History:

• In 1744, one of the cities’s 2 MP’s Edward Wortley, purchased and voluntarily transferred 2 houses on the south side of Westgate fronting Boroughbury and 4 acres of grassland between Westgate and Cowgate. He gave the buildings to the Trustees for a new parish workhouse to supplement the workhouse in Cumbergate. It was administrated by the Feoffees (Charity Trustees).
• In 1837, both the Cumbergate and Westgate workhouses were converted into almshouses (charitable buildings to help the poor and the needy) by the Feoffees as they forced the Board of Guardians to build a new Workhouse on Thorpe Road instead of taking over the Westgate site.
• In 1903, the Feoffees rebuilt parts of the Cumbergate almhouses and 1 of the rear wings of the Westgate Almshouses to form a courtyard, following a generous gift from Miss Frances Pears.
• In 1907/8 the Peterborough Feoffees were renamed Peterborough United Charities and their principle responsibilities were to provide and maintain the Almhouses.
• In the 1960’s the Almhouses were replaced by the flats of Stephenson Court, on the corner of Bishops Road / South Street.
• In the 1970’s, when the Queensgate shopping arcade was built, the front wing and eastern wall of the Westgate Almshouses were re-built due to the rear wings being demolished.
• In 1982 it became a public house called “The Wortley Almshouse

Architecture:

In 1873, the Feoffees rebuilt the Almsrooms in the Tudor style using stone from the original building and reset the cartouche of 1744 above the central door.

The 2 storey L-shaped building has an attic, a Collyweston stone slate and welsh slate roof and 4 tall chimneys made of local Fletton brick.  Although the frontage of the property along the street retains the same appearance, nothing remains of the internal layout.

There are 5 gabled dormer windows with leaded casements; carved bargeboards and finials sit in the roof of stone slates. There are 6 windows of which 4 have 19th century transoms, stone mullions, leaded lights and dripstones/moulds. The dripstones were designed to divert running water before it reached the windows or doorways.

The caved stone cartouche above the door reads; “This building was erected in 1744 by Edward Wortley Esq. Member of parliament for Peterborough”. Below the inscription is the Wortley Coat of Arms.

The Almsrooms are now are a Grade II listed building. Of the Almsrooms, odd numbers from 61 to 67, 71 and 73 are occupied by FC Wright and the odd numbers 81 to 93 are occupied by Westgate Café.

Social History :

• Workhouses in the late 16th century by law were built in parishes to provide both accommodation and employment for the ‘deserving’ poor.
• Churchwardens or Overseers of the Poor of Parishes were normally responsible, but in Peterborough, there were a group of Charity trustees called Feoffees.
• Around 1722, on the west side of Cumbergate, the Feoffees started the first workhouse and then petitioned their MP, Edward Wortley Montagu for a second in Westgate in 1744 as the Cumbergate site became inadequate.
• The premises before belonged to William and Mary Smith and Sarah Billings, the widow of Henry Billings, they were leased by deed to Edward Wortley Montagu.

• In 1834, the Poor Law Amendment Act was introduced. A new legislation that changed the way the poor were ordered and given relief. Instead of having small workhouses in individual parishes, a large ‘central’ workhouse was provided to a service a group of Parishes, called a Union. The existing buildings in both Cumbergate and Westgate were not sufficient for the poor of the Peterborough Union, so the Board of Guardians, who was now in control, built a new workhouse in Thorpe Road.
• The almshouses provided single rooms for the worthy, old, poor and mainly women who had no other resources than the help of the Parish. Each room was equipped with a coal-fired cooking area so occupants looked after their own domestic arrangements until later there was help from other elderly inmates until the old age pension cut in at 70 years of age.
• The Feoffees sold most of the land lying between Westgate and Cowgate of which the Deacon School Peterborough used the frontage of Queens Street for the erection of their new classrooms.
• Lady Mary, montagu’s wife notably famous for her writings of the day’s society was also know for bringing across from Turkey the idea of vaccinations for small pox, 50 years before Jenner’s started vaccinating in England. Unfortunately furious locals drove many vaccinators away.

• Rumour has it that after visiting and using Wortley’s workhouse between 1837 and 1839, Charles Dickens used it as inspiration for his novel ‘Oliver Twist”