The ancient Boston Guildhall of St Mary's Guild in Boston, Lincolnshire, England was built in the 1390's. It was previously thought to have been built in 1450, but during its recent restoration and analysis of the roof timbers, experts have dated the building much earlier. The Guildhall is also one of the earliest brick buildings in Lincolnshire.
After the Dissolution of the Monasteries, it became the town hall, council chamber (until 1904 when new buildings were built), courts and was used for banquets or any celebrations for the town.
In 1607, it is believed to have been the place where William Brewster, William Bradford and their followers (the Separatists, later to be known as the Pilgrim Fathers) were taken following their arrest after trying to flee England.
Boston Guildhall (as it is now called) now tells the story of the building itself as well as the history of the town of Boston, including its importance in medieval times as a port, and Boston's links with the Hanseatic League.
In the Court Room are a set of ceramic tiles designed by John Moyr Smith depicting various scenes from Shakespearian plays; they date around 1878 and were made at the Minton China Works, Stoke-on-Trent.
The Council Chamber has a grand and large portrait of Sir Joseph Banks commissioned by the Corporation of Boston in 1814 and painted by Thomas Phillips RA. Banks was recorder for the town and his Estate of Revesby lies north of Boston.
Famous quotes containing the word boston:
“The Boston papers had never told me that there were seals in the harbor. I had always associated these with the Esquimaux and other outlandish people. Yet from the parlor windows all along the coast you may see families of them sporting on the flats. They were as strange to me as the merman would be. Ladies who never walk in the woods, sail over the sea. To go to sea! Why, it is to have the experience of Noah,—to realize the deluge. Every vessel is an ark.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)