Nantwich, Cheshire - High Street, pedestrianised, shops - local postcard c.1980s

Postcard
• Picture / Image:  High Street, Nantwich, Cheshire - shows pedestrianised street with shops including Nobel Hollins, Yorkshire Building Society, Olivers, Supercards, WH Smsiths
• Publisher:  Crewe andf Nantwich Borough Council
• Postally used:  yes
• Stamp:  1st clas vermilion Machin
• Postmark(s):  Manchester c.1994
• Sent to:  Brill, Aylesbury, Bucks.
• Notes / condition: 

Please ask if you need any other information and I will do the best I can to answer.

Image may be low res for illustrative purposes - if you need a higher definition image then please contact me and I may be able to send one.

------------------------------------------------

Postage & Packing:

UK (incl. IOM, CI & BFPO): 99p

Europe: £1.60

Rest of world (inc. USA etc): £2.75

No additional charges for more than one postcard. You can buy as many postcards from me as you like and you will just pay the fee above once. (If buying postcards with other things such as books, please contact or wait for invoice before paying).

Payment Methods:

UK - PayPal, Cheque (from UK bank) or postal order

Outside UK: PayPal ONLY (unless otherwise stated) please.   NO non-UK currency checks or money orders (sorry).

NOTE: All postcards are sent in brand new stiffened envelopes which I have bought for the task. These are specially made to protect postcards and you may be able to re-use them. In addition there are other costs to sending so the above charge is not just for the stamp!

I will give a full refund if you are not fully satisfied with the postcard.

----------------------------------------------

Text from the free encyclopedia WIKIPEDIA may appear below to give a little background information (internal links may not  work) :

*************

Nantwich is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Cheshire East and the county of Cheshire, England. In 2011 Nantwich had a population of 13,964.^[1]

The origins of the settlement date to Roman times^{[citation needed]} when salt from Nantwich was used by the Roman garrisons at Chester (Deva Victrix) and Stoke-on-Trent as both a preservative and a condiment. Salt has been used in the production of Cheshire cheese and in the tanning industry, both products of the dairy industry based in the Cheshire Plain around the town. Wich and wych are names used to denote brine springs or wells. In 1194 there is a reference to the town as being called Nametwihc, which would indicate it was once the site of a pre-Roman Celtic nemeton or sacred grove.^[2]

In the Domesday Book, Nantwich is recorded as having eight salt houses. It had a castle and was the capital of a barony of the earls of Chester, and of a hundred (one of the seven sub-divisions of medieval Cheshire). Nantwich is one of the few places in Cheshire to be marked on the Gough Map, which dates from 1355–66.^[3] It was first recorded as an urban area at the time of the Norman conquest – the Normans burned the town to the ground^[4] leaving only one building standing.

The town is believed to have been a salt-producing centre from the 10th century or earlier.^[5] The Norman castle was built at the crossing of the Weaver before 1180, probably near where the Crown Inn now stands. Although nothing remains of the castle above ground, it affected the town's layout.^[6][7] During the medieval period, Nantwich was the most important salt town and probably the second most important settlement in the county after Chester.^[8][9] By the 14th century, the town held a weekly cattle market at the end of what is today known as Beam Street, and was also important for its tanning industry centred on Barker Street.^[10]

fire in December 1583 destroyed most of the town to the east of the Weaver.^[11][12] Elizabeth I contributed financially to the town's rebuilding, which occurred rapidly and followed the plan of the destroyed town.^[13] Beam Street, one of the main streets of Nantwich, was renamed to reflect the fact that timber (including wood from Delamere Forest) to rebuild the town was transported along it. A plaque marking the 400th anniversary of the fire and of Nantwich's rebuilding was unveiled by the Duke of Gloucester on 20 September 1984.^[14]

During the English Civil War Nantwich declared for Parliament, and consequently it was besieged several times by Royalist forces. The final, six-week long, siege was lifted following the victory of the Parliamentary forces in the Battle of Nantwich on 26 January 1644, which has been re-enacted as Holly Holy Day on its anniversary every year since 1973 by the Sealed Knot, a registered charity devoted to re-enacting English civil war battles for educational purposes. The name comes from the sprigs of holly worn by the townsfolk in their caps or clothing in the years after the battle, in its commemoration.^[15]

The salt industry peaked in the mid-16th century, with around 400 salt houses in 1530, and had almost died out by the end of the 18th century; the last salt house closed in the mid-19th century.^[16][17][18] Nikolaus Pevsner considers the decline in the salt industry to have been the critical factor in preserving the town's historic buildings.^[16] The last tannery closed in 1974. The town's location on the London to Chester road meant that Nantwich served the needs of travellers from the medieval era.^[8][19] This trade declined in the 19th century, however, with the opening of Telford's road from London to Holyhead, which offered a faster route to Wales, and later when the Grand Junction Railway bypassed the town.^[17]

Nantwich has the largest collection of historic buildings outside Chester in the county.^[22] The listed buildings are clustered particularly in the town centre on Barker Street, Beam Street, Churchyard Side, High Street and Hospital Street, and extending across the Weaver on Welsh Row. The majority are located within the 38 hectares (94 acres) of conservation area, which broadly follows the boundaries of the late medieval and early post-medieval town.^[9][23] The oldest listed building is St Mary's Church, which dates from the 14th century and is listed at grade I. Two other listed buildings are known to pre-date the fire of 1583: Sweetbriar Hall and the grade-I-listed Churche's Mansion are both timber-framed, ""black and white"" Elizabethan mansion houses. A few years after the fire, William Camden described Nantwich as the ""best built town in the county"",^[24] and particularly fine examples of timber-framed buildings constructed during the town's rebuilding include 46 High Street and the grade-I-listed Crown coaching inn. Many half-timbered buildings, such as 140–142 Hospital Street, have been concealed behind brick or render. The town contains many Georgian town houses; good examples include Dysart Buildings, 9 Mill Street, Townwell House and 83 Welsh Row. Several examples of Victorian corporate architecture are listed, including the former District Bank by Alfred Waterhouse. The most recent listed building is 1–5 Pillory Street, a curved corner block in 17th-century French style which dates from 1911. The majority of the town's listed buildings were originally residential; churches, chapels, public houses, schools, banks, almshouses and workhouses are also well represented. Unusual listed structures include a mounting block, twelve cast-iron bollards, a stone gateway, two garden walls and a summerhouse.

Dorfold Hall is a Jacobean mansion in the nearby village of Acton. It is listed at grade I,^[25] and was considered by Pevsner to be one of the two finest Jacobean houses in Cheshire.^[26] Nantwich Show, including the International Cheese Awards, takes place in the hall's grounds each summer.

Nantwich Museum is on Pillory Street. It has galleries on the history of the town, including Roman salt making, Tudor Nantwich's Great Fire, the Civil War Battle of Nantwich (1644) and the more recent shoe and clothing industries. There's also a section on the local cheese-making industry. Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker, based a few miles outside the town, is a former government-owned nuclear bunker located in the village of Hack Green. It is now a museum.

The 82-seat Nantwich Players Theatre is on Pillory Street in the centre of town. It puts on around five plays each year.^[27]

Jan Palach Avenue in the south of the town commemorates the self-immolation of a student in Czechoslovakia in 1969

Nantwich is on the Cheshire Plain, on the banks of the River Weaver. The Shropshire Union Canal runs through the town and makes a junction with the Llangollen Canal at Hurleston to the north. The town is approximately four miles south-west of Crewe and 20 miles south-east of Chester. There is a major road junction in the town, being the meeting point of the A51, A500, A529, A530 and A534 roads. The stretch of the A534 from Nantwich to the Welsh border is regarded as one of the ten worst stretches of road in England for road safety.^[28]

Nantwich railway station is on the line from Crewe to Whitchurch, Shrewsbury and other towns along the Welsh border. The station is currently served mainly by stopping trains between Crewe and Shrewsbury.

GHA Coaches now operate the majority of local bus routes, with funding from Cheshire East council. Arriva, D&G Bus and a few smaller companies also operate routes in and around Nantwich.

The Shropshire Union Canal runs to the west of the town on an embankment, crossing the A534 via an iron aqueduct. The basin is a popular mooring for visitors to the town.

type=printed postcards

theme=topographical: british

sub-theme=england

county/ country=cheshire

number of items=single

period=1945 - present

postage condition=posted