Wide-mouthed loggerheads

 

This small plaque appears over the door on Wesley House in Shrewsbury's Fish Street. The building dates back to the 1400s; it's so named because John Wesley, the founder of the Methodists, preached from it in 1761.
In 2019, it was converted - in a respectful way - and is now a bed & breakfast.

The plaque is not be confused with an insurance mark, but it's not quite clear what its function is - if indeed it has one. Certainly these particular loggerheads have the widest mouths of all loggerheads we've seen!

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1787 was a good year

 

Although the loggerheads appeared on Shrewsbury Corporation's official insignia for centuries, their popularity as a decorative feature on town objects seems to have waxed and waned.

But 1787 must have been a good year; this lead trough - now utilised as a planter in the entry-way at Shrewsbury Library - is dated to then. To enhance the decorative design, there are four (not the usual three) loggerheads around each lion.

It's curious though that the loggerheads surround a 'rampant' lion. The loggerheads clearly are meant as a heraldic device, but the lion rampant holds no particular heraldic meaning in Shrewsbury.
Or... does it? 
Please let us have your thoughts... Use the comments field just down this page or email us direct.  

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Atcham 'new' bridge

 
There are two bridges in Atcham, side by side - which seems slightly unnecessary, but when it seemed the old bridge was going to be replaced, it was given a heritage listing, so it couldn't just be demolished.

So, right alongside it, Shropshre County Council built a new bridge - which is what you see in the photo.  It crosses the Rivern Severn, and carries the main road through the village.

It was opened in 1929 by the rather famous politician & writer Herbert Morrison, who was the transport minister at the time.

The involvement of the county council explains the loggerheads' presence. 

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Loggerheads in Birmingham/Hereford

At the front of Birmingham Catholic Cathedral, one will find a number of heraldic designs in glass panels, including these arms. As we're a bit away from Shropshire, it was odd to see the loggerheads here.
However, the Birmingham Diocesan Archivist points out that they represent the coat of arms of Thomas Brown, the first Bishop of Newport & Menevia (died 1880).  The Catholic Diocese of Newport & Menevia, which doesn't exist any more, covered the whole of Wales (which is why the Welsh harp) plus, oddly, Herefordshire.  

So... what's the connection? Bit mysterious, this.
The usual explanation is that the ancient arms of the see of Hereford carry the three leopards' heads, which is why Bishop Brown adopted them - but the Hereford ones are upside down with fleur-de-lys issuing from them... so that explanation seems a bit thin, to me.
Does anyone have a better explanation? 

The leopards' faces are also rather crudely painted, which also struck me as odd.

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Daubing on Butcher Row

Butcher Row is one of Shrewsbury's iconic medieval streets and is full of listed buildings - but it looks like someone once thought it a good idea to paint daubs on some of these venerable door frames.

You have to look for them, but when you find them, you'll see that one of the daubs is a set of loggerheads. The work is amateurish and includes an unusual heraldic lion.

The other daub  that interests us is a shield of arms (see below right) - which we don't recognise. 

So, the mysteries are: who painted the loggerheads, and when, and why?  And whose arms are those on the second image?

Please let us have your thoughts... Use the comments field just down this page or email us direct.  

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Loggerheads lying about

 

The Abbey Public Gardens, by the English Bridge in Shrewsbury, doubles as a sort of monumental rockery - with fragments of antique stonework around each of its corners.
According to the book 'Public Sculpture of Worcestershire & Shropshire', the piece of decorative work in our photo is “a coat of arms showing three leopards, swags and foliage, which surmounts a collection of crossed swords, maces and fasces” (all are symbols of authority).
However, the story of this particular loggerheads set is not properly known. 

Some of the fragments in the gardens are certainly remnants of the old Shrewsbury Guildhall, which was demolished in 1834.  And there is a theory that this artwork is also from there. However, in a contemporaneous drawing (see pic below), the arms just above the doorway don't look quite the same.

Shrewsbury Guildhall 1796 by Ingelby, detail (from Wikimedia Commons)

The Abbey Gardens were originally the site of the stoneyard of John Carline The Elder (1730-95) who was both an architect and a sculptor.  He seems to have been a collector of pieces discarded from demolished buildings as well as a maker in his own right.
So, are these loggerheads a piece he found?  Or a piece he made, only for it never to be used? 

The gardens, though small, are worth a quick visit.  Among the old Guildhall stonework lying about in the gardens, is the head of Justice, and some old Ionic column capitals.

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Leopards. Definitely!

 
You may need to squint a bit - but in this picture you can see a leopard (with spots!) inside a pink-ish template of the shape of the county of Shropshire. This piece of pavement-artwork is just outside the offices of Shropshire Archives in Shrewsbury.

There has been debate over the centuries as to whether the loggerheads that are emblematic of the town are lions or leopards.  It looks like the Archives think they are definitely leopards. 

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