Huntingdon Cambridgeshire
The Cromwell Museum Huntingdon Cambridgeshire, contains collections exploring the life of Oliver Cromwell and to a lesser extent his son Richard Cromwell. Oliver Cromwell was born in Huntingdon in 1599 and lived there for more than half his life. The museum is located in the former grammar school building in which Cromwell received his early education from c1610. (also the diarist Samuel Pepys)
The building has fragments of the medieval infirmary hall of the Hospital of St John the Baptist (c1170-90) which was an almshouse for the poor founded by David Earl of Huntingdon. Keeping to an Augustinian rule, the masters of the hospital were appointed by the mayor and burgesses of the town until the suppression of chantries and hospitals in 1547.
Vested in the corporation of the town, the hospital building then became the Grammar School being extensively modified and shortened. The building was remodelled and partially rebuilt in 1863, and then heavily restored in 1878 by architect Robert Hutchinson at a cost of £900 paid for by the dramatist Dion Boucicault in memory of his son, killed in the Abbots Ripton rail accident of 1876. The school closed in 1896
The building had been encased in brick and when this was removed a blocked Romanesque doorway was discovered. www.flickr.com/gp/52219527@N00/U3g2Ce The exterior has a bellcote, 5 decorative arches on its west front and 2 bays of the hall's nave and aisles
Following a temporary exhibition in 1958 to mark the anniversary of Cromwell's death, Huntingdonshire CC it was decided that the vacant grammar school would be a suitable location for a museum which opened in 1962 .
Huntingdon Cambridgeshire
The Cromwell Museum Huntingdon Cambridgeshire, contains collections exploring the life of Oliver Cromwell and to a lesser extent his son Richard Cromwell. Oliver Cromwell was born in Huntingdon in 1599 and lived there for more than half his life. The museum is located in the former grammar school building in which Cromwell received his early education from c1610. (also the diarist Samuel Pepys)
The building has fragments of the medieval infirmary hall of the Hospital of St John the Baptist (c1170-90) which was an almshouse for the poor founded by David Earl of Huntingdon. Keeping to an Augustinian rule, the masters of the hospital were appointed by the mayor and burgesses of the town until the suppression of chantries and hospitals in 1547.
Vested in the corporation of the town, the hospital building then became the Grammar School being extensively modified and shortened. The building was remodelled and partially rebuilt in 1863, and then heavily restored in 1878 by architect Robert Hutchinson at a cost of £900 paid for by the dramatist Dion Boucicault in memory of his son, killed in the Abbots Ripton rail accident of 1876. The school closed in 1896
The building had been encased in brick and when this was removed a blocked Romanesque doorway was discovered. www.flickr.com/gp/52219527@N00/U3g2Ce The exterior has a bellcote, 5 decorative arches on its west front and 2 bays of the hall's nave and aisles
Following a temporary exhibition in 1958 to mark the anniversary of Cromwell's death, Huntingdonshire CC it was decided that the vacant grammar school would be a suitable location for a museum which opened in 1962 .