Taxing at St Nicholas

These loggerheads appear over the doorway into the Saint Nicholas Cafe Bar in the Castle Gates area of Shrewsbury town.

When I first noticed them some years ago, they were in a small window in the staircase up one of the turrets (the building being a converted church). At that time, the owner said he thought that the building had been a tax office (or something like that) some decades ago for the local authority - thus we have the town council logo, the loggerheads.  Does anyone know any different theory?

The building is the Victorian neo-Norman church of St Nicholas which I find rather ugly, but, nevertheless, it is Grade II listed. 
It's not clear when it was converted to secular use.

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Warding off evil (possibly)

 

These characters are definitely three in number and probably leopards - but are they loggerheads?
They are to be found inside Morville Church in eastern Shropshire, just across from Morville Hall, the National Trust property - but no one at the church seems to know their history. The guess is that they are a little more than 300 years old.
You'll find them over the door to the tower, which is often where such 'grotesques' were placed, as a charm against outside spirits, but whether this is what these ones are up to is open to question.
Anyone got any ideas?... Use the comments field just down this page.

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