Huntingdon Town Hall

The first municipal building on Market Hill was a 17th-century courthouse which was arcaded on the ground floor, so that markets could be held, with an assembly room on the first floor.^[2][3] It was demolished in the mid-18th century to allow construction of the current building.^[2]

The current building was designed by Benjamin Timbrell in the neoclassical style, built in red brick with stone dressings and was completed in 1745.^[4][5][6] Initially the building was of two storeys over an open ground floor, but in 1817-18 it was reconfigured by S. P. Cockerell:^[7] the ground floor was enclosed to form an entrance hall, and two new law courts to the rear.^[8]

As rebuilt, the design involved a symmetrical main frontage with seven bays facing onto Market Hill with the ground floor rendered and painted; the central section of three bays, which projected forward, featured a doorway flanked by two pairs of Tuscan order columns supporting an entablature; there was a balcony and a French door flanked by casement windows on the first floor and there were three tall round headed windows on the second floor.^[1] At roof level there was a large pediment with a clock in the tympanum and central cupola above that.^[1] Internally, the principal rooms were on the top floor:^[8] the assembly hall (or 'ballroom'), which featured three chandeliers and a series of important portraits, the Mayor's Parlour and the council chamber, which featured boards listing the names of former mayors of the town.^[9] The main staircase was recovered from the earlier courthouse.^[2]

After the First World War, a war memorial in the form of a bronze statue of a soldier was designed by the sculptor, Kathleen Scott and erected in front of the town hall by the local contractor, Thackray and Co; the statue, which became known as "the Thinking Soldier", was unveiled by the Lord Lieutenant of Huntingdonshire, the Earl of Sandwich, on 11 November 1923.^[10] The building continued to serve as the headquarters of Huntingdon Borough Council and, from 1961, of Huntingdon and Godmanchester Borough Council^[11] and briefly remained the local seat of government when the enlarged Huntingdonshire District Council was formed in 1974.^[12] Although the district council relocated to modern facilities at Pathfinder House in St Mary's Street in Huntingdon in 1977,^[13] the town hall continued to be used as a meeting place by Huntingdon Town Council^[14] and, following a major programme of refurbishment works costing £0.9 million which was completed in 2012,^[15] the building became an approved location for marriages and civil partnership ceremonies.^[16]

Works of art in the town hall include a portrait by John Shackleton of King George II^[17] and by Gainsborough Dupont of Queen Caroline,^[18] as well as portraits by Allan Ramsay of King George III^[19] and of Queen Charlotte.^[20] There are also portraits by Peter Lely of Oliver Cromwell,^[21] by Sir Joshua Reynolds of the Duke of Cumberland^[22] and by Godfrey Kneller of the former local member of parliament, Sir Lionel Walden,^[23] as well as portraits by Francis Grant of the Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, Sir Frederick Pollock^[24] and of the former Secretary of State for War, Jonathan Peel.^[25]

• Grade II* listed buildings in Huntingdonshire