Cross Keys Row
Cross Keys Row
Location of the Cross Keys Inn?
Cross Keys Row was a pair of dwellings on the south side of Park Street immediately west of Park Row and 50 yards or so east of the junction with Pen Hill. It is possible, although not certain, that one of the cottages was the Cross Keys public house.
The houses are not shown on either Madeley's map of 1831 or Day's map of the same year, but are shown on Bidder's map of 1843.
They were demolished in
the 1960’s as
part of the Park
Street widening.
MAP
This map, based on the 1886 Ordnance Survey, shows the junction of Pen Hill and Park Street (although this section of Park Street was sometimes called Belmont). Cross Keys Row is seen right of centre, next to Park Row.
Gallery
The Cross Keys Lodging House, formerly the Cross Keys Inn - was this one of the two houses of Cross Keys Row?
Many thanks to Rob Baker who sent me the above photograph. It is a clipping from the Express and Star of some twenty years ago and the photograph had been sent in by Flo Essex (Rob's great-aunt) - the photograph shows Rob's great-gran, Florence Thorne (at left) who ran the Cross Keys lodging house in Park Street with her mother and father. She is pictured outside the Cross Keys with her own mother, Helen (Rob's great-great-gran at centre), and daughters Caroline and Theresa.