The early history of this property can be found in John Rhodes book Terrier of Llanthony Priory’s Houses and Lands in Gloucester 1443. The property was in two parts, the south-west part and the south-east part, both fronting onto Westgate Street. John lists the property as being ‘on the Girdlery and Mercery at the south east corner of Marwardynes Lone, opposite the Kynges Board, where William Eldesfield, mercer, lives’. From 1443 to 1455, William Eldesfield rented both parts of the property, as his shop and his home

Over the centuries, many different people owned and rented the property. In 1667, it was inhabited by William Lugg who left it to his widow, Hannah and son, Thomas. By 1672, it was jointly inhabited by Thomas Lugg and a Mr Bishop, both of whom paid tax on two hearths each. The place was then let to Laurence Wiltshire of Lincoln’s Inn, when Jane Higgs was dwelling there. The next tenant was George Coucher, mercer and milliner.

By the turn of the eighteenth century, in 1702, William Ailberton, mercer, lived and worked there, the tenant of another Wiltshire, John Wiltshire of Hornsey. Finally, in 1709, he leased the property to John Palmer, a bookseller. And the lease was sold to Nicholas Lane, the younger, apothecary.

This brings us up to the earliest of the documents that I have transcribed.