wilton House and Old Sarum airfield during part of the war and was responsible for camouflage in the south. He learned to fly at Old Sarum. He also drank at the Haunch of Venison. For quite a lot of the time, and on occasions after the war, Seago rented Moat Cottage at Britford. It is still there, much extended, and now (2013) a many starred holiday let.
There is (July 2014) a very big exhibition of Seago's work in the Portland Gallery, London. He died 19th January 1974. There was a memorial exhibition at Marlborough Fine Arts in December 1974. The late Queen Mother, the Duke of Edinburgh and Prince Charles have all been collectors of his work. He painted with the Duke of Edinburgh and accompanied him on a trip to Antarctica. He stayed at Sandringham most years where there was in July 2014 an exhibition of his work which is in royal ownership. Most of the royals visited his studio in Norfolk. He helped Prince Charles to learn to paint and Prince Charles has written the foreword to a biography which was published in 2014. He painted a lot of images of Salisbury and its surrounds.
Edith Olivier - A novelist of Huguenot descent, born in Wilton, one of ten children of a Rector and later a Canon of Wilton, educated at St Hugh's College, Oxford. She at one stage lived at 20 The Close.
Sidney C Chick - The fireman on the stationary train when the express crashed into it in the 1906 Salisbury Train Disaster. In spite of being badly burnt he managed to walk to the Infirmary, but died from his injuries. It was suggested that the plaque be placed on Platform 6 at Salisbury railway station, the site of the accident. The plaque should be a memorial to all 28 who died in the crash. Interested railway groups should be invited to the unveiling ceremony.
Lovibond Court - to commemorate the founding of Lovibond Tintomter works on this site in the late 19th century.
Catherine Lovibond - Business woman; founder of Stonehenge Woollen Industries. A plaque to be placed on the old S.P.C.K. shop in the High Street. She tried to help the unemployed rural poor in the county by encouraging people to knit and so generate an income to help support their families, at the beginning of the 20th century.
Theodore Brown - A lifelong experimenter in optical entertainments such as stereo pictures, pop up books, cinematography, 3D movies, jigsaw puzzles. He was editor of Optical Lantern and Cinematography Journal. This is a request from the developers of the site between Devizes Road and Wilton Road, to put up a plaque to Theodore Brown 1870-1938, who lived in a house on the site.
Commemorating Bournehill as the home of Salisbury District Council from 1927 until its demise.
John Constable - a plaque to be sited on the Long bridge, Elizabeth Gardens.
Tom Adlam - Salisbury's only Victoria Cross won during WWI. A plaque might be placed on the Adlam Buildings in Rectory Road, and not on Bishop Wordsworth’s school. He came from Salisbury, was educated here, and ran a business in the city.
Lawrence Whistler - the glass engraver, who lived at the Walton Canonry.
John Ivie - a plaque to be placed on the house of John Ivie, mayor of Salisbury in 1627. When the plague arrived in the city he organised the food supplies and care of its citizens, when everyone else in authority had fled.
W.H. Hudson - the author of “A Shepherd’s Life”. He used to live in a farmhouse near Martin.
Sir Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton, CBE - (14 January 1904 – 18 January 1980) was an English fashion and portrait photographer, diarist, interior designer and an Academy Award-winning stage and costume designer for films and the theatre. Between 1930 and 1945 he leased Ashcombe House in Wiltshire. In 1948 he bought Reddish House in Broadchalke. He died at the house in 1980 and is buried in Broadchalke churchyard.
A.G. Street - a plaque on Ditchampton farm, to commemorate this the well-known author and broadcaster. He was a renowned broadcaster on the BBC and his 27 titles are much sought after even though they are out of print. He wrote at length about country matters during the 1930's.- 1950's.
Dorothy Brooke - Dorothy Brooke was the founder of the Brooke Hospital for Horses in Cairo. She at one time lived in Malmesbury House in The Close.
Nomansland Reading Room - to celebrate their centenary in 2010.
Henry Fielding - Henry Fielding was a novelist and playwright, born April 22nd 1707- died October 8th 1754. He had a house near St Ann’s Gate in Salisbury's Cathedral Close. Over four years he wooed the three Craddock sisters, who lived at 14 The Close. In February 1734 he married the eldest Charlotte Craddock and at first lived here in her mother’s house. The couple lived happily together for ten years until Charlotte died of a fever in Bath in 1744. There is a long article here on Henry Fielding.
Brook House - in Coombe Bissett is where the artist Henry Lamb lived and where Evelyn Waugh and John Betjeman visited.

Links to other Web Sites

Click here   to learn what the White Hart hotel in Salisbury has to offer.

Click here   for an exciting site concerning some of Salisbury's intriguing history, by Frogg Moody.

Click here   for the website of a current plaque manufacturer.

Click here   for a website on blue plaques and their history.

Click here   for the origin of Salisbury street names.

Click here   for details of memorials and monuments in Portsmouth.

Click here   for details of the English Heritage register of plaque schemes.