The Municipal Buildings are historic buildings in Corporation Street,

Taunton Taunton () is the county town of Somerset, England. It is a market town and has a Minster (church), minster church. Its population in 2011 was 64,621. Its thousand-year history includes a 10th-century priory, monastic foundation, owned by the ...

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

, England. The buildings, which were the home of Taunton Grammar School before becoming the headquarters of Taunton Borough Council, are Grade II* listed.

History

Taunton Grammar School

The east end of the current building, which was commissioned as a school, dates back to about 1480. The school was re-formed by the

Bishop of Winchester The Bishop of Winchester is the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Winchester in the Church of England. The bishop's seat (''cathedra'') is at Winchester Cathedral in Hampshire. The Bishop of Winchester has always held ''ex officio'' the offic ...

and

Lord Privy Seal The Lord Privy Seal (or, more formally, the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal) is the fifth of the Great Officers of State (United Kingdom), Great Officers of State in the United Kingdom, ranking beneath the Lord President of the Council and abov ...

Richard Foxe Richard Foxe (sometimes Richard Fox) ( 1448 – 5 October 1528) was an English churchman, the founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He was successively Bishop of Exeter, Bath and Wells, Durham, and Winchester, and became also Lor ...

, in 1522. Foxe gave the school an endowment in the shape of a small manor near

Chard Chard (; '' Beta vulgaris'' subsp. ''vulgaris'', Cicla Group and Flavescens Group) is a green leafy vegetable. In the cultivars of the Flavescens Group, or Swiss chard, the leaf stalks are large and often prepared separately from the leaf b ...

. In the late 18th century this was producing an income of some £40, enough to pay a

schoolmaster A schoolmaster, or simply master, is a male school teacher. The usage first occurred in England in the Late Middle Ages and early modern period. At that time, most schools were one-room or two-room schools and had only one or two such teacher ...

but little more. On Foxe's instructions, the mastership of the school was to be in the gift of the Warden of

New College, Oxford New College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by Bishop William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as New College's feeder school, New College was one of the first col ...

"for ever". The school was badly damaged by the Parliamentarian forces commanded by

Robert Blake Robert Blake (or variants) may refer to: Sports * Bob Blake (American football) (1885–1962), American football player * Robbie Blake (born 1976), English footballer * Bob Blake (ice hockey) (1914–2008), American ice hockey player * Rob Blake ...

in the

Sieges of Taunton The sieges of Taunton were a series of three blockades during the First English Civil War. The town of Taunton, in Somerset, was considered to be of strategic importance because it controlled the main road from Bristol to Devon and Cornwall. R ...

between September 1644 and July 1645 during the

English Civil War The English Civil War or Great Rebellion was a series of civil wars and political machinations between Cavaliers, Royalists and Roundhead, Parliamentarians in the Kingdom of England from 1642 to 1651. Part of the wider 1639 to 1653 Wars of th ...

. One of the school's masters,

James Upton Corporal James Upton VC (3 May 1888 − 10 August 1949) was a British Army soldier and an English recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC), the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British ...

, was appointed in 1706 at the instigation of Lord Poulett and built the school up to the point of being a leading provincial grammar school, with over two hundred boys. In 1818, a writer on schools was puzzled to note that although the school had fine buildings, including a school-room "of vast dimensions", it had had "no scholars" for many years. In 1820, ''

The Gentleman's Magazine ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' was a monthly magazine founded in London, England, by Edward Cave in January 1731. It ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1907, ceasing publication altogether in 1922. It was the first to use the term ''m ...

'' reported that The school moved to South Road in 1870, but after getting into financial difficulties, it returned to Corporation Street in 1880, before closing completely in 1885. The newly-completed and abandoned premises in South Road were acquired by Canon

Nathaniel Woodard Nathaniel Woodard ( ; 21 March 1811 – 25 April 1891) was a priest in the Church of England. He founded 11 schools for the middle classes in England whose aim was to provide education based on "sound principle and sound knowledge, firmly groun ...

and became

King's College, Taunton King's College is an independent co-educational day and boarding school in Taunton, Somerset, England, providing education for 2 to 18-year-olds. Set across two sites, it is surrounded by Somerset countryside. A member school of the Woodard Co ...

. Meanwhile, a new girls' grammar school, funded by Bishop Fox's endowment, opened in the former Roman Catholic Church on The Crescent in 1890: this evolved to become known as Bishop Fox's School.

Notable old boys

Notable old boys included: * John Enty (''c.'' 1675 – 1743), presbyterian minister *

John Poulett, 2nd Earl Poulett John Poulett, 2nd Earl Poulett (10 December 1708 – 5 November 1764), styled Viscount Hinton until 1743 was an English peer. Poulett was the son of John Poulett, 1st Earl Poulett and his wife, Bridget Bertie, daughter of the Honourable Pe ...

(1708–1764) *Peregrine Poulett (died 1752), member of parliament for Bridgwater * Vere Poulett, 3rd Earl Poulett (1710–1788) *

Thomas Wakley Thomas Wakley (11 July 179516 May 1862) was an English surgeon. He gained fame as a social reformer who campaigned against incompetence, privilege and nepotism. He was the founding editor of ''The Lancet'', a radical Member of Parliament (MP) ...

(1795–1862), surgeon and social reformer, founder of ''

The Lancet ''The Lancet'' is a weekly peer-reviewed general medical journal, founded in England in 1823. It is one of the world's highest-impact academic journals and also one of the oldest medical journals still in publication. The journal publishes ...

Headquarters of Taunton Borough Council

After Taunton became a

municipal borough A municipal borough was a type of local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of ...

in 1885, civic leaders decided to acquire the vacant grammar school building in Corporation Street and to convert it for municipal use in 1887. In order to create extra capacity for council officers, the building was significantly extended to the west in 1904. The building continued to serve as the headquarters of Taunton Corporation for much of the 20th century and remained the local seat of government when the enlarged Taunton Deane Council was formed in 1974. However, the council eventually moved to modern facilities at Deane House on Belvedere Road in spring 1987.

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 Taunton and saw the work being undertaken to convert the Municipal Buildings for future use on 8 May 1987. The building was re-opened as a voluntary service centre by

Princess Margaret Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon (Margaret Rose; 21 August 1930 – 9 February 2002) was the younger daughter of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. She was the younger sister and only sibling of Queen Elizabeth II. ...

on 12 June 1987.

Architecture

The building was designed in the Tudor style and it was built with rubble walls and

ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...

stone dressings. The design involves an asymmetrical main frontage of eleven bays facing onto Corporation Street. The eastern section features five-light

mullion A mullion is a vertical element that forms a division between units of a window or screen, or is used decoratively. It is also often used as a division between double doors. When dividing adjacent window units its primary purpose is a rigid sup ...

ed windows while the western section features gablets containing two-light mullion windows. There is a

bellcote A bellcote, bell-cote or bell-cot is a small framework and shelter for one or more bells. Bellcotes are most common in church architecture but are also seen on institutions such as schools. The bellcote may be carried on brackets projecting from ...

in the centre of the roof. Internally, the main rooms are the council chamber (originally a boys' dormitory), the main hall (originally the schoolroom) and the mayor's parlour.

References