Ware, Hertfordshire
Ware is a town and civil parish in the East Hertfordshire district, in the county of Hertfordshire, England. It is close to the county town of Hertford. In the 2021 Census, the parish had a population of 19,622.
History
Archaeology has shown that Ware has been occupied since at least the Mesolithic period. The Romans had a sizeable settlement here and foundations of several buildings, including a temple, and two cemeteries have been found. Ware was on Ermine Street, the Roman road from London to Lincoln. A well-preserved Roman skeleton of a teenage girl was found beside the road and nicknamed 'Ermintrude'. It has been said that Ware is one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe.In the Domesday Book of 1086, the town was named Waras from the natural weirs in the River Lea. The historic rivalry with nearby Hertford can be traced to 1090 when the Lady of Ware diverted Ermine Street from the Roman ford to create a High Street and new bridge over the Lea. The bailiff of Hertford tried to destroy the new bridge before it was recognised as part of the King's Highway by Henry III in person. In 1381, during the so-called Peasants' Revolt, 42 prominent Ware townsmen, led by the Vicar, joined others in destroying Hertford Castle, then owned by John of Gaunt. Many inns were established in the High Street, reflecting Ware's importance as a coaching stop on the Old North Road. Chaucer mentioned Ware twice in The Canterbury Tales. The Great Bed of Ware, cited by Shakespeare and other playwrights, was housed in a succession of Ware inns.
Mary I had Thomas Fust burned at the stake in Ware marketplace for refusing to convert to Catholicism.
In the 17th century, Ware became the source of the New River, constructed to take fresh water into London. The Ware Mutiny occurred on 15 November 1647, between the First and the Second English Civil War at Corkbush Field, when soldiers were ordered to sign a declaration of loyalty to Thomas Fairfax, the commander-in-chief of the New Model Army, and the Army Council. When some with Leveller sympathies refused to do this they were arrested and court-martialled; one of the ringleaders, Trooper Richard Arnold, was shot. 62 children were sent to Ware after the 1666 Great Fire of London. In 1683, the Rye House Plot involved assassinating Charles II after he passed through Ware. It failed.
England's first turnpike road was established at Wadesmill, two miles north of Ware, in 1633 in an attempt to control the malting traffic into and from Ware. The town had become a major maltmaking centre during the Civil War and soon became the most important supplier of malt to the Common Brewers of London, with its own quoted price on the London grain market, particularly for brown malt, used in brewing porter beer. The Ordnance Survey First Edition of 1880 showed 107 malt kilns in Ware, more than twice as many as in any other Hertfordshire town. The last working malting in Ware, Pauls Malt at Broadmeads, closed in 1994. In November 1999, the bronze Maltmaker statue by Oxfordshire sculptor, Jill Tweed, was unveiled outside St Mary's Church to commemorate the end of the industry and the Millennium. The unveiling was done by Hugo Page Croft, member of a famous Ware malting family; others involved in the project were Guy Horlock, chairman of the Stanstead Abbots maltsters, French & Jupps Ltd, and David Perman, curator of the Ware Museum.
Two legends associated with the 17th century are sometimes mentioned. One is that bargemen born in Ware were given the "freedom of the River Thames" — avoiding the requirement of paying lock dues — as a result of their transport of fresh water and food in during the Great Plague of London of 1665–66. In fact, Ware barges were freed from having to carry a pilot in the Port of London as a result of their relieving the Dutch blockade of the Thames in 1667, by bringing in coal brought overland from the Wash. The other legend is that Ware bargemen brought plague bodies out of London in 1666 and interred them at the Buryfield. The truth is that the Burymead was mentioned as early as 1513 and referred to the present Glaxo site where a number of Roman cemeteries have been found; the Buryfield Recreation Ground was established in 1931 on charity land, the Bell Close, now partly covered by the GSK multi-storey car park.
At the end of the 19th century, malt-making in Ware was joined by two other industries. In 1886, Dennis Wickham, member of a brewing family, established a bottling plant which in 1900 moved to Viaduct Road and became an engineering company. The firm of D. Wickham & Co. became manufacturers of railcars and construction equipment, closing in 1991. In 1898, the pharmaceutical company, Allen & Hanburys, acquired a lease on the Ware corn mill and began building a medicines, dried milk and health foods factory at the nearby Buryfield. A new plant for pharmaceutical research and development was built in Park Road during World War II. Allenburys, as it was known, was merged with Glaxo in 1958 and is now part of GlaxoSmithKline.
The Ware Town Council coat of arms was issued in 1956 by the College of Arms to Ware Urban District Council, and transferred to Ware Town Council in 1975. The arms are derived from matters with which Ware is associated — the barge rudders reference the bargemen of Ware, with the red and white striping on the rudders being the livery colours of the City of London, associating the Ware bargemen's free entry rights to that City; the crossed coach horns reference the town's long history as a coaching town; and the sheaves of barley reference the malting history of Ware. The motto "cave" was suggested by the College of Heralds, with the intent of its being a pun on the town's name.
Features
Ware has 202 listed buildings including fourteen Grade II* and three Grade I, one of which is the remains of a 14th-century friary, now the offices of Ware Town Council and a conference, wedding and function venue called Ware Priory and Fletcher's Lea. Recent restoration work has shown that it dates from the 13th century. Opposite the priory is the large 14th-century St Mary's parish church. It is known for its elaborate font with large carved stone figures. The town is also famous for its many 18th-century riverside gazebos, several of which have been restored recently.The Lee Navigation is a canalised river incorporating the River Lea, which runs through the centre of the town; it is one of its most popular tourist attractions, as well as being home to a thriving boating community.
Ware is also known for the Great Bed of Ware, which is mentioned in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and is reputedly able to accommodate at least four couples. It is in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, but from April 2012 until April 2013 it was loaned to the museum in Ware.
Ware is mentioned in The Canterbury Tales and was also the unintended destination of John Gilpin in William Cowper's comic poem.
Some of the buildings along the High Street date back to the 14th century. Ware used to have many coaching inns and passageways between some shops lead to their stables. Many of these passageways also have former maltings. Crib Street has a good sequence of timber-framed buildings which have been restored since the 1970s.
Today the town's main employer is GlaxoSmithKline, which has large manufacturing and research plants in the town. The Ware company was formerly Allen & Hanburys and has a long connection with the town, with many historical items on view in a section on the company in the Ware Museum. There are also many other small factories.
Fairport Convention's 1971 album "Babbacombe" Lee was inspired by an old newspaper story that fiddle player Dave Swarbrick bought in an antiques shop in the High Street of Ware when the band lived at The Angel former public house in nearby Little Hadham.
File:WareWeir.jpg|thumb|right|Ware Weir. The GSK offices are in the background.
Places of interest
Ware Museum
Ware has its own museum which, in 2008, received full accreditation from the Museums, Archives and Libraries Council. The museum is independent and run completely by volunteers. In 2012–2013, Ware Museum was home to the Great Bed of Ware on loan for one year from The Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The bed is reputedly haunted by the ghost of its alleged maker, Jonas Fosbrooke, who is said to harass any non-royal person who attempts to sleep in the bed.The museum is partially housed in the former Priory Lodge and partly inside a Second World War Command Bunker used to co-ordinate local defences and respond to air-raids; this part was refurbished for 2010. The museum contains many interesting items from the history of Ware, including Roman archaeology, exhibits relating to the Second World War and Allen & Hanburys pharmaceuticals. There are also a number of exhibits for children and many special activity days throughout the year.
Scott's Grotto
Ware is home to Scott's Grotto, built for John Scott, an 18th-century poet who owned Amwell House from 1768. The grotto, the largest in the UK, is a series of chambers extending over 65 ft into the chalk hillside. The chambers are decorated with shells, stones such as flint and coloured glass. The grotto was restored in 1990 by the Ware Society and is now owned and managed by the Scott's Grotto Trust; it is Grade I listed.Bluecoat Yard
In Bluecoat Yard is Place House, Ware's oldest extant surviving building. It dates from the early 14th century, with additions in the 16th and 17th centuries, and was once Ware's Manor House. It has a crown post roof.Governance
Ware has three tiers of local government, at parish, district and county level: Ware Town Council, East Hertfordshire District Council, and Hertfordshire County Council.Historically, the parish of Ware was included in the hundred of Braughing. Prior to the 16th century Ware was sometimes called a borough, but it never had a borough charter from the monarch nor sent members to Parliament.
The town was given improvement commissioners in 1811 to pave and light the streets. In 1835 Ware became the centre of a poor law union, and the Ware Union Workhouse was built in 18391840 on Collett Road.
The town was made a local board district on 1 August 1849. The local board replaced the improvement commissioners and had more extensive powers, particularly regarding sewerage and water supply. The local board of health district covered the built-up part of the parish of Ware plus an area known as Amwell End, a southern suburb of the town which was in the neighbouring parish of Great Amwell. After elections, the Ware Local Board held its first meeting on 1 September 1849 at the boardroom of the Ware Union Workhouse, when William Parker was appointed the first chairman of the board.
Under the Local Government Act 1894, the Ware Local Board became Ware Urban District Council on 31 December 1894. The Act also directed that parishes could not straddle urban and rural districts, and so the parish of Ware was split with effect from 4 December 1894 into two parishes: Ware Urban for the part within the urban district, and Ware Rural for the part outside it. Ware Rural parish was included in the Ware Rural District and was renamed Wareside in 1991.
Ware Urban District Council was initially based at the Town Hall at 8 West Street. The Town Hall on West Street comprised an early eighteenth house on the street frontage, behind which were a large public hall and meeting rooms which had been built in 1867, initially as a Corn Exchange. The Corn Exchange business failed in 1875. The following year the building was bought by a new company called the Ware Town Hall and Assembly Rooms Company. The urban district council rented rooms there to serve as its offices and meeting place.
In 1920, the urban district council was effectively given Ware Priory; its owner, Anne Elizabeth Croft, gave the council a 999year lease at a nominal rent of 3 shillings a year. The council then used Ware Priory as its offices and meeting place until its abolition. Most of the former Town Hall at 8 West Street was demolished in the 1950s, retaining only the original house at the front, which is now known as Rankin House.
Ware Urban District Council was granted a coat of arms on 26 March 1956.
Ware Urban District was abolished under the Local Government Act 1972, merging with other districts to become East Hertfordshire on 1 April 1974. A successor parish was created covering the former urban district of Ware, with its parish council taking the name Ware Town Council. Ware Town Council is now based at The Priory.